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Mesud II
Mesud II
Mesud II
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Ghiyath al-Dīn Me’sud ibn Kaykaus or Mesud II (Old Anatolian Turkish: مَسعود دوم, Ghiyāth ad-Dīn Mas'ūd bin Kaykāwūs; Turkish: Gıyaseddin Mesud, Persian: غياث الدين مسعود بن كيكاوس) bore the title of Sultan of Rûm at various times between 1284 and 1308. He was a vassal of the Mongols under Mahmud Ghazan and exercised no real authority. Mesud died in 1308, the last of the Seljuks of Rum.

Key Information

Reign

[edit]
Dissolution of the Seljuk Sultanate into Turkish Beyliks and other states around Anatolia, c. 1300

Mesud was the eldest son of Kaykaus II. He spent part of his youth as an exile in the Crimea and lived for a time in Constantinople, then the capital of the Byzantine Empire. He appears first in Anatolia in 1280 as a pretender to the throne. In 1284 the new Ilkhanid Sultan Ahmed Tekuder deposed and executed the Seljuq sultan Kaykhusraw III and installed Mesud in his place.[2] Ahmad's successor, Arghun, divided the Seljuq lands and granted Konya and the western half of the kingdom to the deposed sultan's two young sons. Mesud invaded with a small force, had the two boys killed, and established himself in the city in 1286.[3]

Mesud led several campaigns against the emerging Turkmen principalities, the Beyliks, always on behalf of the Mongols and usually with Mongol troops. Notable among these is the expedition beginning late in 1286 against the Germiyanids. The Germiyanids were a warlike band of Turkmen ancestry, settled by the Seljuqs a generation before in southwestern Anatolia to keep the more unruly Turkmen nomads in check. Mesud conducted the campaign under the tutelage of the vizier and elder statesman, Fakhr al-Din Ali. Though there were a few successes on the battlefield, the highly mobile Germiyanids remained a significant force in the region. Mesud and his Mongol allies conducted similarly futile expeditions against the Karamanids, Eshrefids and Ottomans.[4]

In 1297 in an atmosphere characterized by intrigue and near constant revolt against the distant Ilkhan authority, both on the part of Mongol officers and local Turkoman potentates, the hapless Mesud was implicated in a plot against the Ilkhanate. He was pardoned but deprived of his throne and confined in Tabriz.[5] He was replaced with Kayqubad III who soon became involved in a similar plot and was executed by Mahmud Ghazan. The impoverished Mesud returned to the throne in 1303.[6]

By 1308, Mesud was dead, the last member of the Seljuks of Rum.[7]

According to Rustam Shukurov, Mesud II "had dual Christian and Muslim identity, an identity which was further complicated by dual Turkic/Persian and Greek ethnic identity".[8]

Findings in 2015 propose his grave has been identified in Samsun.[9]

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Mesud II

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Ghiyāth al-Dīn Masʿūd II (c. 1260–1308), eldest son of Sultan Kaykāwūs II, was the final nominal of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rūm, bearing the title at various intervals between 1284 and 1308. Proclaimed sultan in following his father's death around 1278–1279, he established control in by 1283 but operated as a of the Mongol , exercising no substantive authority amid pervasive Mongol oversight and internal fragmentation. Masʿūd's rule epitomized the sultanate's terminal decline, marked by repeated depositions—including expulsion in 1295 and exile to or —and restorations engineered by Mongol khans, such as Ghāzān in 1303 after the death of his nephew Kayqubād III. Despite nominal sovereignty over undivided territories initially, real power resided with Mongol governors and local emirs, compounded by dynastic rivalries, strained alliances (including a to a Mongol princess), and pressures to suppress rising principalities like . His in in 1308 precipitated the sultanate's dissolution, yielding to a mosaic of independent that set the stage for subsequent Turkish polities. No significant military or administrative achievements are attributed to his tenure, underscoring the era's causal dominance of external Mongol hegemony over indigenous Seljuk governance.

