Who they were
Born Temüjin, he unified the warring Mongol tribes and was acclaimed Genghis Khan at the kurultai of 1206.
What they did
His campaigns, waged at great human cost, created the largest contiguous land empire in history. He broke the Jurchen Jin’s defenses in north China, taking Zhongdu (modern Beijing) in 1215, and destroyed the Central Asian empire of Khwarazm (1219–1221). He died in 1227 during the final campaign against the Western Xia; his burial place is unknown. His institutions endured: decimal military organization, the yam relay-post network, adoption of a written Mongol script, and pragmatic religious tolerance.
Legacy
In Chinese historiography he is Yuan Taizu — the Yuan dynasty proclaimed by his grandson Kublai in 1271 stood on his conquests. The Mongol peace that followed reopened exchange across Eurasia.