Tumen or Tümen (from Turkic: tümen, "unit of ten thousand" [1], also means "many" or "large" in Mongolian) was the part of decimal system used by Turkic, Proto-Turkic (such as the Huns) and Mongol peoples for their armies. Tumen is an army of 10,000 soldiers. It is considered a significant size of army or soldiers to use in possible warfare without being too small or too large such as in a campaign. It is a military unit which is still used in the Turkish Army comprising 6,000 to 10,000 soldiers.[2]
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Genghis Khan's organization
Under Genghis Khan's military system, Tumen is constructed from units of 10, 100, 1000 soldiers and commanded by a noyan. Units were recursively built from groups of 10 (Arban), 100 (Yaghun), 1,000 (Minghan) and 10,000 (Tumen), each with a leader reporting to the next higher level. Tumens were considered reasonable size in Genghis Khan and Great Khans' era and campaigns and the military strategy were based on the use of tumens as an useful building block causing reasonable shock and attack.[3]
Trivia
- In the fictional MechWarrior universe, the Clans refer to their militaries as "toumans", this is most likely a misspelling of tumen.
See also
- Genghis Khan
- Mongol Empire
- Mongol military tactics and organization
- Tyumen - the name originates from tumen
- Turkish army
References
- ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language - toman
- ^ Sabah Newspaper Online - Turkish Armed Forces
- ^ Corvisier, André. "A Dictionary of Military History and the Art of War". Blackwell Publishing, 1994. page 529
