Hulegu (d. 1265)

Mongol prince and founder of the Ilkhanate, the Mongol state in Persia. Hulegu was born around 1217, the son of Chinggis Khan’s youngest son Tolui.

In 1253 Hulegu’s elder brother, the Great Khan (Mong. qaghan) Mongke, dispatched him westward with an army to assume overall command of the Mongol forces operating in Persia and the Caucasus. Having largely annihilated the Isma‘ili Assassins (1256) and destroyed the ‘Abbasid caliphate in Baghdad (1258), Hulegu entered Syria and captured Aleppo in January 1260. But in the spring he withdrew into Azerbaijan with the bulk of his army, and a smaller force left in Palestine under his general Kitbuqa was overwhelmed by the Egyptian Mamluks at ‘Ayn Jalut on 3 September 1260; Syria and Palestine were lost.

Hulegu was unable to avenge this defeat, owing to the disintegration of the empire following Mongke’s death (1259) and the outbreak in 1261 of war with his cousin Berke, khan of the Mongols of the Golden Horde. It was probably at this juncture that he established himself as virtually an autonomous ruler in Persia and Iraq, recognized by his brother, the new qaghan Qubilai (Kublai) in the Far East.

In 1262 Hulegu inaugurated a series of Ilkhanid overtures to the Latin West by writing to King Louis IX of France, urg-

Humbert II of Viennois (1312-1355)

Ing concerted action against the Mamluks. His envoy to Pope Urban IV reported his desire for baptism (c. 1263). Hulegu’s mother, Sorqaqtani, had been a Nestorian Christian, as was his principal wife, Doquz Khatun. Nevertheless, he also manifested a marked interest in Tibetan Buddhism and remained attached to the shamanistic practices of his forebears until his death (8 February 1265).

-Peter Jackson

See also: Itkhans; Mongols

Bibliography

Boyle, John Andrew, “Dynastic and Political History of the Ilkhans,” The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. 5: The Saljuq and Mongol Periods, ed. J. A. Boyle (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1968), pp. 340-355.

Jackson, Peter, “The Crisis in the Holy Land in 1260,” English Historical Review 95 (1980), 481-513.

Meyvaert, Paul, “An Unknown Letter of Hulagu, Ilkhan of Persia, to King Louis IX of France,” Viator 11 (1980), 242-258.