DĀNEŠMAND-E ḤĀJEB

 

DĀNEŠMAND-E ḤĀJEB, Muslim officer in Mongol service in the first half of the 13th century. In 616/1219-20 he was sent by Čengīz Khan to the town of Zarnūq, on the south bank of the Sir Darya (Jaxartes), and induced it to surrender to the Mongols (Jovaynī, ed. Qazvīnī, I, p. 76). Later that year he was dispatched on a similar but unsuccessful mission to the mother of the Ḵᵛārazmšāh ʿAlāʾ-al-Dīn Moḥammad, Terken (Terkān) Ḵātūn (Nasavī, pp. 49-50, tr. p. 56). His standing with the Mongols even at that early stage is clear from the fact that he was given in marriage Terken Solṭān, a daughter of the Ḵᵛārazmšāh who was captured with Terken Ḵātūn in 617/1220 (Nasavī, p. 54, tr. p. 60). During the reign of Čengīz Khan’s son and successor, the great khan Ögödei (Ūkadāy; 626-­39/1229-41), Dānešmand-e Ḥājeb was in attendance at the imperial court, where he brought up the great khan’s son Melig (Rašīd-al-Dīn, p.14); he also appears in a number of anecdotes concerning Ögödei’s generosity, retailed by Jovaynī (I, pp. 162, 174, 186). For a time, however, he must also have functioned as one of the Mongol representatives in Khorasan, where after the death of the governor Čin Temür (Čīn Tīmūr) in 632/1233 he supported the claims of the latter’s son (Jovaynī, II, p. 229). He is last mentioned as the person responsible for the execution of the minister Činqay (Jīnqāy), a Nestorian Christian, following the accession of the great khan Möngke (Mūngkā) in 650/1252 (Jovaynī, III, p. 58).

 

Bibliography:

Barthold, Turkestan3, pp. 407, 430-­31.

Šehāb-al-Dīn Moḥammad Ḵorandezī Nasavī, Sīrat al-solṭān Jalāl-al-Dīn, ed. O. Houdas, Paris, 1891; 13th-century Pers. tr. Sīrat-e Jalāl-al-Dīn, ed. M. Mīnovī, Tehran, 1344 Š./1965.

Rašīd-al-Dīn Fażl-Allāh, Jāmeʿ al-tawārīḵ, ed. E. Blochet, II, Leiden and London, 1911.

(Peter Jackson)

Originally Published: December 15, 1993

Last Updated: November 14, 2011

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