The Successors of Genghis Khan - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian ...

HISTORY OF JOCHI KHAN
January, 1303], bringing falcons and other presents. They bore this
message: "It is requested that you constantly send ambassadors with
good tidings and wait until the emirs go to war in whatsoever direction
is commanded and render service. For this year we have gone to war
against Chapar, and Toqta is allied with us and has been sending
troops."
Toqta had sent 2 lumens to link up with the troops of the Qa'an at
Deresii,25 for the frontier of their territory is close to that of the Qa'an
and they had joined forces before. Some years ago Qaidu, fearing they
might link up with the troops of the Qa'an, sent his second son, called
Bayanchar, another son called Shah, Tode-Temiir, the son of Shiregi,
the son of Mongke Qa'an, and Malik Temiir, the son of Ariiq Boke,
with an army to the frontier of Bayan's country and handed over that
region to them so that they might form a screen between the troops
of the Qa'an and those of Bayan and not allow them to link up. And
Kiiiluk, with the troops that have gone over from Bayan and those
which have come to assist him from Qaidu and Du'a, has seized part
of the territories and ulus of Bayan, though Bayan still administers
the greater part of the ulus of Orda, but on account of these constant
battles his troops have become empoverished, some mounted and some
on foot; nevertheless he continues to struggle against his powerful
enemy and seeks help in money from here. The Lord of Islam (may God
cause him to reign forever /) sent back from Tabriz his ambassadors that
had reached him in Baghdad; with them he sent gold, clothing, and
other presents for Bayan and his wives.
Second Son of Qonicki—Bachqirtai. He was born of Buqulun Khatun
of the Merkit and had a wife called Kokeliin of the Kereit, by whom
he had a son called Yeke.
« DRSW. In a letter dated the aoth February, 1968, Professor Francis W. Cleaves
suggests that this name is "almost certainly the Mongolian deresu(ri), a kind of high
grass, which occurs very frequently in proper names." Cf. the Tersiit of the SH,
the T'a-la-su of the Sheng-wu ch'in-cheng lu, in which Pelliot (Campagnes, pp. 224-26)
sees a plural of this same deresu(n). Deresii is perhaps to be identified with this place,
in which, in 1201, Ja-gambo, the brother of Ong-Khan, made his submission to
Genghis Khan, or else with Yeke-Deresiin, where, according to the Yuan shih (quoted
by Pelliot, Campagnes, p. 226), the Great Khan Mongke gave an audience to his brother
Qubilai at the beginning of 1258. Unfortunately, we know nothing about the location
of either of these places. For a description of deresu(n) "broom grass, lasiagrostis
splendens" and the effect it produces on the steppe landscape, see Thiel, p. 136.
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