Background and Early Life

Family Origins and Ancestry

Mesud II was the eldest son of Kaykaus II, who had co-ruled the Sultanate of Rum with his brother Kilij Arslan IV from 1246 until his overthrow and exile in 1260 by forces aligned with the Mongol Ilkhanate. His birth occurred circa 1261, during a period of intensifying familial divisions within the Seljuk dynasty, where Kaykaus II's branch vied for legitimacy against the descendants of Kilij Arslan IV. This paternal lineage positioned Mesud as a claimant from a collateral line, descending through Kaykhusraw II (r. 1237–1246), Kaykaus I (r. 1211–1220), Kaykhusraw I (r. 1205–1211 and 1192–1196), and ultimately Kilij Arslan II (r. 1156–1192), affirming ties to the core Seljuk forebears amid disputes over primogeniture and Mongol-backed successions. Records on Mesud's maternal ancestry remain sparse, with no definitive identification of his mother in primary chronicles, reflecting the common reliance on concubines or alliances with local or nomadic elites in Seljuk harems to bolster political ties. Such unions often diluted pure Seljuk bloodlines, incorporating elements from Byzantine, Armenian, or steppe nomad stock, which facilitated survival under Ilkhanid overlordship but invited accusations of illegitimacy from rival factions—claims echoed in contemporary accounts questioning the validity of non-direct heirs during power vacuums. Potential matrimonial links to , as suggested in some genealogical traditions tying Kaykaus II's consorts to figures like Khan of the , underscore efforts to curry favor with overlords, though these remain unverified beyond inference from diplomatic patterns. Prior to his accession, Mesud exhibited no notable personal accomplishments, having spent his early years in exile in following his father's deposition, later residing in under Byzantine protection until recalled amid the 1284 crisis following Kaykhusraw III's death. This peripatetic youth exemplified the erosion of central Seljuk authority through uncle-nephew depositions and inter-branch strife, empirically documented in 13th-century Persian and Mongol-influenced histories as precursors to the sultanate's vassalage and fragmentation. The resultant infighting, devoid of unified hereditary consensus, empirically weakened dynastic cohesion, paving the way for beylik emergences by the early .

Ascension Amid Sultanate Decline

Mesud II ascended the throne of the in 1284 when Ilkhanid sultan Ahmad Tekuder deposed and executed the incumbent , installing Mesud as a ruler to uphold nominal Seljuk under Mongol oversight. This intervention exemplified the Ilkhanate's strategy of rotating compliant sultans to forestall local consolidation of power and quash potential rebellions, ensuring continued extraction of tribute and maintenance of military garrisons in . Prior to his formal , Mesud emerged as a around 1280 and traveled to the Ilkhanid court during the reign of (1265–1282), where he positioned himself as a viable claimant amid the sultanate's factional disputes. Following Abaqa's death in 1282, Mesud secured confirmation from Ahmad Tekuder, his successor, which formalized the shift from the sultanate's earlier semi-autonomy—retained tenuously after the 1243 —to direct dependency on Mongol patronage for legitimacy. The ascension occurred against a backdrop of instability intensified after 1277, stemming from the death of the powerful regent Pervane Mu'in al-Din Suleyman and ongoing internal rivalries under Kaykhusraw III's nominal rule, which had already subordinated the sultanate to Ilkhanid demands for annual tribute and troop levies. By endorsing Mesud, the Ilkhanate aimed to stabilize control over Anatolia's fragmenting political landscape, where emerging Turkmen beyliks challenged central authority, while preserving the Seljuk dynasty as a symbolic intermediary to legitimize Mongol dominance.

Reign Periods

First Reign (1284–1296)

Mesud II ascended the throne of the Sultanate of Rum in 1284 after the Ilkhanid ruler Ahmad Teküder deposed his predecessor, Kaykhusraw III, installing Mesud as a puppet sovereign to ensure Mongol oversight. His authority remained nominal, confined to facilitating the extraction of tribute and taxes owed to the Ilkhanate, with real power exercised by Mongol governors and Persian administrators in key Anatolian provinces. Military efforts during this period focused on suppressing Turkmen beyliks asserting autonomy, particularly the in central and in the west, but these campaigns, often conducted with Mongol support, proved ineffective in restoring central control. No major victories were achieved, allowing groups like the to consolidate local rule and challenge Seljuk legitimacy without decisive reprisal, signaling the sultanate's deepening fragmentation. By 1296, amid accusations of disloyalty and plotting against Ilkhanid interests under , Mesud II faced deposition, paving the way for Kayqubad III's installation as a more compliant figurehead. This transition underscored the sultanate's reliance on Mongol patronage, with Mesud's ouster reflecting the Ilkhanate's strategy of alternating rulers to prevent independent consolidation of power.

