Tughril Beg enters Baghdad
In December 1055 the Seljuk sultan Tughril Beg, invited by the Abbasid caliph al-Qa'im, entered Baghdad with his Turkmen army, arrested the last Buyid emir of Iraq and ended 110 years of Shi'ite Buyid tutelage over the caliphate. From then on Turkish sultans ruled the eastern Islamic world in the name of the Abbasid caliphs, as champions of Sunni Islam.
- Date
- between 17 December and 18 December 1055exact date unknown: an interval is given
- Place
- Baghdadtoday: Baghdad, Iraq · Middle East and Egypt
- Participants
- Tughril Beg, Seljuk Empire, Abbasid Caliphate, al-Qa'im, Buyids, Fatimid Caliphate
- Threads
- Middle East and Egypt (11th–12th c.)
- Also known as
- Seljuk conquest of Baghdad; Tughril in Baghdad; Сельджуки в Багдаде
By the 1050s the Seljuk Turks, who had defeated the Ghaznavids at Dandanaqan in 1040, had overrun Khorasan and most of Iran, while the Buyid emirate in Iraq was falling apart amid mutinies of Turkish troops and street fighting between Sunnis and Shi'ites in Baghdad. Its strongman, the Turkish commander al-Basasiri, quarrelled with the caliph al-Qa'im and his vizier Ibn al-Muslima, who accused him of dealings with the Fatimids of Cairo. Tughril announced that he was coming as a pilgrim on his way to Mecca and would afterwards make war on the Fatimids. On Friday, 15 December 1055, the sermon in the mosques of Baghdad was read in his name, and on 18 December — 17 December in another account — he entered the city.
The presence of his troops provoked riots, and Tughril, accusing the Buyid emir al-Malik al-Rahim of stirring them up, had him arrested on 23 December despite the caliph's protests; the last Buyid ruler of Iraq died a prisoner in Iran. Al-Basasiri withdrew and entered Fatimid service. In 1058 the caliph received Tughril, invested him with a robe of honour and gave him the title of "King of the East and the West". But when Tughril marched away to fight his rebellious brother Ibrahim Inal, al-Basasiri seized Baghdad on 27 December 1058 and for about a year had the Friday sermon pronounced in the name of the Fatimid caliph al-Mustansir, while al-Qa'im was held in custody outside the city. Tughril returned with the caliph in January 1060, and al-Basasiri was killed in battle near Kufa.
The settlement of 1055 lasted. The Seljuk sultan governed the lands of the eastern caliphate in the caliph's name, while the caliph kept religious authority and the power to legitimise him; Tughril gave a niece in marriage to al-Qa'im and in 1062, against the caliph's resistance, married his daughter. The Seljuk age brought a Sunni revival, embodied in the madrasas of the vizier Nizam al-Mulk; for the Shi'ites of Baghdad it began badly — the library of the scholar Shaykh al-Tusi was burned, and he moved to Najaf. Sixteen years after the entry into Baghdad, Tughril's nephew Alp Arslan defeated the Byzantines at Manzikert.
