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'Pervâneoğlu' (in Turkish plural ''Pervâneoğulları'' - the sons of Pervâne) was an Anatolian Turkish Beylik centered in Sinop on the Black Sea coast and controlling the immediately surrounding region in the second half of the 13th century and the beginning of the 14th (1261-1326).

Contents

The Pervane Mu‘in al-Din Suleyman

The Gâzi Çelebi

Monuments

See Also

References

Books

External links

The Pervane Mu‘in al-Din Suleyman

The founder of the Beylik, The Pervâne Mu‘in al-Din Suleyman, was the son of Muhadhdhab al-Din, vizier to the Seljuq Sultan Kaykhusraw II in 1243 at the time of the Battle of Köse Dağ. He was for a time (especially between 1261-1277) a key player in Anatolian politics involving the Seljuq Sultanate, the Ilkhan Mongol Empire and the Mamluks under Baybars. His grandson the Gazi Çelebi, last Bey of Pervane, transformed his realm into a serious regional naval power, conducting raids against Genoese possessions in the Black Sea and Crimea, as well as against the Empire of Trebizond.
Raised in a time of trouble after the Battle of Köse Dağ and having received a good education, Suleyman Pervane become commander of Tokat, and later Erzincan. He was appointed, by Mongol commander Bayju's recommendation, as chamberlain to the Konya palace of Anatolian Seljuks, then vassals of the Mongols. He married Kaykhusraw's widow Gürcü Hatun and became the undisputed master of the declining state, making a name as a great intriguer. His title Pervâne means, aside from "chancellor," "The Butterfly".
After Kaykhusraw’s death and the ensuing dispute among his sons for the throne, the Pervâne supported Kılıç Arslan IV and succeded in having him declared as the successor. In the same period, he also took Sinop and twelve surrounding castles from the Empire of Trebizonde and the region was accorded to him and his family as an iqta. His growing power made him worry that the sultan Kılıç Arslan IV might want to eliminate him and he took the initiative by having the sultan strangled in Aksaray in 1265. The throne was succeeded by Kılıç Arslan IV's minor son Kaykhusraw III (1265-1283).
During the Mamluk-Ilkhanid War (1260-1281) and especially once after the Mamluk hand had strengthened under Baybars, Pervâne's policy was characterized by multiple allegiances, all at the same time wishing to keep all his options open. According to Ibn Shaddad, when Baybars came to Syria in 1275, Pervâne played a pivotal role in dissuading him from his plans for invading the Anatolian heartland and directed him rather towards raids in the southern Anatolian regions (then called Lesser Armenia), persuading him to leave the territories of his sultanate to the year after. But neither did he enjoy the Ilkhanid Emperor Abaqa Khan's full confidence and the successes of Baybars had brought insipient anti-Mongol feelings among Seljuk notables, led by the Seljuk governors of Diyarbekir, Harput and Niğde, to the fore.
In 1277, Baybars entered the Seljuk sultanate and on 18 March, overcame the Mongol army of occupation in Elbistan, while Pervâne, who was in command of the Seljuk contingent expected by both Baybars and the Mongols, took flight to Tokat along with the young sultan. Baybars made a triumphal entry into Kayseri on 23 April and then returned to Syria. At the news of his troops' defeat, Abaqa hastened to Anatolia (July 1277) and sternly punished the Seljuk Turks, sources citing massacres of tens of thousands of people. Deeming him responsible for Baybars's foray into Anatolia, Abaqa also had Pervâne killed on 2 August 1277.
Pervâne's fate is played up and recounted with relish by the historian, traveller and the king of Lesser Armenia Hetoum I, friend and ally of the Mongols and mindful of his audience among potential European military allies according to George Lane.
:''At Il-Khan's command all that he should encounter should partake of the flesh of Pervâne; and so Abaka did eat of the flesh, and gave some to his men. And that was the vengeance that Abaka took...'' ^[1]
His son Mehmed Bey took over the family possessions around Sinop and pursued a prudent policy of allegiance to the Mongols, which was also pursued under his son Mesud Bey's period as Bey. Mesud Bey was kidnapped by the Genoese in 1298 and could be delivered against a heavy ransom.

The Gâzi Çelebi

The remarkable Gâzi Çelebi, among the first Turkish naval commanders of note, ruled Sinop during the final floruit of the Pervâneoğlu Beylik. His epitaph in the Alâiye Medrese states that he was the son of Mas’ūd, probably the Mas’ūd Bey kidnapped by the Genoese in 1298-99.^[2] He continued to attack Genoese shipping in the Black Sea and together with the Grand Komnenos Alexios II was likely responsible for raids on the Genoese port of Kaffa in the Crimea between 1311 and 1314. When Ibn Battuta visited Sinop in either 1332 or 1334,^[3] the town had passed into the hands of the Candaroğlu Bey Ibrahim, but the memory of the Gâzi Çelebi was still vivid. Inhabitants said that he possessed a talent for swimming under water and piercing the hulls of enemy galleys during battle. He did this with such stealth, they said, that the sailors did not know what had happened until their ships started to sink. In one memorable episode, probably in 1324, the Gâzi used this method to sink several Genoese ships raiding Sinop’s harbor, capturing their entire crew. The Sinoptians also remembered that the Gâzi Çelebi enjoyed smoking “an excessive quantity of hashish.”^[4]

Monuments

Several foundations of the Pervâne survive. In Sinop the Alaeddin Camii stands on the site of the former cathedral, which sometime after 1214 was converted into a mosque by ‘Ala al-Dīn Kayqubād I. The present structure was built de novo by the Pervâne in A.H. 666 (1267-68 C.E.).^[5] The nearby Alâiye Medrese, sometimes called the Pervâne Medrese, was completed in the same year.^[6] In Tokat he built the so-called Gök Medrese in 1277. Originally founded as a hospital and medical school, the building now houses a museum. A nearby Seljuq style hamam is attributed to him although no inscription survives. There is another mosque of the Pervâne in Merzifon.
Recently the archaeological remains of a medrese founded by the Pervâne came to light within the compound of the closed bazaar of Kayseri. The medrese was partially excavated in 2002.^[7]

See Also

★ Ottoman Archivies about Tımar-ı Pervane in Erdemuş (Ardamuş) Villiage of Kailar or Kayılar of Manastır.

References

1. limited preview Early Mongol Rule in Thirteenth-Century Iran ISBN 0415297508, George Lane, , , Routledge, 2003,
2. Anthony Bryer and Richard Winfield, ''The Byzantine Monuments and Topography of the Pontos'', vol. 1, (Washington D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1985) 73.
3. Ross E. Dunn, ''The Adventures of Ibn Battuta: A Muslim Traveler of the 14th Century'' (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986), 162.
4. Ibn Battutah, ''The Travels of Ibn Battuta'', trans. Sir Hamilton Alexander Rosskeen Gibb, vol. 2 (Cambridge, 1962), 466-7
5. Bryer and Winfield, ''Pontos'', 75.
6. ibid. 72.
7. Pervâne Bey Medresesi olarak adlandırılan yapının ve Kayseri Kapalıçarşısı'nın korunması yönünde alınan kararlar ve değerlendirilmesi (''The decisions taken for the protection of Kayseri closed bazaar and Pervâne Bey Medrese) Seda Çalışır Hovardaoğlu

Books

★ (limited preview) Mongols and Mamluks: The Mamluk-Ilkhanid War, 1260-1281 ISBN 0521462266, Reuven Amitai-Preiss, , , Cambridge University Press, 1995,

★ (limited preview) The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia ISBN 0813513049, René Grousset (translated by N. Walford), , , Rutgers University Press, 1970,