Interregnum and Rivalry with Kayqubad III

Following the deposition of Mesud II in 1297 for his support of the Mongol governor Baltu's revolt against Ilkhanid authority, the Ilkhanate installed his nephew, , as sultan of Rum to restore order and maintain vassalage. Mesud, implicated in the uprising that challenged the distant Mongol overlords, was exiled—accounts vary between and imprisonment in —effectively sidelining him from Anatolian affairs and exposing the sultanate's dependence on Ilkhanid favor rather than internal legitimacy. This shift underscored the fratricidal dynamics within the Seljuk family, where rival claimants leveraged Mongol arbitration to seize power, prioritizing survival under over unified governance. Kayqubad III's tenure from 1297 to 1301 proved brief and destabilizing, marked by extreme purges of Mesud's administrative loyalists through violence, which alienated local elites and deepened factional rifts. As a Mongol-preferred puppet, he wielded nominal authority but exercised it with reputed corruption and cruelty, failing to consolidate support amid ongoing revolts by Mongol officers and Anatolian notables against Ilkhanid exactions. These shortcomings, rather than any merit-based assessment, highlighted how Ilkhanid selections favored pliable figures over capable rulers, exacerbating the sultanate's internal fragmentation without addressing root instabilities like beylik encroachments. In 1301, Ilkhan Khan, seeking to realign control after Kayqubad's involvement in further unrest or simple incompetence, ordered his execution and reinstated Mesud II, reflecting strategic favoritism toward the exiled claimant who had likely petitioned from captivity. This by (r. 1295–1304), who prioritized Mongol oversight over Seljuk competence, temporarily resolved the rivalry but perpetuated the cycle of puppetry and deposition, as Mesud's restoration came amid a sultanate already eroded by rival beyliks and Mongol tribute demands. The thus exemplified causal drivers of Rum's decline: familial competition arbitrated externally, yielding instability without genuine sovereignty.

Second Reign (1301–1307)

Mesud II was reinstated as sultan of Rum in 1302 through the intervention of Ilkhanid ruler Ghazan Khan, who sought a compliant vassal following the deposition of Kayqubad III amid internal intrigues and Mongol oversight failures. This restoration occurred without substantive policy shifts from prior Seljuk administrations, maintaining the sultanate's nominal subordination to the Ilkhanate while local power eroded. Mesud established his de facto base in Kayseri, shifting focus from the traditional capital of Konya, which suffered increasing neglect and vulnerability to local warlords. During this period, Mesud's authority manifested primarily in the nominal collection and forwarding of tributes to the , underscoring the sultanate's role as a fiscal intermediary rather than an autonomous polity. Efforts to counter encroachments by emerging beyliks, such as the , involved joint expeditions with Mongol allies, but these proved ineffective, allowing Turkmen principalities to consolidate control over rural territories and trade routes. Mesud's passive stance reflected the 's waning direct influence in , prioritizing stability for revenue extraction over territorial defense. By 1307, the sultanate's effective governance had contracted to isolated urban centers like , with peripheral regions dominated by autonomous beylik leaders who operated independently of central directives. This fragmentation accelerated the devolution of power to local Turkmen dynasties, rendering Mesud's reign a ceremonial endpoint to Seljuk amid the inexorable rise of Anatolian principalities.

Governance and Relations

Vassalage to the Ilkhanate

Mesud II's position as sultan was defined by utter dependence on the , with his installations and depositions dictated directly by Mongol khans, stripping the Rum sultanate of any pretense of . His first reign from 1284 onward followed Ilkhanid intervention in Seljuk succession disputes, while his second tenure began only after Khan (r. 1295–1304) explicitly ordered his restoration in 1303, allowing Mesud to return to under strict Mongol oversight. This subservience extended to personal summons to the Ilkhanid court; Mesud was arrested and imprisoned in for alleged involvement in anti-Mongol intrigues, demonstrating how Ilkhanid suspicions could nullify the sultan's presence in . Such requirements confined Mesud's agency, as khanly decrees superseded local rule, fostering paralysis in governance amid emerging regional threats. Ilkhanid mechanisms reinforced this control through appointed overseers, including atabegs and shahnas stationed in key Anatolian centers, who enforced collection and levies while frequently countermanding sultanic orders. These officials, drawn from Mongol or Persian administrative elites, managed tax farms and garrisons that siphoned resources to , exacerbating fiscal strain on the sultanate without precise quantification in extant records for Mesud's era. The pervasive Mongol presence, including tamgha () duties and periodic encampments near Alatağ, ensured compliance, as sultans risked deposition or worse for defiance. This structure debunked any residual , as Mesud wielded no effective power beyond ceremonial functions, his edicts valid only with Ilkhanid . Contemporary Persian chronicles from the Ilkhanid milieu, such as those reflecting court perspectives under , depicted the arrangement as normalized overlordship integral to the khanate's western domains, yet the enforced dependency humiliated Seljuk elites by reducing the dynasty to . Later Turkish narratives in Anatolian traditions occasionally romanticized fleeting resistance, but primary evidence of Mesud's repeated restorations and court subjugation confirms pragmatic acquiescence, underscoring how Mongol causally immobilized the sultanate's capacity for unified action or .

