Kings and their demesnes · The Khwarazmshah's realm · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Tekish

Tekish holds Khwarazm itself as his own domain: the delta oasis of the Amu Darya with Gurganj, his capital, where he has built a great madrasa with his future tomb, Kath on the right bank, Khiva, Hazarasp, Zamakhshar and Darghan, and the frontier command of Jand on the lower Syr Darya, his own first governorship as a prince.

Khurasan he has given to his heir; the Jibal and Tabaristan conquests to governors and emirs. He is pious in the Hanafi way, a soldier, one-eyed from a wound, and said to play the lute well. On 1 January 1200 he is at the end of his last western campaign: he leaves his son Ali Shah over Iraq at Isfahan and enters Khwarazm on 10 Jumada II 596 (28 March 1200) (Juvaini).

Who he is

Name
Ala al-Din Tekish ibn Il-Arslan
Title
Khwarazmshah, sultan by the caliph's diploma of 595
Since
1172 (567 AH)
Born
not pinned
Family
Anushteginid; son of Il-Arslan (died 1172); wife Terken Khatun of the Qipchaq; sons: Nasir al-Din Malikshah (died 1 March 1197), Qutb al-Din Muhammad (the heir, born about 1169 by one account), Taj al-Din Ali Shah, Yunus Khan; daughters married to the Bavandid Ardashir (about 1183) and to the Qipchaq chief Qara Ozan (by 1181); grandsons: Hindu Khan (Hindu Shah) and his brothers, sons of Malikshah, and Arboz Khan
Confidence
high

Juvaini (Boyle) vol. I; Ibn al-Athir years 595-596; TDV; Iranica (Al-e Bavand); Wikipedia after Buniyatov and Biran.

Overlord

Tributary of the Qara Khitai gurkhan (by Biran's reading still paying in 1199-1200); the caliph al-Nasir's name stands first in the khutba.

What it holds

  • Gurganj and its rustaq (the capital)
  • Kath and the right-bank towns
  • Khiva, Hazarasp, Zamakhshar, Darghan and the delta
  • Jand and the lower Syr Darya to Yangikent
  • Overlordship of Khurasan (through the heir), Gurgan, Dihistan, Qumis, the Tabaristan castles and the Jibal towns

How it was acquired

By inheritance in 1172, after a war with his brother Sultan Shah won with Qara Khitai help.

Allies and rivals

See the realm record. Personally reconciled with the caliph in 595 (robes and diploma for himself and his son); peace with the Ghurids since 1198; war with the Nizaris since 1199.

How things stand that morning

Whereabouts on 1 January 1200 not pinned closer than this: he set out for the Jibal about January 1199, took Arslan-gusha (four-month siege) and attacked Alamut, took Firuzkuh, Ustunavand and Fulul from the Bavandid, set Ali Shah over Iraq at Isfahan, and entered Khwarazm on 28 March 1200 (Juvaini); so that morning he is in the Jibal or on the road home through Khurasan. Khwarazm itself is run in his absence by his household and officials; who held the deputy's office in Gurganj that winter is not pinned.

Wealth

The irrigated oasis (grain, cotton, fruit, melons), the Gurganj caravan trade to the Volga and the steppe, the Jand crossing, the tolls of Khurasan.

Military

Slave guard, iqta' holders, Kangli and Qipchaq horsemen; Gurganj walled; Jand a frontier fortress.

Threats

  • Illness (quinsy), fatal in July 1200
  • The Nizaris
  • The succession quarrel between his son Muhammad and his grandson Hindu Khan

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

  1. 28 March 1200 (10 Jumada II 596)Enters Khwarazm (Juvaini); raises troops there; falls ill with a quinsy, recovers and sets out again.Depends on: nothing in play delaying him Stopped by: a new crisis in the west
  2. 3 July 1200 (19 Ramadan 596)Dies at Chah-i Arab near Shahristana on the way to Khurasan; buried in his madrasa at Gurganj.Depends on: natural death from his illness Stopped by: only a change in his health

Places of note

  • Tekish's madrasa and tomb: Built by Tekish at Gurganj; his burial place from 1200.

Where the sources disagree

  • See the realm record for the death date and place, the vizier and Mayajuq.

Evidence: Juvaini and Ibn al-Athir date his campaigns closely; his exact position on 1 January 1200 is inferred.

On the map: The oasis outline follows the modern irrigated land, which is close to the medieval extent; the Syr Darya strip follows the modern river.

