Toghon Temür

Toghon Temür (Mongolian: Тогоонтөмөр, romanized: Togoontömör; Mongolian script: ᠲᠤᠭᠤᠨᠲᠡᠮᠤᠷ; simplified Chinese: 托贡帖木儿; traditional Chinese: 托貢帖木兒; pinyin: Tuō Gòng Tiē Mù Er; 25 May 1320 – 23 May 1370), also known by his temple name as the Emperor Huizong of Yuan (Mongolian: Юань улсын эзэн хаан Хуйзун, romanized: Yuani Ulsyn Ezen Khaan Khuizun; Chinese: 元徽宗; pinyin: Yuán Huīzōng), bestowed by the Northern Yuan dynasty, and by his posthumous name as the Emperor Shun of Yuan (Mongolian: Юань улсын эзэн хаан Шун, romanized: Yuani Ulsyn Ezen Khaan Shun; simplified Chinese: 元顺帝; traditional Chinese: 元順帝; pinyin: Yuán Shùndì) bestowed by the Ming dynasty, was the last emperor of the Yuan dynasty and later the first emperor of the Northern Yuan dynasty.

[2][3][4] He was a son of Kusala, known as Emperor Mingzong (Mongolian: Эзэн хаан Минзонг, romanized: Ezen khaan Minzong; Chinese: 明宗皇帝; pinyin: Míngzōng Huángdì).

Emperor Huizong was a Buddhist student of the Karmapas (heads of the Karma Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism) and is considered a previous incarnation of the Tai Situpas.

Toghon Temür's mother was Mailaiti, descendant of Arslan Khan, the chief of the Karluks, a prominent nomadic Turkic tribal confederacy in Central Asia.

[6] The Mongols circulated a similar story about Toghon Temür fathering Yongle Emperor of the Ming dynasty.

However, after Kuśala died and his younger brother was restored to the throne as Jayaatu Khan Tugh Temür (Emperor Wenzong), he was kept from the court and was banished to Goryeo (modern Korea) and later to Guangxi in South China.

[7] Lady Gi had been sent to China sometime in the late 1320s as "human tribute" as the kings of Goryeo were required to send a certain number of beautiful teenage girls to Yuan to serve as concubines after the Mongol invasions.

Many of the great Chinese literati came back to the capital from voluntary retirement or from administrative exile and the imperial examination system was restored.

One of his successful projects was to finish the long-stalled official histories of the Liao, Jin and Song dynasties, which were eventually completed in 1345.

Since the late 1340s, people in the countryside suffered from frequent natural disasters, droughts, floods, and ensuing famines.

In 1354, when Toqto'a led a large army to crush the Red Turban rebels, Toghon Temür suddenly dismissed him for fear of betrayal.

In 1364 the Shanxi-based warlord Bolad Temür occupied Khanbaliq and expelled the Crown Prince from the winter base.

In 1365, Toghon Temür finally promoted his much beloved Lady Ki to First Empress and announced that his son by her would be the first in the line of succession.

[8] During the Yuan dynasty, one of Confucius' descendants, who was one of the Duke Yansheng Kong Huan's 孔浣 sons, named Kong Shao 孔紹, moved from China to Goryeo era Korea and established a branch of the family there called the Gong clan of Qufu after marrying a Korean woman (Jo Jin-gyeong's 曹晉慶 daughter) during Toghon Temür's rule.

[14] When the Koreans captured a Japanese fishing ship they thought was spying, the Goryeo court sent it to their overlord, the Yuan emperor Toghon Temür, who then sent the fishermen back to Japan.

In 1369 when Shangdu also fell under the Ming's occupation, Toghon Temür fled northward to Yingchang, which was located in present-day Inner Mongolia.

At the time of his death, the Northern Yuan maintained its influence, stretching the domination from the Sea of Japan to the Altai Mountains.

In southwestern China, Basalawarmi, the self-styled "Prince of Liang", established a Yuan resistance movement in Yunnan and Guizhou that was not put down until 1381.

Rebels and warlords in 1363 during the late reign of Toghon Temur.
Monument in honor of the rebuilding of the Temple of Yan Hui in Qufu in Year 9 of the Zhizheng era (1349).
A statue of Toghon Temür in Mongol Castle .
The David Vases date to the Zhizheng era of Toghon Temür (1351). British Museum .