For centuries, historians and treasure seekers have sought to find the burial site of history's most famous conqueror. The new results offer strong evidence that it has finally been discovered.
Genghis Khan, the conqueror and ruler of the 13th century, created the largest empire in territory, which at the time of his death stretched from the Caspian Sea to the Pacific Ocean. Since then, the place of his burial has been unsuccessfully searched for for 800 years. Having conquered most of Central Asia and China, his army suffered death and devastation, but at the same time new ties arose between East and West. One of the brightest and most ruthless leaders in world history, Genghis Khan reshaped the world.
The life of the conqueror is legendary, and his death is shrouded in the fog of myths. Some historians believe that he died from wounds received in battle. According to others - as a result of a fall from a horse or illness. And the place of his burial could not be found. The greatest precautions were taken at that time to protect against grave robbers. Tomb seekers had little to grasp on due to the paucity of the original historical sources. According to legend, in the course of the advancement of the funeral cortege of Genghis Khan, anyone who came across on the way was killed in order to hide the burial place of the conqueror. They also killed the builders of the tomb, as well as those soldiers who killed them. According to one source, the 10,000-strong cavalry rammed the grave, leveling it to the ground; otherwise, a forest was planted in this place and the riverbed was changed.
Scholars continue to debate fact and fiction as the chronicles are falsified and distorted. But many historians are sure that Genghis Khan was not only buried in the earth: it is assumed that his loved ones were buried with him in a vast necropolis and, possibly, with the treasures and trophies of his numerous conquests.
The Germans, Japanese, Americans, Russians, and British made expeditions to find his grave, spending millions of dollars on them. All to no avail. The location of the tomb remained one of the most insoluble mysteries.
And so…
An interdisciplinary research project that brought together US scientists and Mongolian scientists and archaeologists has received the first encouraging evidence of the location of Genghis Khan's burial site and the necropolis of the emperor's family in a remote mountainous area in northwestern Mongolia.
The team found the foundations of large structures dating from the 13th to 14th centuries in an area historically associated with this burial. Scientists have also found a large number of artifacts, including arrowheads, pottery, and a variety of building materials.
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“The chain is very compelling,” Albert Lin, researcher and chief expert for the project from National Geographic, told Newsweek in an exclusive interview.
For 800 years, the Khentei mountain range, where this place is located, was a forbidden area - so Genghis Khan himself decided during his lifetime. If the find is confirmed, this will become perhaps the most important event for areology for many years. With the help of drones and penetrating radars, and thanks to the efforts of thousands of people who carefully checked data from satellites and photographs, the team surveyed the mountain range - a detailed area of 4 thousand square miles.
In search of clues to Genghis Khan's burial site, Lin and his team carefully scanned large volumes of high-resolution satellite imagery and created 3-D reconstructions of radar scans at the California Institute of Telecommunications and Information Technology laboratory at the University of California, San Diego. In an unprecedented open-source project, thousands of Internet volunteers viewed 85,000-resolution satellite imagery in an attempt to identify structures or unusual formations invisible to the naked eye.
“It cannot be denied that Genghis Khan changed the course of history. And yet I can't imagine another historical figure of this magnitude that we knew so little about,”says Lin, who still does not fully disclose the team's results, as the peer review has not yet been received. And yet, behind academic restraint, one cannot fail to feel emotional excitement. "Any archaeological findings on this topic shed light on an important segment of our common historical heritage, from which the veil of secrecy has now been thrown."
To get to the Khentei mountains, you need to go east from the capital of the country - Ulan Bator, bypassing the dazzling equestrian statue of Genghis Khan, to the mining town of Baganur. The crumbling city appears in all the charm of a post-Soviet Dickensian nightmare: 10-mile dumps indicate that this is the largest opencast coal mine owned by the Mongolian government. North of the city are the ruins of a Soviet military base, evoking post-apocalyptic horror movie associations. But after leaving the city, you find yourself in the valley of the Kherlen River, the homeland of the Mongols, and a wonderful panorama appears before your eyes. It is located on one of the main steppe routes of Central Asia, connecting the east and west - from the Caspian to Japan and northern China - bypassing the Gobi Desert, which terrified Marco Polo and other travelers.
