A new danger appears from within the Seljuq state as the Mongols threaten from the outside: a charismatic preacher, Baba Ishak, is fomenting rebellion among the Turkmen of Anatolia.
Nomadic Turkmen had begun moving into Anatolia a few years prior to the Battle of Manzikert.
After 1071, Turkic migration into the region had gone largely unchecked.
Both their number and the persuasive power of their religious leaders, nominally Islamized shamans known as babas or dedes, have played a large part in the conversion of formerly Christian Anatolia.
The Persianized Seljuq military class has expended considerable effort keeping these nomads from invading areas inhabited by farmers and from harassing neighboring Christian states.
The Turkmen have been pushed into marginal lands, mostly mountainous and frontier districts.
Baba Ishak is one such religious leader.
Unlike his predecessors, whose influence had been limited to smaller tribal groups, Baba Ishak’s authority extends over a vast population of Anatolian Turkmen.
It is not known what he preached, but his appropriation of the title rasul, normally applied to Muhammad, suggests something beyond orthodox Islam.
The revolt had begun in about 1240 in the remote borderland of Kafarsud in the eastern Taurus Mountains and quickly spread north to the region of Amasya.
Seljuq armies at Amasya and …
