SOLAYMĀN, Il-Khan of Iran (739/1339-745/1344). A great-grandson of Yošmut, son of Hülegü (Hulāku), he was proclaimed khan in 739/1339 by the Chobanid amir Ḥasan b. Timurtāš (‘Ḥasan-e Kuček’), who forced the previous Il-Khan, the princess Sati Bik (Sati Beg), to marry Solaymān, although according to the contemporary Mamluk author al-Šojāʿi (pp. 57, 100) he was a mere boy (ṣabi). Solaymān reigned for four years (Ahri, p. 167), and coins were struck in his name in Tabriz, Hamadān, Kāšān, Yazd, and Kerman from 740/1339-40 to 744/1343-4. In the latter year Ḥasan-e Kuček sent him with an army to eastern Anatolia to remove the semi-independent amir Eretnā. In an engagement near Sivās, Solaymān’s forces were initially victorious but dispersed in order to plunder; and, caught unprepared by Eretnā's firm stand and riposte, he suffered a crushing defeat (Ahri, p. 169; al-Šojāʿi, pp. 261-62).
But Solaymān’s position improved following Ḥasan’s murder shortly afterwards, when he was presented with some of the late amir’s treasure; Ḥasan’s brother Malek Ašraf accused him of having instigated the murder (Zayn-al-Din, Ḏayl, p. 29). Deserted by Ašraf, who proclaimed as khan an obscure figure named Anušervān, Solaymān turned for support to the Chobanids’ great rival, the Jalayerid Šayḵ Ḥasan-e Bozorg, who escorted him to Tabriz (Ahri, pp. 170-71). The literary sources last mention him later in 744/1343-4, when he and Sati Beg moved to Diārbakr to join forces with the Oirat chieftain Ebrāhim Šāh (Ahri, p. 171). But coins were struck in his name throughout the Jazira in 745/1344-5 and in Baghdad the following year (Hébert 1982; Album 1984, p. 100).
Bibliography:
Abu Bakr al-Qoṭbi al-Ahri, Tāriḵ-e Šayḵ Ovays, ed. J. B. Van Loon, The Hague, 1954, pp. 167-71.
Ḥāfeẓ-e Abru, Ḏayl-e Jāmeʿ al-tavāriḵ, ed. Ḵānbābā Bayāni, 2nd ed., Tehran, 1350/1971, pp. 208-24 passim.
S. Album, “Studies in Ilkhanid History and Numismatics, I. A Late Ilkhanid Hoard (743/1342),” Studia Iranica 13/1, 1984, pp. 49-116.
Idem, “Studies in Ilkhanid History and Numismatics, II. A Late Ilkhanid Hoard (741/1340) as Evidence for the History of Diyār Bakr,” Studia Iranica 14/1, 1985, pp. 43-76.
J. A. Boyle, “Dynastic and Political History of the Il-Khāns,” in The Cambridge History of Iran V, ed. J. A. Boyle, Cambridge, 1968, pp. 303-421; esp. pp. 415-16.
R. J. Hébert, “A Late Ilkhanid Hoard,” Hamdard Islamicus 5, 1982, pp. 3-21.
Bertold Spuler, Die Mongolen in Iran : Politik, Verwaltung und Kultur der Ilchanzeit 1220-1350, 4th ed., Leiden, 1985.
Šams-al-Din al-Šojā‛i, Tāriḵ al-malek al-Nāṣer Moḥammad b. Qalāwun al-Ṣāleḥi wa-awlādehe, ed. Barbara Schäfer, Die Chronik aš-Šuğā‛īs I (Arabic text), Wiesbaden, 1977.
Zayn-al-Din b. Ḥamd-Allāh Mostawfi Qazvini, Ḏayl-e Tāriḵ-e gozida, ed. Iraj Afšār, Tehran, 1372/1993.
M. Weiers, “Münzaufschriften auf Münzen mongolischer Il-Khane aus dem Iran, Teil drei,” Ural-Altaische Jahrbücher, N.F., 5, 1985, pp. 168-86.
(Peter Jackson)
Originally Published: November 9, 2016
Last Updated: November 9, 2016
Cite this entry:Peter Jackson, “SOLAYMĀN,” Encyclopædia Iranica, online edition, 2016, available at http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/solayman-ilkhan (accessed on 09 November 2016).