Administrative Shifts and Capital Relocation

Mesud II established his authority in in 1283, shifting the sultanate's primary administrative base from the longstanding capital of to this eastern city strategically positioned along Ilkhanid trade and oversight routes. This relocation, sustained through his first reign (1284–1296) and reinstated during his second (1301–1307), prioritized proximity to Mongol governors and tribute collection points over traditional Anatolian centrality, enabling more efficient compliance with obligations amid the sultanate's diminished sovereignty. The move detached governance from Konya's cultural and economic heartland, where earlier sultans like had centralized patronage, thereby exposing western territories to greater local drift. Administrative operations under Mesud II reflected pragmatic concessions to Ilkhanid dominance rather than proactive centralization; no major legal codifications, infrastructural campaigns, or fiscal reforms are documented, contrasting sharply with predecessors' investments in madrasas, caravanserais, and irrigation systems that bolstered state cohesion. Instead, revenue extraction devolved to local Turkmen emirs and nasirs (governors), who handled and military levies with increasing autonomy, as evidenced by empowered frontier chieftains like the in regions such as . This decentralized approach, akin to evolving grants becoming hereditary holdings, accelerated fiscal self-sufficiency among beyliks by allowing emirs to retain surpluses beyond quotas, eroding sultanic oversight without Mesud II initiating countermeasures.

Interactions with Emerging Beyliks

During Mesud II's reigns, the Sultanate of Rum's diminished capacity under Ilkhanid overlordship enabled Turkmen beyliks like and to achieve via persistent border raids and territorial encroachments in central and western . Mesud undertook military expeditions against these groups, particularly the ' incursions southward and the ' expansions westward, but these actions, reliant on limited Mongol auxiliaries, yielded no lasting subjugation and instead highlighted the sultanate's inability to enforce loyalty beyond nominal oaths. The , led by figures exploiting post-1284 power vacuums after Kaykhusraw III's execution, openly challenged Seljuk primacy by withholding effective tribute while consolidating holdings around , forcing Mesud into reactive defenses rather than proactive dominance. Similarly, Karamanid forces under Mehmed Bey preyed on region's fringes, their unchecked ghazi raids disrupting trade routes and agrarian stability without decisive Seljuk retaliation. These frictions underscored how Mesud's constrained resources—diverted by throne rivalries and Ilkhanid demands—fostered beylik resilience, eroding central legitimacy through cycles of evasion and reprisal. While such peripheral dynamics permitted ongoing Turkic tribal influxes that preserved linguistic and nomadic cultural threads amid Seljuk decline, the tolerance of beylik amplified predatory violence, as ghazi bands prioritized frontier conquests over fealty, accelerating the sultanate's fragmentation into successor states. Mesud's era thus exemplified causal neglect breeding rivals, with beyliks evolving from subordinates to proto-dynasties unhindered by sustained coercion.

Death and Immediate Aftermath

Circumstances of Death

Ghiyath al-Din Masud II died in late 1307 or early 1308, likely in , the administrative center of the remnant . Persian chronicles such as those by Mahmud b. Muhammad Aqsarayi, a contemporary administrator under Ilkhanid rule, record the event with scant detail, indicative of the sultan's eroded authority by this juncture. The timing coincided with Oljeitu Khan's consolidation of power in the after 1304, during which Mongol priorities shifted toward internal stabilization and religious policy, reducing direct intervention in Anatolian affairs and leaving local Turkmen beyliks to assert independence. This context of peripheral neglect, compounded by prior revolts and administrative fragmentation, rendered Masud's terminal phase unremarkable in primary accounts, with no recorded resistance or notable intrigue. Subsequent summaries occasionally portray the death as assassination amid beylik rivalries or Ilkhanid displeasure, yet such claims lack corroboration from verifiable chronicles and may stem from interpretive biases in later emphasizing dramatic ends to dynasties. The absence of empirical attestation privileges interpretations of natural or inconsequential demise over conspiratorial narratives.

