Identity of Patron

Khwand Khatun or Mahpari Khatun’s name is mentioned in a number of written sources and in the inscriptions of the monuments that she founded. Mahpari Khatun was one of the wives of ‘Alâ’ al-Din Kayqubâd I (r. 1220-1237) and the mother of his successor, Ghiyâth al-Dîn Kaykhusraw II (r. 1237-1246). She was the daughter of Kyr Vard who was the governor of Kalonoros (modern-day Alanya). Until the end of the twelfth century Kalonoros was a Byzantine city, then it came under the control of the Armenian kings of Cilicia. Kyr Vard was recorded as paying tribute to the Armenian kingdom as the lord of Kalonoros. The ethnic identity of Kyr Vard is controversial. According to Osman Turan, he was Armenian; however, according to Claude Cahen and Rustam Shukurov, he was Greek. Although the ethnic identity of Kyr Vard is unclear, it is known that he was Christian. Hence, his daughter was born as a Christian and appears to have retained her religious identity after her marriage with ‘Alâ’ al-Din Kayqubâd I following his conquest of Kalonoros in 1221. Kyr Vard surrendered the city to ‘Alâ’ al-Din Kayqubâd and was appointed as the beg of Akşehir.

In contrast to the two other wives of ‘Alâ’ al-Din Kayqubâd, Mahpari Khatun seems to have lacked the independent wealth that comes from her family. One of ‘Alâ’ al-Din Kayqubâd’s other wives was al-Malika al-‘Adila who was the daughter of the Ayyubid sultan al-‘Âdil Abû Bakr b. Ayyub (r. 1200-1218). Another one was ‘Ismat al-Dunyâ wa’l-Dîn who was the daughter of Mughîth al-Dîn Tughrilshâh b. Qilij Arslan, the independent Seljuk ruler of Erzurum and ‘Alâ’al-Din Kayqubâd’s uncle. Even though ‘Alâ’ al-Din Kayqubâd had apparently designated one of his younger sons by al-Malika al-‘Adila to succeed to the throne, it was Ghiyâth al-Dîn Kaykhusraw who became the sultan following emirial negotiations after Kayqubad’s death by poisoning. Al-Malika al-‘Adila was subsequently strangled in Ankara, and her two sons, ‘Izz al-Dîn and Rukn al-Dîn, were imprisoned.

According to Bar Hebraeus’s reports, after the defeat of the Seljuq army by the Mongols in Kösedağ in 1243, Mahpari Khatun sought refuge in the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia. However, Baron Constantine, the effective ruler of Cilicia from whom Mahpari Khatun is said to have sought protection, surrendered her to the Mongol army. Mahpari Khatun was then carried into captivity and remained out of the Seljuk scene in Anatolia. If Bar Hebraeus writes as early as the 1250s, it seems that she had a long period of captivity. With this record, Mahpari Khatun’s visibility in textual sources comes to an end.

Mahpari Khatun did not emerge as a patron until after the death of her husband and the accession of her son as ruler. Antony Eastmond suggested that Mahpari Khatun’s patronage of a mosque complex was intended to erase her Christian past. In the inscription on her cenotaph and in the two portal inscriptions of the mosque, she is clearly depicted with the title Safwat al-Dunya wa ‘l-Dîn which indicates her non-royal background. For women born as Muslim princesses the preferred title was ‘Ismat al-Dunya wa ‘l-Dîn. Two other epithets used for Mahpari Khatun on her cenotaph were ‘Mary of her age’ and ‘the Khadija of her time,’ a dual reference to the mother of Jesus and the wife of the Prophet Muhammad. These two epithets could refer to Mahpari Khatun’s both Christian and Muslim identities.

Apart from her complex in Kayseri, Mahpari Khatun was also the patron of at least two caravanserais. One of these, known as the Hatun Han, is located on the road from Sivas to Amasya. It has a dedicatory inscription and is dated 1238-1239. The other caravanserai, Çinçinli Han (1239-1240?) is located in the region of Yozgat. The fragments of foundation inscription in Mahpari Khatun’s name found in nearby mosque may have belonged to the caravanserai.