Khutulun - The Princess Wrestler

 

"The Princess Wrestler"

Khutulun Painting
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     Khutulun was the most famous female wrestler starting off in circa 1260, and ending around in 1306 when she died. Khutulun was born in Mongolia, and lived there her whole life. She was apart of the Khan's Mongol empire, which is one of the most known and biggest empires that spread throughout China, Europe, and the Middle East. Khutulun's family line is based off of very powerful rulers, such as her father, Kaidu, and her uncle, Kublai Khan. These two were both well-known emperors of the Khan's Mongol empire. Khutulun's father became the emperor around the age of 1280; he became the most powerful ruler of Central Asia. This helped Khutulun become well-known to all the people in this area, due of the fact that her father considered her the favorite daughter. This was because her father was most pleased by Khutulun's abilities, so she travelled with him on military campaigns. (1). 

     Khutulun grew up with fourteen brothers, meaning she learned the saying "shove or get shoved" as a way of life because of how the boys always wrestled each other. This helped her gain her strength and toughness to become the most powerful female wrestler. In Mongolian culture, wrestling is known as a gender-netural sport. What makes Mongolian culture even better is that Mongolian people considered every activity a uni-sex activity. A good example of this would be that both males and females could participate in warfare because speed, agility, and a good aim to shoot could be shown by both genders. This was why Mongolian citizens were very accepting and supportive of Khutulun being a wrestler. (2).

Khutulun Riding Horse
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     In wrestling, the fighters wrestled for the winning prize, which were horses. Horses were very important in this culture and empire because the warfare fighters need strong, healthy horses to help them ride into battle. Legend has it that Khutulun had more horses than the emperor of China. It was told that she gathered a herd of ten thousand horses from winning all of the wrestling matches she participated in. What makes her even more strong and brave is that the game of wrestling in their eyes of Mongolian people was not based on height/weight like how United State culture does it (2). Mongolian wrestlers were paired up with whoever wanted to fight, no matter their weight or size. No matter what size, gender, or weight the opponent was, Khutulun still won all of her matches (3). Khutulun was so powerful that she told herself she would get married to the man who is able to beat her, but sadly no one could beat her (2).

Khutulun Wrestling
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     Her father very dearly wanted her to fight a husband instead of bringing home more horses each day, but Khutulun stuck to her words by waiting for a guy that could beat her. As she kept getting older and was still single, a rumor began to spread. Because Khutulun was so close to her father, the other citizens began to think that the two were having an incestuous relationship. Khutulun realized that her family was going keep getting slandered by this rumor, so she made a deal with one of her father's soldiers to wrestle her for marriage (3). She told the soldier she would go easy on him because Khutulun knew she could beat him. Once the soldier "won" the match, they got married and the rumor died off (4).

     A couple years later, her father decided to step down from and hand the role of emperor to Khutulun. Her brothers were mad that she got the throne, and honestly, so was Khutulun. She didn't really want to become the emperor because she enjoyed fighting in the armed forces, instead of being trapped in a palace (2). Despite her frustration of that, she did end up taking the throne, becoming one of the last warrior princesses to rule. Unfortunately, after a couple years being emperor, Khutulun died unexpectedly, leading the Khan empire to fall to pieces (3).

Claudia Kim as Khutulun
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     In popular culture of Western countries today, the story of Khutulun is brought back to life in a Netflix series called Marco Polo. In the trailer, viewers will see bits and pieces of her wrestling, but all throughout the show, her storyline in thoroughly followed as the legend is told (5). The character Khutulun is played by Claudia Kim, who is an Asian actress and model (6). In addition to that, there is a racing horse who is named Khutulun. This name must bring luck because this racing horse has won around $500,000 as of August 2018. The fact that the horses name is Khutulun is so ironic because of how many horses Khutulun had, and the luck she had (1).

     In my own opinion of the story of Khutulun, I greatly appreciated the fact that both males and females could participate in any sport, hobby, or on the battlefield. I feel like this is a very proactive storyline more citizens in Western culture should read to understand the concept that both genders are equally capable to participate in "more tough" environments. I think this a great story to show a girl who wants to join wrestling, or a male-dominated sport/hobby (for example: football, hunting). I also appreciated how Khutulun beat all of the men she wrestled, and how she was a female emperor, making a huge power statement because most stories in Western culture are based on the male being more powerful than a female. Overall, I wish that the culture of the United States was a replica of the Mongolian culture, based off of the social construction -- where the genders are equal and the sports/hobbies are defined as "uni-sex", rather than "feminine" and "masculine".


Works Cited

(1) “Khutulun.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 7 Oct. 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khutulun.

(2) Wikarski, N S. “Khutulun and the V-Neck T-Shirt.” Khutulun, www.mythofhistory.com/Khutulun.html.

(3) Porath, Jason. “Khutulun: The Wrestler Princess.” Rejected Princesses, 2018, www.rejectedprincesses.com/princesses/khutulun.

(4) “Khutulun: The Undefeated Bad-Ass Mongolian Warrior Princess.” Ancient Origins, Ancient Origins, 2013, www.ancient-origins.net/history-famous-people/khutulun-0010840.

(5) “Marco Polo | Official Trailer [HD] | Netflix.” YouTube, YouTube, 17 Nov. 2014, www.youtube.com/watch?v=hB-ltNasHVw.

(6) “Claudia Kim.” IMDb, IMDb.com, www.imdb.com/name/nm2263791/.