Connections
Causes and preconditions
- Battle of Dandanaqan23 May 1040 · Central and Northern Asiavictory at Dandanaqan opened Khurasan and Iran to the Seljuks; fifteen years later Tughril entered Baghdad
Related events
- The Buyids take Baghdad19 December 945 · Middle East and EgyptTughril ended the Buyid domination of Baghdad that had begun when Mu'izz al-Dawla entered the city on 19 December 945
- The caliphate of al-Mustansir and the ‘Mustansirite hardship’13 June 1036 – 29 December 1094 · Middle East and Egyptin 1058–1059 al-Basasiri had the Friday sermon read in Baghdad for the Fatimid caliph al-Mustansir
- The Nizamiyya madrasa opens in BaghdadSeptember 1067 · Middle East and Egyptthe Nizamiyya was founded in the Baghdad of the Seljuk sultans, who had ruled the city since 1055
- Battle of Manzikert26 August 1071 · Balkans and AnatoliaTughril himself had besieged Manzikert in vain in 1054, before he entered Baghdad; in 1071 his nephew and successor Alp Arslan defeated and captured Romanos IV there
Same participants
- Samanid Bukhara and the rise of New Persian literature900–999 · Central and Northern Asiavia Abbasid Caliphate
- Ibn Sina's ‘Canon of Medicine’between 1020 and 1025 · Middle East and Egyptvia Buyids
- The Banu Hilal invade Ifriqiyabetween 1050 and 1051 – 1057 · Africavia Fatimid Caliphate
- Mahmud al-Kashgari compiles the Dīwān Lughāt al-Turkbetween 1072 and 1077 · Middle East and Egyptvia Abbasid Caliphate
Same place
- Reign of Vologases I51–78 · Middle East and Egypt
- Trajan’s Parthian campaign114–117 · Middle East and Egypt
- Roman–Parthian War of 161–166161–166 · Middle East and Egypt
- Reign of Vologases IV147–191 · Middle East and Egypt
- Mani begins his mission240 · Middle East and Egypt
- Reign of Shapur II309–379 · Middle East and Egypt
- Julian’s Persian expedition and the Peace of 3635 March 363 – July 363 · Middle East and Egypt
- Council of Seleucia-Ctesiphon410 · Middle East and Egypt
- Reign of Bahram V Gurbetween 420 and 421 – 438 · Middle East and Egypt
- Suppression of the Mazdakitesbetween 524 and 529 · Middle East and Egypt
- Reign of Khosrow I Anushirvan531–579 · Middle East and Egypt
- Revolt of Bahram Chobin and the restoration of Khosrow II589–591 · Middle East and Egypt
- Founding of Baghdad: al-Mansur’s Round Citybetween 30 July and 2 August 762 – between 766 and 767 · Middle East and Egypt
- Indian astronomy in Arabic: the Zij al-Sindhindbetween 771 and 773 · Middle East and Egypt
- Paper comes to Baghdadbetween 794 and 795 · Middle East and Egypt
- Fourth Fitna: al-Amin against al-Ma'mun and the siege of BaghdadJanuary 811 – September 813 · Middle East and Egypt
- Al-Khwarizmi writes the book of al-jabrc. 820 · Middle East and Egypt
- The mihna: the Abbasid inquisition over the createdness of the Qur’an833 – between 848 and 852 · Middle East and Egypt
- The House of Wisdom and the translation movement in Baghdadc. 800 – c. 900 · Middle East and Egypt
- Siege of Baghdad29 January – 10 February 1258 · Middle East and Egypt
- Capture of Baghdad by Suleiman Ibetween November and December 1534 · Middle East and Egypt
Meanwhile in the world
Other regions, within a year of this event
Eastern Europe
- The Cumans reach the Black Sea steppes and the borders of Rus’between 1054 and 1055 – between 1061 and 1062
Africa
- The Banu Hilal invade Ifriqiyabetween 1050 and 1051 – 1057
- The Almoravids: from a desert reform movement to an empirebetween 1039 and 1046 – 1147
- K2 (Bambandyanalo) and the rise of Mapungubwec. 1000 – c. 1220
- Igbo-Ukwu: bronze casting in the West African forest800–899 – 1100–1199
Southeast Asia and Oceania
- Anawrahta builds the Pagan Empire1044–1077
- Polynesians settle the Society Islandsbetween 1025 and 1120
North America
- Classic Mimbres: the painted bowls of the Mogollonc. 1000 – between 1130 and 1150
- Pueblo II: stone pueblos and the Chaco worldc. 900 – c. 1150
Latin America
- Collapse of Tiwanakuc. 1000 – c. 1150
- Tula and the Toltecs: the leading city of central Mexicoc. 900 – c. 1150
- Middle Sicán: the Lambayeque culture at its height at Batán Grandec. 900 – c. 1100
- Chimor: the Chimú kingdom and its capital Chan Chanc. 900 – c. 1470
The same period
Sources
- Wikipedia (English): Tughril I
- Wikipedia (English): Al-Basasiri
- Wikipedia (English): Al-Malik al-Rahim
- Wikipedia (English): Al-Qa'im (Abbasid caliph at Baghdad)
- Wikipedia (Russian): Тогрул-бек
- Wikipedia (Russian): Абдуллах аль-Каим Биамриллах
- Bosworth C. E. The Political and Dynastic History of the Iranian World (A.D. 1000–1217) // The Cambridge History of Iran. Vol. 5: The Saljuq and Mongol Periods / ed. J. A. Boyle. — Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968. — P. 1–202.