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Wikipedia / Touman

Touman (), from Old Chinese (220 BCE): *do-mɑnᴬ, is the earliest named (leader) of the Xiongnu tribal confederation, reigning from , directly preceding the formation of the Xiongnu empire.

Life

Competing with the Xiongnu for supremacy were the Donghu people () and the Yuezhi. In 215BCE, Qin Shi Huang, the founding emperor of the Qin dynasty, sent a 300,000-man army headed by General Meng Tian into the Ordos region and drove the Xiongnu northward for 1,000 , or about . "Touman, unable to hold out against the Qin forces, had withdrawn to the far north, where he held out for over ten years."

After the death of Meng Tian in 210BCE, Touman led the Xiongnu across the Yellow River to regain their previous territory.

A legend says that Touman favoured a younger son from another concubine. To get rid of his eldest son, Modu, Touman sent him to the Yuezhi as a hostage and then made a sudden attack on them. In retaliation, the Yuezhi prepared to kill Modu, but he managed to steal a horse and escape back to the Xiongnu. Touman was impressed by his bravery and put Modu in command of a force of 10,000 horsemen. Modu was very successful in training and his men obeyed him absolutely. In 209BCE, Modu commanded his men to shoot his father, killing him as well as his stepmother, younger brother, and high officials who refused to take orders from him. Thereafter, Modu became .

Footnotes

References

  • Watson, Burton. (1993). Records of the Grand Historian by Sima Qian. Translated by Burton Watson. Revised Edition. Columbia University Press. .

  • Beckwith, Christopher I. (2009): Empires of the Silk Road: A History of Central Eurasia from the Bronze Age to the Present. Princeton: Princeton University Press. .

  • Yap, Joseph P. (2009). Wars With The Xiongnu, A Translation from Zizhi tongjian. AuthorHouse, Bloomington, Indiana, U.S.A. . Introduction and Chapter 2.

  • Doerfer, Gerhard (1963-1975). Türkische und Mongolische Elemente im Neupersischen. 4 vols. Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner. OCLC accession number 01543707 on Worldcat.org, where no ISBN found.

  • Ban Gu 班固. (89 AD). Han shu 漢書.

  • Steingass, Francis Joseph. (1892; Fifth Impression, 1963; ...). . London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Limited.