Ani

Who holds it

Name

Zakare Mkhargrdzeli, for Tamar (by conquest of 1199; formal grant 1201)

Title

Lord of the city

Since

1199

Confidence

high

Iranica cites a Shaddadid inscription at Ani dated 595 AH (3 November 1198 to 23 October 1199) naming Soltan b. Mahmud b. Shavor b. Manuchehr al-Shaddadi. Vardan Areweltsi dates the Zakarid capture to 648 of the Armenian era, which ran from about 31 January 1199 to about 30 January 1200; Georgian and modern accounts give 1199; Iranica says the city was in Mkhargrdzeli hands 'by 1200'. Read together: the Shaddadid lost it during 1199.

Lord in 1200

Zakare Mkhargrdzeli for the Georgian crown, by conquest in 1199. The queen's formal grant of Ani to Zakare as a fief is dated 1201. Before the conquest the city was ruled by the Shaddadid emir Soltan b. Mahmud (inscription of 595 AH, 1198-99), the last of the Kurdish dynasty that bought Ani from the Seljuks in 1072.

How things stand that morning

Georgian, newly conquered, held by Zakare Mkhargrdzeli; facing the emir of Kars (a Saltukid vassal) across the plateau.

Charter

None recorded for 1200.

Council

The Armenian notables and merchants of the city; no council recorded for 1199-1200.

Communities

Armenians (the great majority), with Georgian officers and soldiers newly arrived; Muslims of the Shaddadid time (the Manuchihr mosque); Syrian and Persian merchants (thin).

Fairs and markets

None recorded.

Militia

None recorded.

Walls and castle

The double walls of Smbat II (989) and the older walls of Ashot III (963-64) closing the plateau on its open north side, with the citadel at the southern point; the gorges of the Akhurian and the Alaja protect the rest.

Trade and crafts

A great caravan city on the road between Tabriz and Dvin and the Black Sea and Anatolia (Kars, Erzurum, Trebizond); silk and cloth; a translated text of 1222 mentions about forty crafts.

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.

In 1200

1. 1200 (not pinned)Zakare builds: a church at Ani and an inscription dated 1200 are attributed to him (Wikipedia, Zakarid Armenia).Depends on: Ani held Stopped by: A Muslim counter-attack

Later, on the likely course

1. 1201Tamar grants Ani to Zakare as a fief.Depends on: Ani held through 1200 Stopped by: The loss of Ani
2. Before 1210 (later course; date not pinned)A Muslim raid from Ardabil sacks Ani and massacres Christians; the Mkhargrdzeli take revenge on Ardabil in 1210-11.

Where the sources disagree

• Capture date: 1199 (Vardan Areweltsi, 648 AE; Georgian sources; Lordkipanidze; Wikipedia) against 1201 in some accounts, which is the year of the grant; Iranica gives only 'by 1200'. Drawn as Georgian.

Evidence: The Shaddadid inscription of 595 AH and Vardan's 648 AE for the conquest bracket it within 1199; the month is not known.

Primary sources for Georgia

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 Chronicle of Michael the Syrian (Michael the Great), Michael the Syrian, patriarch of Antioch 1166 to 1199 (about 1180 to 1195). The Jacobite patriarch's world chronicle, in parallel columns of church, secular and miscellaneous events, ending four years before 1200 and shortly before his own death on 7 November 1199, which left the Syrian Orthodox church with a disputed succession in 1200. Read online
• The History of Derbent and Shirvan, as preserved in Munejjim-bashi's Jami al-duwal, Anonymous (an 11th-century author of Derbent, excerpted by Munejjim-bashi, died 1702) (about 1075; preserved in an Ottoman compilation of the 1670s). The only local history of the Shirvanshahs and the emirs of Derbent, surviving as extracts in a 17th-century Ottoman compilation.
• 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
• History of the Armenians, Kirakos Gandzaketsi (1241 to 1265). Written at Getik and Gandzak in the Zakarid lands of Georgian Armenia. Read online
• The Georgian Chronicles: the Histories and Eulogies of the Sovereigns, and the Life of Queen Tamar, Anonymous, attributed to the chancellor Theodore of Chqondidi and to Basili, master of the court (about 1210 to 1225). Two court histories of Queen Tamar written within a generation. Read online
• The Historical Compilation of Vardan Areveltsi, Vardan Areveltsi (about 1267 to 1271). A short universal history that for the 12th and 13th centuries follows Samuel of Ani, Michael the Syrian (which Vardan helped translate into Armenian in 1248) and Kirakos. Read online
• The History of the Seljuks of Rum, Ibn Bibi (Nasir al-Din Husayn ibn Muhammad) (about 1281 to 1285, at Konya). The main Seljuk narrative for Rum begins with Kilij Arslan II's partition of the sultanate among his sons and his death (1192), Kaykhusraw I's first reign at Konya, his deposition in 1196 to 1197 by Rukn al-Din Sulayman II, Kaykhusraw's wanderings to Cilician Armenia, Aleppo and Constantinople, Sulayman's reduction of his brothers' towns (Tokat, Malatya, Amasya, and Ankara by 1204) and his Erzurum and Georgian campaigns. Read online