This location and acceptable climate contributed to the fact that the steppe became an attractive place for nomads to live. Unlike other regions of the country, where temperatures can drop sharply to -40 degrees Celsius, and in summer reach +38, the climate in these valleys is usually mild. Ritual monuments and burial sites are found throughout the territory. Archaeologists find burial grounds on top of the burial grounds of other tribes who used the same ritual sites in other eras.
Mongolian families still live in yurts, traditional local tents, preserving the nomadic lifestyle. The blue sky merges with the horizon, and the white spots of yurts in the vast landscape look like sailboats in the middle of the green sea.
From the outside, it may seem that the pastoral picture of pastures has changed little since the time of Genghis Khan. For nomads, however, the changes are palpable. A decade of harsh winters followed by dry summers has undermined the livelihoods of herds-dependent herders, who make up a third of the country's population. Tens of thousands of people have moved to urban slums, while thousands of others have taken up illegal gold mining in search of livelihoods. They are called ninja here because they resemble cartoon Ninja Turtles with their large green wash trays behind them. At the same time, Mongolia's economy is the fastest growing in the world, the state seeks to build its wealth on the basis of coal, copper and gold, the reserves of which are estimated at $ 1.3 trillion.
Looking closer, you notice that the changes have not spared the remote valley either. On the yurt, where we went for advice, there is a satellite dish, and next to it is a motorbike and a Chinese truck.
Altan Khuyag, 53, shepherd and hunter, with traditional Mongolian hospitality, offered us a cup of milk tea and insisted that we stay overnight. Among nomads, hospitality is a vital trait of the steppe lifestyle. When I asked about Genghis Khan, he dipped his finger with a ring in a bowl of vodka and flicked a drop into the sky - as a sign of worship of Tengri, the god of blue skies. Two more dipping and clicking, as a kind of ritual offering. In Mongolia, the name of Genghis Khan is surrounded by superstition, and the topic of finding his burial place often leads to heated debate. Here many worship him on a par with God.
“He's watching us. Thanks to him, we live well today,”says Altan, pulling his head into his shoulders, as if feeling attention from above. He, like many local residents, believes that Genghis Khan was buried in the Khentei mountains - this opinion is shared by both ancient and modern historians, but until now there was no physical confirmation of this - until Lin and his Mongol partners made their discovery.
Altan has marked the coordinates twice, but he is confident that the conqueror's grave must be left alone. "I don't think people should look for his tomb because if it is opened, the world will end."
This can, at a minimum, lead to geopolitical tensions, since many Chinese consider Genghis Khan theirs and China their property. In fact, a huge mausoleum was erected in China to replicate Genghis Khan's empty coffin, and this monument is popular with the Chinese, some of whom revere him as their semi-divine ancestor.
"If the tomb of Genghis Khan is found in Mongolia, it will have a huge geopolitical resonance," says John Man, author of Genghis Khan: Life, Death and Rebirth. - Many in China believe that Mongolia, like Tibet, should be part of China, as it was under Khubilai (Mongol Khan, founder of the Mongolian state of Yuan, which included China - Wikipedia). If China manages to obtain the mining rights in Mongolia and take over this industry, then the tomb of Genghis Khan could be at the center of political ambitions, which the world has never seen before.
Born into a noble family, Genghis Khan - or Temujin, as he was later called, lived a life that has become legendary. As a child, he became an outcast after the murder of his father and the expulsion of his family. But he survived and became an outstanding warrior and tactician who managed to unite the warring tribes and become a conqueror in the then world. At the same time, he changed society, introduced the alphabet and a single currency, becoming one of the most influential people of the last millennium.
During the campaigns of conquest, his soldiers robbed and raped, and Genghis Khan had many descendants, although they were considered only legitimate sons. His son Jochi is said to have had 40 sons, while his grandson Kublai had 22. A 2003 genetic study revealed the same Y chromosome in 16 million men, which belonged to a man who lived a thousand years ago. From which many conclude that this is most likely the DNA of Genghis Khan, although, of course, there is no reliable confirmation of this, since his remains have not yet been found.
However, the influence of Genghis Khan is unparalleled. In less than 20 years, he conquered thousands of miles of territories from the Pacific Ocean to the Caspian Sea, and brought the riches looted in campaigns to Mongolia. The trophies were divided among the soldiers as a reward. It is believed that after the death of noble people, luxury items were placed with them in the graves, since according to legend they needed them in the afterlife. But few of these treasures have ever been discovered. It’s like they got to Mongolia and disappeared.
