In the 1960s a French historian, Claude Cahen (1909-91), published extracts of a Syrian chronicle by Ibn Natif, an Ayybubid official living in Syria in the early 13th century. Ibn Natif's work, combined with Latin and Greek writings of the period, can be used to piece together the military campaigns of John III Vatatzes against the Seljuq Turks. Under the year 622/1225, the chronicler states that the Sultan captured several fortresses in the course of a war against Vatatzes.
The sultan was Kayqubad I (reigned 1220-1237), sometimes styled Kayqubad the Great, whose reign represented the apogee of Seljuq power and influence in Anatolia. It seems Kayqubad and Vatatzes were well-matched. Under the year 1227, Ibn Natif records that war resumed between Nicea and the Turks, in which the sultan seized one of the emperor's 'great fortresses' after an eight-day siege. However, Vatatzes staged a counter-attack, defeated the Seljuqs and captured part of their army.
Independent confirmation of this account is found in the work of Nicodemus Hagiortes. He reports that in the fourth year of the emperor's reign (1225/26), Vatatzes waged successful warfare against the Seljuks, who had attacked Antioch and other cities along the upper Maendaer valley.
In the same year, Vatatzes sent an embassy laden with gifts to the sultan's other rival, al-Kamil, the Ayyubid sultan of Egypt. His intent was probably to open up another front against the Seljuks and force Kayqubad to fight two enemies at the same time.
Just to confuse matters further, another army appeared in 1227 on the Seljuk-Ayyubid frontier. These were the Khwarizmians, led by Jalal al-Din Mangburni. They initially allied with the Seljuks, which – along with Nicean gold – probably influenced al-Kamil's decision to side with Vatatzes.
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