The Province of Zardandan

CHAPTER 51. How the King of Mien and Bangala vowed vengeance against the Great Kaan.

A famous battle was fought in the kingdom of Vochan in the Province of Zardandan.

In 1272, the Great Kaan sent a large force into the kingdoms of Carajan and Vochan, to protect them from the ravages of ill-disposed people.

Afterwards, he made Sentemur king there, the son of a son of his who was deceased.

The king of Mien and of Bangala was a very puissant prince.

He had much territory and treasure and people and was not as yet subject to the Great Kaan.

This king of Mien and Bangala heard that the host of the Great Kaan was at Vochan.

He decided to fight this with so great a force that woud ensure his cutting off the whole of them.

• This would then make the Great Kaan be very sorry for ever sending an army there.

This king had:

• 2000 great elephants, on each of which was set a tower of timber carrying 12-16 well-armed fighting men.
• 60,000 horsemen and footmen

When the king had completed these great preparations to fight the Tartars, he tarried not, but straightway marched against them.

After advancing without meeting with anything worth mentioning, they arrived within three days of the Great Kaan’s host, which was then at Vochan in the territory of Zardandan.

So there the king pitched his camp, and halted to refresh his army.

CHAPTER 52. The Battle that was fought by the Great Kaan and his Seneschal, against the King of Mien.

The Captain of the Tartar host, Nescradin, heard news that the king aforesaid was coming against him with so great a force, he waxed uneasy, seeing that he had with him but 12,000 horsemen.

Nonetheless he was a most valiant and able soldier, of great experience in arms and an excellent Captain.

His troops too were very good, and he gave them very particular orders and cautions how to act, and took every measure for his own defence and that of his army.

The Tartars advanced to receive the enemy in the Plain of Vochan where they waited to give them battle.

After the King of Mien had halted long enough to refresh his troops, he resumed his march, and came to the Plain of Vochan, where the Tartars were already in order of battle.

When the king’s army had arrived in the plain, and was within a mile of the enemy, he caused all the castles that were on the elephants to be ordered for battle, and the fighting-men to take up their posts on them, and he arrayed his horse and his foot with all skill, like a wise king as he was.

When he had completed all his arrangements he began to advance to engage the enemy. The Tartars, seeing the foe advance, showed no dismay, but came on likewise with good order and discipline to meet them.

When they were near and nought remained but to begin the fight, the horses of the Tartars took such fright at the sight of the elephants that they could not be got to face the foe, but always swerved and turned back; whilst all the time the king and his forces, and all his elephants, continued to advance upon them.

When the Tartars perceived how the case stood, they were in great wrath, and wist not what to say or do; for well enough they saw that unless they could get their horses to advance, all would be lost. But their Captain acted like a wise leader who had considered everything beforehand.

He immediately gave orders that every man should dismount and tie his horse to the trees of the forest that stood hard by, and that then they should take to their bows, a weapon that they know how to handle better than any troops in the world.

They did as he bade them, and plied their bows stoutly, shooting so many shafts at the advancing elephants that in a short space they had wounded or slain the greater part of them as well as of the men they carried. The enemy also shot at the Tartars, but the Tartars had the better weapons, and were the better archers to boot.

When the elephants felt the smart of those arrows that pelted them like rain, they turned tail and fled.

Nothing on earth would have induced them to turn and face the Tartars.

So off they sped with such a noise and uproar that you would have trowed the world was coming to an end! And then too they plunged into the wood and rushed this way and that, dashing their castles 103against the trees, bursting their harness and smashing and destroying everything that was on them.

So when the Tartars saw that the elephants had turned tail and could not be brought to face the fight again, they got to horse at once and charged the enemy.

Then the battle began to rage furiously with sword and mace. Right fiercely did the two hosts rush together, and deadly were the blows exchanged.

The king’s troops were far more in number than the Tartars, but they were not of such metal, nor so inured to war; otherwise the Tartars who were so few in number could never have stood against them.

Then might you see swashing blows dealt and taken from sword and mace; then might you see knights and horses and men-at-arms go down; then might you see arms and hands and legs and heads hewn off:

Besides the dead that fell, many a wounded man, that never rose again, for the sore press there was. The din and uproar were so great from this side and from that, that God might have thundered and no man would have heard it! Great was the medley, and dire and parlous was the fight that was fought on both sides; but the Tartars had the best of it.{3}

In an ill hour indeed, for the king and his people, was that battle begun, so many of them were slain therein.

When they had continued fighting till midday the king’s troops could stand against the Tartars no longer; but felt that they were defeated, and turned and fled.

When the Tartars saw them routed they gave chase, and hacked and slew so mercilessly that it was a piteous sight to see. But after pursuing a while they gave up, and returned to the wood to catch the elephants that had run away, and to manage this they had to cut down great trees to bar their passage.

Even then they would not have been able to take them without the help of the king’s own men who had been taken, and who 104knew better how to deal with the beasts than the Tartars did. The elephant is an animal that hath more wit than any other.

But in this way at last they were caught, more than 200 of them. And it was from this time forth that the Great Kaan began to keep numbers of elephants.

So thus it was that the king aforesaid was defeated by the sagacity and superior skill of the Tartars as you have heard.