“People think that [Genghis Khan's] tomb is filled to the brim with gold and silver, valuables, wealth, the spoils of his great conquests,” said Professor Ulambayar Erdenebat during our meeting at the National University of Ulaanbaatar, where he leads the department of archeology … A transparent crystal belt lies between us on the table, and Erdenebat carefully straightens every fold of the black cloth underneath.
“This is a unique exhibit. This is not found anywhere else in the world. We found him in a tomb belonging to a nobleman of the 13th century, probably from the tribe of Genghis Khan,”Erdenebat explains. Then he opens a small jewelry box and carefully lays out a gold ornament intricately engraved with thread-thick elements and covered with rubies and turquoise. He slowly opens a cabinet with other valuables: a bowl of pure silver, gold rings, clasps and earrings - all items dated to the time of Genghis Khan, appear before our eyes.
For decades, expeditions were disrupted due to the inaccessibility of the country. After the fall of the Qing dynasty, Mongolia declared independence in 1911, although China still considers it part of its territory. Having become a close ally of the Soviet Union, Mongolia, with the support of Moscow, re-declared its independence in 1924. Friendship with Moscow, however, hindered archaeological research, as the Soviet authorities persecuted and punished scholars for studying the history of Genghis Khan for fear that his figure could become a symbol of the opposition seeking greater independence from Moscow.
In the early 60s of the last century, an East German-Mongolian expedition discovered shards, nails, tiles, bricks and what they considered to be the foundation of a temple in the sacred mountainous area. At the top, hundreds of stone mounds were found, and at the highest level - iron armor, arrowheads, sacrifices, but no traces of burial.
After the collapse of the Soviet empire, a Japanese-led expedition sponsored by the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper landed from a helicopter on the top of this mountain. The event was heavily publicized, but the results were nil. In 2001, an expedition led by former Chicago consumer goods dealer Maury Kravitz surveyed the area, but authorities forbade any approach to the mountain itself. At a site called Almsgiver's Wall, the grave of a soldier from a 10th century guard post was discovered, but the expedition had to be called off after a series of incidents, in connection with which one newspaper wrote that the "curse" of Genghis Khan's tomb was "making itself felt again."
Some archaeologists have suggested that hundreds of stone pyramids discovered in the 1960s are actually graves. But Lin and his Mongolian partners conducted geophysical research and found that this theory has no scientific value.
Using modern innovative technologies not available to researchers of the past, the team decided to weed out fact from fiction. This is somewhat reminiscent of a Hollywood epic, combining the world of high-tech Jason Bourne with Technicolor technology in Indiana Jones.
Lin, whose admiration for Genghis Khan arose during his own expedition to Mongolia in 2005 to study his legacy, is fortunate enough to be a techie scientist on this ongoing adventure. “I was lucky. I am a scientist and engineer who faced this unusual 800-year-old mystery,”he says. “It seemed to me that rapidly developing technologies could open a new scientific chapter in the lost world of world history.”
Lin contacted the International Association for Mongolian Studies and the Mongolian Academy of Sciences. Three years ago, an expedition with the support of the University of California from San Diego and the National Geographic Society received permission to survey the ridge and valley, the year Genghis Khan was born. Lin emphasizes that their approach is based on preserving the territory of the ancestral burials intact through the use of non-invasive technologies.
“Hopefully, as we search for fresh data, we will open a new chapter in the ongoing process of recognizing the merits of our past,” said Professor Tsogt-Ochirin Ishdorj, principal investigator of the project.
During the search for man-made objects or materials from the ancient era, the participants' enthusiasm increased when the outlines of the foundation of a large structure appeared on the radar. Then small teams of field scientists and archaeologists were sent to the area to examine the find on the spot using high-tech equipment - radar, magnetometers and drones.
Their efforts were rewarded when they discovered arrowheads, pottery, roof tiles, and bricks, suggesting human activity in this remote desert area. All this caused an exciting awe among the researchers. “When we expanded our search area and looked closely, we saw hundreds of artifacts all over the area. It became clear that there was something very important here,”says archaeologist Fred Hiebert, a member of National Geographic and another principal investigator of the project.
