Queen Genepil (1905-1938) was the last Queen of Mongolia and wife of the last Mongol Khan. After the death of her husband, she was arrested and executed in 1938, as part of the systematic Stalinist destruction of Mongolian culture and any reminders of the old regime.
A vast number of the population were killed, including almost all the shamans and Buddhist lamas of Mongolia. It is estimated that between 20,000 and 35,000 "enemies of the revolution" were executed, which represented 3 to 5 percent of Mongolia's total population at the time.
Genepil's daughter, Tserenkhand, who managed to survive the Great Purge, recalled the sudden disappearance of her mother as a child saying, “They took her away at night. She did not wake us, only left a piece of sugar on our pillows. I still remember the joy of a sudden discovery of that rare delicacy in the morning”.
