rticle of
Timur, in Bibliotheque Orientale, is of a mixed nature, as D'Herbelot
indifferently draws his materials (p. 877--888) from Khondemir Ebn
Schounah, and the Lebtarikh.]

[Footnote 6: _Demir_ or _Timour_ signifies in the Turkish language,
Iron; and it is the appellation of a lord or prince. By the change of
a letter or accent, it is changed into _Lenc_, or Lame; and a European
corruption confounds the two words in the name of Tamerlane. *
Note: According to the memoirs he was so called by a Shaikh, who, when
visited by his mother on his birth, was reading the verse of the Koran,
'Are you sure that he who dwelleth in heaven will not cause the earth
to swallow you up, and behold _it shall shake_, Tamurn." The Shaikh then
stopped and said, "We have named your son _Timur_," p. 21.--M.]

[Footnote 606: He was lamed by a wound at the siege of the capital of
Sistan. Sherefeddin, lib. iii. c. 17. p. 136. See Von Hammer, vol. i. p.
260.--M.]

In the eyes of the Moguls, who held the indefeasible succession of the
house of Zingis, he was doubtless a rebel subject; yet he sprang from
the noble tribe of Berlass: his fifth ancestor, Carashar Nevian, had
been the vizier [607] of Zagatai, in his new realm of Transoxiana; and in
the ascent of some generations, the branch of Timour is confounded, at
least by the females, [7] with the Imperial stem. [8] He was born forty
miles to the south of Samarcand in the village of Sebzar, in the
fruitful territory of Cash, of which his fathers were the hereditary
chiefs, as well as of a toman of ten thousand horse. [9] His birth [10]
was cast on one of those periods of anarchy, which announce the fall of
the Asiatic dynasties, and open a new field to adventurous ambition. The
khans of Zagatai were extinct; the emirs aspired to independence; and
their domestic feuds could only be suspended by the conquest and tyranny
of the khans of Kashgar, who, with an army of Getes or Calmucks, [11]
invaded the Transoxian kingdom. From the twelfth year of his age, Timour
had entered the field of action; in the twenty-fifth [111] he stood forth
as the deliverer of his country; and the eyes and wishes of the people
were turned towards a hero who suffered in their cause. The chiefs of
the law and of the army had pledged their salvation to support him with
their lives and fortunes; but in the hour of danger they were silent
and afraid; and, after waiting seven days on the hills of Samarcand,
he retreated to