The Georgian campaign against the Eldiguzids was a military campaign led by the Amirspasalar (Commander-in-Chief of the army) of the Kingdom of Georgia, Zakare II Zakarian for Queen Tamar of Georgia, from 1209 to 1211.
The campaign was a response to the 1209 plundering of the Armenian capital of Ani by the ruler of Ardabil, a vassal of the Eldiguzid Atabeg Nusrat al-Din Abu Bakr. Ani had been left unprotected, as the Georgian court was spending Easter at the Palace of Geguti.[1] Ani was thoroughly plundered and a population of 12,000 was allegedly massacred on this Eastern Sunday of 1209.[2][1]
In retaliation, Zakare raided Ardabil on Ramadan.[2][3] In 1210, Zakare launched a vast campaign against Persia, passing Nakhchivan, and going on to plunder the cities of Julfa, Marand, Tabriz, Meyaneh, Zanjan, Qazvin, and as far as Gorgan.[2] Altogether, it was a journey of about 3,000 kilometers, before going back to the Georgian capital of Tbilissi.[2][3]
References
- ^ a b Rayfield 2013, p. 115.
- ^ a b c d Baumer 2023, p. 30.
- ^ a b Lordkipanidze & Hewitt 1987, p. 154
Sources
- Baumer, Christoph (5 October 2023). History of the Caucasus: Volume 2: In the Shadow of Great Powers. Bloomsbury Publishing. pp. 29–30. ISBN 978-0-7556-3630-3.
- Lordkipanidze, Mariam Davydovna; Hewitt, George B. (1987). Georgia in the XI–XII Centuries. Tbilisi: Ganatleba Publishers.
- Rayfield, Donald (15 February 2013). Edge of Empires: A History of Georgia. Reaktion Books. p. 115. ISBN 978-1-78023-070-2.
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