City · The Seljuk sultanate of Rum · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Konya

The sultans' capital, built round the citadel mound (today's Alaeddin hill).

On it stand the palace pavilion of Kılıç Arslan II, the great mosque begun by the earlier sultans and not finished until 1220, and Kılıç Arslan II's tomb in its courtyard, the oldest in the city. The Greeks keep their own quarter: TDV reads the remains as a wall dividing the hill between Turks to the north and Christians to the south. Markets cluster round the mound.

Barbarossa's crusaders beat Malikshah's army and plundered the town in mid-May 1190 (TDV: entered on 17 May), the old sultan having left it. Kaykhusraw ruled here from 1192 until October 1196, when his emirs surrendered the city on terms to Süleymanshah. Latin merchants came here (one brought the second false Alexios to the sultan in about 1191-1192) and Byzantine merchants traded with Iconium, which Alexios III's seizure of their goods in about 1196 shows.

Who holds it

Name
Sultan Süleymanshah II in person
Title
lord
Confidence
high

Lord in 1200

Sultan Süleymanshah II in person (Süleymanshah II)

How things stand that morning

The sultan's own city and residence on 1 January 1200.

Charter

No charter: Seljuk towns had no communal liberties. The sultan's governor (subaşı) and the judge (qadi) ruled; townsmen spoke through their notables and the head of the town (ra'is), none named for 1200.

Communities

Muslims (Turkish soldiers and nomads settling, Persian-speaking officials and scholars); Greeks with their own quarter and the metropolitan of Ikonion (holder's name not pinned), and the Greek village of Sille nearby; the church later called Eflatun Mescidi stood in the twelfth century. Armenians and Jews: not pinned. Latin and Byzantine merchants visit.

Militia

The citadel garrison under the governor; townsmen and their young men (later the ahi brotherhoods, which are not attested this early) defended the walls when needed.

Walls and castle

The citadel on the mound with its palace. Süleymanshah repaired the walls of Konya (TDV; year not given). The great outer walls with their many towers are Kayqubad's work of 1221: later. In 1200 the lower town is largely open or weakly walled.

Trade and crafts

The court and the army make the market; caravan roads west to Akşehir and the Byzantine frontier, east to Aksaray and Kayseri, south to Karaman and the Taurus passes. The Konya mint strikes for the sultan (a dinar of 597 AH, 1201, survives). Two buildings near the old town, the İplikçi mosque (before 1201) and the Altınapa madrasa and han (1202), are being built or are still to come.

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. autumn 1200A Turkish embassy leaves Konya for Constantinople and makes peace with Alexios III.Depends on: the quarrel of 1200 running its course. Stopped by: war.

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: TDV 'Konya' for the buildings and the quarters; Brand (from Choniates) for the merchants and the events.

Primary sources for Sultanate of Rum

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 Anonymous Syriac Chronicle to 1234, Anonymous (a Syrian Orthodox writer, probably of Edessa) (about 1234 to 1240). An Edessene chronicle independent of Michael the Syrian in its later part, with a secular section reaching 1234 that gives the Jazira, Edessa, Harran, Mardin and Melitene about 1200 under al-Adil's sons and the Artuqids, the Seljuks of Rum, the Armenians of Cilicia and the Franks of Antioch, and a church section to 1207 on the Jacobite succession after Michael's death in 1199. Read online
  • 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 Chronicle of Smbat Sparapet (Sempad the Constable), Smbat Sparapet, brother of King Hetum I of Cilicia (about 1270 to 1276). The Cilician court chronicle, drawing on Matthew of Edessa for its early part and on family memory later. Read online
  • 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
  • The Cream of the History of Aleppo, Kamal al-Din Ibn al-Adim (about 1240 to 1260). The annals of Aleppo. 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

5 more in the sources library for Anatolia and the Caucasus.

Sources and studies

  1. C. M. Brand, Byzantium Confronts the West 1180-1204 (1968), pp. 98-99, 149-151, 362 (following Niketas Choniates, Euthymios Tornikes and Ibn Bibi)
  2. TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, 'Konya'
  3. Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı İslâm Ansiklopedisi, 'Süleyman Şah II'
  4. TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, 'Keyhüsrev I'

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