Karakorum, also called Kharkhorin is an archaeological site, and former capital of the Mongols, located in the Orkhon Valley in the present-day Övörkhangai Province of Mongolia.
The Mongols emerged from the unification of several nomadic tribes in the Mongol homeland under the leadership of Genghis Khan, founding a large empire during the 13th and 14th centuries AD that encompassed large parts of Central and Eastern Europe, Asia, and southward into the Indian subcontinent.
Settlement began around AD 1218–20, when Genghis Khan established a town of yurts at Karakorum to rally his troops during his campaigns against the Khwarezm Empire. The name Karakorum literally translates as ‘black-twenty’ or “black gravel,” but studies by linguists suggest that ‘khorin’ could be a diversion of the word ‘khurem’ which means “castle” in Mongolian.