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Europe · High and late Middle Ages

Beylik of Saruhan

drawn on the map 1314–1414

The Sarukhanids (Saruhanoğulları) held the region of ancient Lydia around Manisa (ancient Magnesia), conventionally c. 1300–1410. The founder was Saruhan Bey, whose forebears had served the Germiyanids; Aydın and Saruhan beys were among the westernmost commanders the Germiyanids dispatched.

Shown on the map
1314–1414
Peak area
15k km²
Region
Europe

Overview

The Sarukhanids (Saruhanoğulları) held the region of ancient Lydia around Manisa (ancient Magnesia), conventionally c. 1300–1410. The founder was Saruhan Bey, whose forebears had served the Germiyanids; Aydın and Saruhan beys were among the westernmost commanders the Germiyanids dispatched. Saruhan was a maritime beylik, joining the Aydinids in Aegean naval raids toward the islands, Gallipoli, the Morea, and Thrace. On Saruhan Bey's death in 1345 his son İlyas Bey succeeded. Hemmed in by Germiyan to the east, Aydın to the south, and Karesi (later the Ottomans) to the north, Saruhan pursued a careful policy toward its neighbours and Byzantium. The Ottomans absorbed it in the later 14th century (Bayezid I), with a Timurid-era interruption, before its definitive incorporation by the early 15th century. Manisa later became a favoured residence and training-ground (şehzade sancağı) for Ottoman princes.

Common questions

What was the Beylik of Saruhan?
The Sarukhanids (Saruhanoğulları) held the region of ancient Lydia around Manisa (ancient Magnesia), conventionally c. 1300–1410. The founder was Saruhan Bey, whose forebears had served the Germiyanids; Aydın and Saruhan beys were among the westernmost commanders the Germiyanids dispatched.
When is the Beylik of Saruhan shown on the map?
The border data draws the Beylik of Saruhan 1314–1414. The source samples borders at fixed dates, so a span can begin late or run on past the end.
How large was the Beylik of Saruhan?
At its greatest extent drawn on this map, the Beylik of Saruhan covered about 15,000 km². That is the largest area the border data gives it across the years it is drawn, not necessarily its greatest extent in history.

Sources

This compendium cites its sources once for the whole document rather than per territory. Its bibliography names the English Wikipedia articles for each beylik, khanate and principality as the primary basis, with Encyclopædia Britannica, the World History Encyclopedia, museum and academic sources (the Baku Presidential Library on the Shirvanshahs, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum on the Armenian Genocide) and the historiography of early Ottoman state formation (Wittek, Lindner, Kafadar, Lowry). The article this entry is anchored on:

This entry was last updated .

This entry was researched and drafted with AI from the sources above, and has not been reviewed by a historian. How entries are made

Text available under CC BY-SA 4.0: reuse it with a credit to The World Through Time and a link to this page. Passages drawing on the Wikipedia articles listed above are also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 by their contributors.

Border geometry for the map itself comes from Cliopatria v0.12 (Seshat Global History Databank, CC-BY-4.0).

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