Berke Kahn (1208-1266) was a military commander and governor of the Golden Horde khanate, one of the divisions that came after the fragmentation of the Mongol Empire, and was also the most enduring khanate, encompassing in its heyday much of the current western area of ​​Russia, modern Kazakhstan, Ukraine, part of Belarus, northern Uzbekistan, Western Siberia, and part of Romania.

Grandson of the great Genghis Khan, Berke succeeded his brother Batu Khan and was responsible for the first official establishment of Islam in a Mongol khanate.

In 1252 he converted to the Islamic religion. The story traditionally told about his conversion takes place in Saray Jhuk, where Berke came across a caravan from Bukhara and asked them about their faith. Impressed by the faith of these individuals, Berke Khan decided to convert to Islam on the spot, thus becoming a Muslim. After that, Berke convinced his brother Tukh Timur to also convert.

He allied himself with the Egyptian Mamelukes against another Mongolian khanate established in Persia, the Ilkhanate. Not only, but Berke Khan also supported Ariq Böke against Emperor Shizu of Yuan (Kublai Khan), but he did not intervene militarily in this dispute, since he faced his own battles against his cousin, Hulagu Khan. It is worth remembering that it was Hulagu who invaded and destroyed the city of Baghdad in 1258, putting an end to the Islamic Golden Age and the Abbasid Caliphate, in one of the greatest massacres of the entire Middle Ages.

The battle of cousins ​​Hulagu and Berke Khan took place in the 1260s, just a few years after the destruction of Baghdad by Hulagu Khan, precisely because he made several attacks against Muslim territories.

Hulagu was obstinate to go further and further in his conquests, subduing and destroying what was left of the Islamic world, including Egypt, Syria, and the holy cities of Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem. However, after the death of the Great Khan at the time, Hulagu was forced to return to Karakorum, the capital of the Mongol Empire, having to postpone his endeavor in Muslim cities. After settling the question of the Khan’s succession in 1262, Hulagu marches again towards Islamic lands.

Berke Khan, outraged and offended by Hulagu’s attacks on Muslim cities, especially at the destruction of Baghdad, decides to fight back, ordering his brilliant general Nogai Khan to attack Hulagu’s empire. the Ilkhanate.

According to Muslim historian Rashid-al-Din Hamadani, Berke Khan is said to have told his Mongol and Muslim subjects the following sayings, protesting Hulagu’s attack on Baghdad:

“He (Hulagu) plundered all Muslim cities and also brought the Caliph’s death. With God’s help, I will hold him accountable for all the innocent blood.”

In 1263 Nogai Khan inflicted a great defeat on Hulagu Khan, killing thousands of his soldiers by the sword, as well as pushing several of them towards the Terek River, in which they eventually drowned, putting a brake on Hulagu’s dark advance towards the Islamic territories.

Berke died between the years 1266-1267, falling ill when he tried to cross the Kura River to attack Hulagu’s son, Abaqa Khan, being succeeded by his great-nephew Mengu-Timur. Taken as the savior of Islamic civilization and the Holy Land from Hulagu Khan’s unstoppable advances, Berke emerged almost like a divine providence, thus saving what was left of Muslim cities, being the only one capable of stopping his cousin’s destructive and genocidal attacks.

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Bibliography:

-Morgan, David, The Mongols,

-Amitai-Preiss, Reuven. The Mamluk-Ilkhanid War. 1998

-Hildinger, Erik, Warriors of the Steppe: A Military History of Central Asia, 500 B.C. to A.D. 1700

-Shahid. Shakir Ahmad. Berke Khan: The Savior of the Muslim Civilization