The results of radiocarbon analysis inspired everyone and turned out to be very encouraging, they pointed to the time of Genghis Khan's life and death. "The dating of a number of samples points to the 13th and 14th centuries, although a full analysis has not yet been completed," says Hebert.
If the initial and highly intriguing results are confirmed, it will be the first scientific evidence in 800 years of speculation about the location of Genghis Khan's tomb, one of the oldest historical mysteries.
“Through science, we must fill in the gaps in historical knowledge - this is very important for understanding our past and preserving the future,” says Professor Shagdaryn Bira, a world renowned expert on the topic and project participant.
“We found something that probably confirms the legend. And that's extremely important,”adds Lin.
It is too early to announce any discoveries. The next steps will not be so easy. Movement within the territory is highly restricted and it is closely monitored by the government. The team is now working closely with the authorities regarding all finds.
“We're not going to excavate the site,” Lin says. - We believe that it should be taken under protection as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Then there will be confidence that it will not be plundered or destroyed. This opinion is shared by other scientists of the project, as well as the Mongolian authorities.
“In everyone's mind, this site is already considered the most important site of Mongolian heritage,” says Oyungerel Tsedevdamba, Minister of Culture of Mongolia.
The authorities are not without reason showing concern, since the looting of burial grounds is a growing problem - intermediaries travel around the country and pay local residents to excavate burial sites. The stolen artifacts are then taken out of the country and sold in the Hong Kong and Chinese markets, says Professor Erdenebat of Ulaanbaatar National University.
Returning to the closet, Erdenebat takes out a frayed cardboard lid on which a bone can be seen. “This is all that remains of a burial site recently devastated in Bayankhongor province. They took everything they considered valuable and left bones, shoes and clothing,”he says, laying out a wrinkled 13th century leather boot next to its owner's shinbone.
“It is impossible to estimate how many graves were looted, but the count could go to thousands. It is clear that the situation is getting worse, says Erdenebat. - This is the province of Bayangol. There were several severe winters and drought in summer, herds began to die out. The shepherds have no choice but to dig graves in search of gold. It's a matter of survival."
On the streets of Ulan Bator, it is especially noticeable that Mongolia is still under the rule of Chingisomania, which began with the fall of the Soviet Union, when the Mongols began to recreate their own identity. Many Mongols see Genghis Khan as the father of modern Mongolia, and most importantly, a symbol of their independence. The international airport in the capital is named after Genghis Khan, there is also a hotel with his name. The university and a number of popular energy drinks, as well as a dozen brands of vodka - all over the name of the conqueror.
A visit to several antiquity shops confirms that the authorities are right about black diggers. The owners of the establishments are too annoying in their desire to sell the relics obtained in a dubious way. In one of the shops, nestled on the aptly named Tourist Street in the center of Ulan Bator, the owner offers a gold piece of a finer workmanship than the Erdenebat collection. The price on the tag is 35 thousand dollars. The seller claims that she was recovered from a grave in Hentei province. There is also an elegant stirrup engraved with dragons - it may have belonged to Genghis Khan's general. Estimated at 10 thousand dollars. A bronze water jug from the same era, worth $ 30,000. The most expensive item - for 180 thousand dollars - a three-inch horse engraving of the culture of the Xiongnu nomads, recovered in the Kherlen Valley, the homeland of the Mongols.
“Our main customers are the Chinese,” explains the owner. “They send Mongols from Inner Mongolia to buy things for their new museums. Last week someone offered 80 thousand dollars for a Xiongnu horse, but I refused. " Then, on his own initiative, he gave advice on how to smuggle this thing out: "If you want to buy this horse, hang it around your neck like a necklace, and no customs will stop you."
In the center of the capital, Genghis Khan sits like Abraham Lincoln next to the seat of the government. Outside the city, a steel statue weighing 250 tons depicts him astride a war horse, as if he decided to ride across the steppe again. Tourists can take the elevator inside the statue and enter the platform between the legs to take a look at his property. “Each state has a hero-symbol. He is a symbol of our nation,”says Battulga Khaltmaa, the former judo world champion and now the Minister of Industry and Agriculture, who erected this glittering monument. “I installed this statue to commemorate the 800th anniversary of the Mongolian state and to convey the history of Genghis Khan … to the younger generations, and let them be proud of their past.”