Primary sources for Khwarazm

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

  • The Chronography of Bar Hebraeus, Gregory Bar Hebraeus (Abu'l-Faraj) (about 1275 to 1286). A later compilation that for 1200 relies on Michael the Syrian and Ibn al-Athir, but adds the Jacobite church's own memory of the Jazira, Mosul, Melitene and the Artuqid and Zangid courts, and carries Michael's story past 1195: the Seljuk brothers' war in Rum, the Khwarazmian and Ghurid wars in the east, Mosul under Nur al-Din Arslan Shah, and the caliph al-Nasir. Read online
  • The Complete History, Izz al-Din Ibn al-Athir (about 1200 to 1231, at Mosul). The widest Muslim narrative for the years 596 to 597 AH (1199 to 1201): al-Adil's entry into Cairo and his taking of the sultanate from his nephew al-Mansur Muhammad early in 1200, the quarrels of the Ayyubid princes at Damascus, Aleppo and Hama, the Nile failure and the great famine of Egypt, Mosul under Nur al-Din Arslan Shah and the Jazira under Gokbori and the Artuqids, Baghdad under the caliph al-Nasir, the Khwarazmshah Tekish's death in 1200 and Muhammad's accession, the Ghurid wars in Khurasan, the Eldiguzids and Georgia, the Almohads in the west, and the Seljuks of Rum in passing. Read online
  • Comfort of Hearts and Sign of Joy: a History of the Seljuks, Muhammad ibn Ali al-Rawandi (Ravandi) (1203 to 1204, dedicated to Kaykhusraw I of Rum). A history of the Great Seljuks from their origins to the death of the last sultan Toghril III in 1194, begun at Hamadan and finished for Kaykhusraw of Rum when the author moved to Anatolia. Read online
  • History of Tabaristan, Ibn Isfandiyar (Baha al-Din Muhammad ibn Hasan) (begun 1206, extended about 1216; continued anonymously to 1349). The local history of the Caspian province and the only account of the Bavandid kings of Tabaristan: Husam al-Dawla Ardashir (reigned 1173 to 1206) at Sari and Amul, his dealings with the Khwarazmshahs Tekish and Ala al-Din Muhammad, the Nizaris of Alamut, the Eldiguzids and the caliph, and the marriages, feuds and raids of the Daylamite and Gilaki lords. Read online
  • The History of the World Conqueror, Ata-Malik Juvayni (1252 to 1260). Written for the Mongols but with a long retrospective on the powers they destroyed. Read online
  • The Life of Sultan Jalal al-Din Mankubirti, Shihab al-Din Muhammad al-Nasawi (about 1241, at Aleppo). A Khwarazmian secretary's life of the last Khwarazmshah. Read online
  • The Nasirid Generations: a General History of the Muslim Dynasties, Minhaj-i Siraj Juzjani (1259 to 1260, at Delhi). The Ghurid court's own history, by a man born in 1193 whose family served the sultans of Ghur and Ghazna. Read online
  • Compendium of Chronicles, Rashid al-Din Fadl Allah Hamadani (1300 to 1311, at Tabriz). The official Ilkhanid history, compiled from Mongol oral tradition and the lost Altan Debter. Read online

3 more in the sources library for Persia and the Eastern Islamic World.

Sources and studies

  1. Juvaini, The History of the World-Conqueror, tr. J. A. Boyle, vol. I (1958), Part II, the chapters on Tekish and Muhammad (scan pp. 342-362, read through archive.org search-inside in the copies dli.ernet.507519 and dli.ernet.528458)
  2. Ibn al-Athir, al-Kamil, year 595: Tekish's march to Rayy against Mayajuq (Rabi I 595), via al-Durar al-Saniyya historical encyclopaedia
  3. Ibn al-Athir, al-Kamil, year 595: Tekish's war with the Ismailis, Arslan-gusha, Alamut, the murder of the vizier in Jumada II 596, the siege of Turshiz, via al-Durar al-Saniyya
  4. Ibn al-Athir, al-Kamil, year 596: the death of Tekish at Shahristana, via al-Durar al-Saniyya
  5. TDV Islam Ansiklopedisi: Tekis, Alaeddin
  6. Wikipedia: Ala al-Din Tekish (after Buniyatov, Biran, Ibn al-Athir, Juvaini)
  7. Wikipedia: Qara Khitai (the Khwarazm and Ghurid sections, after M. Biran, The Empire of the Qara Khitai in Eurasian History, 2005, pp. 54-74)
  8. Encyclopaedia Iranica: Al-e Bavand (W. Madelung)

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.