Absence of Viable Succession

Mesud II fathered no known sons, possessing only a single daughter whose marriage and later hostage status in underscored the dynasty's disconnection from Anatolian power centers. This childlessness, combined with the elimination of rival claimants—such as the execution of his cousin in 1301 amid Ilkhanid interventions—deprived the Seljuk line of any direct or collateral male successor capable of asserting centralized authority. Earlier dynastic purges under Mongol oversight, including the blinding and deposition of in 1284, had already systematically eroded alternative branches, leaving Mesud's tenuous restoration in 1303 as the final flicker of Seljuk legitimacy without institutional backing for continuity. Following Mesud's death in 1308, the —preoccupied with internal succession struggles after the death of Khan Oljeitu—abandoned the practice of installing Seljuk sultans, effectively dissolving the arrangement that had sustained the Rum sultanate for decades. Local emirs and Turkmen chieftains, operating through nascent beyliks, seized territorial control without invoking the Seljuk title, as no credible claimant emerged to unify fragmented loyalties under Ilkhanid patronage. This procedural vacuum, rooted in the dynasty's exhaustive pruning of viable heirs and the Ilkhanids' strategic disinterest, empirically terminated the Seljuk lineage in , with historical consensus dating the end to 1308 absent any subsequent figure recognized as a legitimate successor.

Legacy and Historical Assessment

Role in the Fragmentation of Rum

Mesud II's second reign (1301–1307) represented the terminal phase of nominal Seljuk central authority in , where his status as an Ilkhanid underscored the sultanate's subordination and internal erosion of power to provincial emirs and Mongol agents. His murder in 1307 eliminated the last capable of invoking Seljuk legitimacy, catalyzing the irreversible fragmentation of the realm into independent Turkmen beyliks devoid of overarching cohesion. Territorial devolution accelerated post-1307, as core provinces detached under local dynasties; the , already encroaching since their 1277 raids on , consolidated control over the capital by the early , symbolizing the loss of Seljuk heartland unity. Institutional hallmarks of the sultanate, including standardized coinage inscribed with Seljuk titles and imperial prerogatives, terminated after Mesud's era, supplanted by beylik-specific mints that reflected decentralized sovereignty. The Ilkhanate's disintegration in 1335, following Abu Sa'id's death without heir, withdrew the Mongol superstructure that had propped up puppet sultans like Mesud, unleashing unmitigated rivalry among beyliks and exacerbating anarchy through ungoverned fiscal collapse and military disbandment. This vacuum intensified predatory dynamics, with Byzantine sources attesting to heightened banditry and incursions by unbound ghazi bands, though the ensuing polities' autonomy enabled adaptive resilience against residual threats, laying groundwork for enduring Anatolian principalities.

Evaluations of Authority and Impact

Mesud II's as is evaluated by historians as predominantly nominal during his intermittent reigns, particularly from 1301 to 1307, when real power resided with Ilkhanid governors, local Turkmen emirs, and regents rather than the Seljuk itself. Frequent depositions and restorations, including his exile to in 1297 following involvement in a revolt against Ilkhanid , underscored the sultan's dependence on Mongol overlords for legitimacy and survival, rendering centralized governance illusory. Turkmen rebellions proliferated in this era, exploiting the vacuum of effective Seljuk control and highlighting Mesud's inability to enforce loyalty or suppress emerging autonomous powers. The impact of Mesud II's rule is assessed as negligible in stemming the Sultanate of Rum's dissolution, with his murder in 1308 conventionally marking the of Seljuk dynastic continuity and the acceleration of Anatolia's into rival beyliks. Lacking documented military successes, administrative reforms, or cultural patronage attributable directly to him, Mesud's tenure is viewed as a terminal phase of institutional decay, where the sultan's symbolic role failed to counteract the devolution of authority to peripheral warlords, ultimately facilitating the Ottoman beylik's consolidation amid the post-Ilkhanid .

References

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