that the title was really _Gurgan_, "Son-in-Law," a title of
honour conferred on those who married into the imperial blood, and that
this title may have led to the statements of Marco and Odoric about the
nuptial privileges of the family. Gurgan in this sense was one of the
titles borne by Timur.[1]

[The following note by the Archimandrite Palladius (_Eluc._ 21-23) throws
a great light on the relations between the families of Chinghiz Khan and
of Prester John.

"T'ien-te Kiun was bounded on the north by the _Yn-shan_ Mountains, in and
beyond which was settled the Sha-t'o Tu-K'iu tribe, i.e. Tu-K'iu of the
sandy desert. The K'itans, when they conquered the northern borders of
China, brought also under their rule the dispersed family of these Tu-
K'iu. With the accession of the Kin, a Wang Ku [Ongot] family made its
appearance as the ruling family of those tribes; it issued from those Sha-
t'o Tu-K'iu, who once reigned in the north of China as the How T'ang
Dynasty (923-936 A.D.). It split into two branches, the Wang-Ku of the Yn-
shan, and the Wang-Ku of the Lin-t'ao (west of Kan-su). The Kin removed
the latter branch to Liao-tung (in Manchuria). The Yn-shan Wang-Ku guarded
the northern borders of China belonging to the Kin, and watched their
herds. When the Kin, as a protection against the inroads of the tribes of
the desert, erected a rampart, or new wall, from the boundary of the
Tangut Kingdom down to Manchuria, they intrusted the defence of the
principal places of the Yn-shan portion of the wall to the Wang-Ku, and
transferred there also the Liao-tung Wang-Ku. At the time Chingiz Khan
became powerful, the chief of the Wang-Ku of the Yn-shan was Alahush; and
at the head of the Liao-tung Wang-Ku stood _Pa-sao-ma-ie-li_. Alahush
proved a traitor to the Kin, and passed over to Chinghiz Khan; for this he
was murdered by the malcontents of his family, perhaps by Pa-sao-ma-ie-li,
who remained true to the Kin. Later on, Chingiz Khan married one of his
daughters to the son of Alahush, by name Po-yao-ho, who, however, had no
children by her. He had three sons by a concubine, the eldest of whom,
Kiun-pu-hwa, was married to Kuyuk Khan's daughter. Kiun-pu-hwa's son, Ko-
li-ki-sze, had two wives, both of imperial blood. During a campaign
against Haidu, he was made prisoner in 1298, and murdered. His title and
dignities passed over in A.D. 1310 to his son _Chuan_. Nothing is known of
Alahush's later descendants; they probably bec