DOKUZ ḴĀTŪN

 

DOKUZ (DOQUZ) ḴĀTŪN (d. 29 Šaʿbān 663/16 June 1265), chief wife of the Il-khan Hülegü (Hūlāgū; 654-63/1256-65) and granddaughter of Wang (Ong) Khan, leader of the Nestorian Christian Kereyit (Karāyet) tribe domiciled near present-day Ulan Bator. After Wang Khan’s defeat by the future Čengīz Khan in 1203 she was given to the latter’s youngest son, Tolui (Tūlī). The marriage was apparently not consummated, and, when Tolui died in 630/1233 she passed into the care of his son Hülegü, who married her during his expedition to Persia in 654-56/1256-58. He had considerable respect for her judgment, and she was able to intercede for the Christians after the Mongol sack of Baghdad in 656/1258; she was also instrumental in securing the election of Mar Denha as Nestorian catholicus in 1265. A mobile church with bells was erected in her camp (ordu). She survived Hülegü by only four months; there is no evidence to support the thirteenth-century Armenian historian Stephanos Orbelian’s claim (pp. 234-35) that she was poisoned by the ṣāḥeb-dīvān (i.e., Jovaynī).

Although Doquz Ḵātūn produced no children, Hülegü had offspring from several concubines in her entourage, and her influence continued to be felt; she helped to ensure the succession for his son Abaqa (663-80/1265-82).

 

Bibliography:

(For abbreviations found here, see “Short References.”) Bar Hebraeus, Chronicon Syriacum, ed. and tr. E. A. Wallis Budge, I, Oxford and London, 1932, pp. 419, 435, 444.

Š. Bayānī, Zan dar Īrān-e ʿaṣr-e moḡūl, Tehran, 1352 Š./1973.

E. Dulaurier, “Les Mongols d’après les historiens arméniens,” JA, 5th ser., 11, 1858, pp. 491, 507-08; 5th ser., 16, 1860, pp. 290-91, 308-09.

Haithon, Flos Historiarum Terre Orientis, in Recueil des historiens des croisades. Documents arméniens 2, Paris, 1906, p. 301.

Histoire de Mar Jabalaha III patriarche des Nestoriens, tr. C.-B. Chabot, Paris, 1895.

H. H. Howorth, History of the Mongols III. The Mongols of Persia, London, 1888 (esp. pp. 209-12).

E. Hunter, “The Conversion of the Kerait to Christianity in A.D. 1007,” Zentralasiatische Studien 22, 1989-91, pp. 142-63.

S. Orbelian, Histoire de la Siounie, tr. M. Brosset, I, St. Petersburg, 1864. Rašīd-al-Dīn, Jāmeʿ al-tawārīḵ (Baku), pp. 6-7, 24, 96.

Idem, Jāmeʿ al-tawārīḵ, ed. E. Quatremère as Raschid-eldin. Histoire des Mongols de la Perse, Paris, 1836, pp. 92-97.

B. Spuler, “Le christianisme chez les Mongols aux XIIIe et XIVe siècles,” in W. Heissig et al., eds., Tractata Altaica, Wiesbaden, 1976, pp. 621-31.

(Charles Melville)

Originally Published: December 15, 1995

Last Updated: November 29, 2011

This article is available in print.
Vol. VII, Fasc. 5, pp. 475-476