GhiyÃÂsñ al-Dën Muḥammad (Persian: úÃÂçë çÃÂïÃÂààÃÂàï), also known as Muḥammad KhÃÂn (Turki/Kypchak: àÃÂàï îçÃÂ; Mamat-Sultan in Russian texts; died 1379), was Khan of the Golden Horde from 1370/1371 to 1379. He was a protégé of Mamai, a beglerbeg. While Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn was recognized as the khan throughout the territories dominated by his patron Mamai, he was in possession of the traditional capital Sarai only intermittently, in 1371âÂÂ1373, 1374, and perhaps briefly in 1375âÂÂ1376.
Based on the early readings of coin labels, Khan Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn was long identified as a supposed Khan Muḥammad-Bà «lÃÂq ("Muhammad-Bolaq," "Muhammed-Buljak"). This identification has had a long influence on subsequent historiography, but has been disproved by recent scholarship, which established that Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn is to be distinguished from his successor as Mamai's protégé, Tà «lÃÂk (Teljak, Tjuljak, Tetjak in Russian sources).
The ancestry of Khan Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn is nowhere precisely stated, and some scholars have supposed that he was a member of the line of Jochi's son Batu Khan, indeed a descendant of ÃÂz Beg Khan. But the line of Batu is said to have ended in 1359 with the death of Berdi Beg, who had eliminated his close male kindred as potential rivals. A plausible alternative is to identify Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn with Muḥammad, son of ÿAbdal (i.e., ÿAbdallÃÂh), son of MënkÃÂsar, son of AbÃÂy, son of Kay-Tëmà «r, son of Tà «qÃÂ-Tëmà «r, son of Jochi, listed by the Muÿizz al-ansÃÂb and TawÃÂrëḫ-i guzëdah-i nuá¹£rat-nÃÂmah. This would make Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn the son of his predecessor ÿAbdallÃÂh, also a protégé of Mamai, and one of the descendants of Tuqa-Timur, who are known to have settled in the Crimea, which was Mamai's power base.
When Khan ÿAbdallÃÂh died in 1370, the all-powerful beglerbeg Mamai replaced him on the throne with Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn, apparently the dead khan's son. In the words of the Nikon Chronicle, "In this year, the Horde prince Mamai installed for himself in the Horde a new Tsar, Mamat Sultan." The new khan was perhaps only about 9 years old. While coins began to be struck in his name at Orda (either a city or Mamai's camp), at the traditional capital Sarai Mamai apparently employed his own wife, Tulun Beg Khanum, the daughter of Berdi Beg Khan, as a stopgap ruler in 1370âÂÂ1371, before installing Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn there at the end of 1371 or beginning of 1372.
The narrative and numismatic sources provide fragmented and sometimes contradictory evidence about the khan's reign. Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn appears to have been recognized briefly at Sarai, while Mamai had Prince Dmitrij Konstantinoviàof Suzdal' advance on Bolghar and force the local ruler Ḥasan to recognize Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn as his khan. In the name of Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn, in 1370 Mamai issued a diploma of investiture (yarlik) with the Grand Principality of Vladimir for Prince Mihail Aleksandroviàof Tver', although the grand princely throne was occupied by Dmitrij Ivanoviàof Moscow. Mihail, however, failed to dislodge Dmitrij of Moscow, in both 1370 and 1371. It was also in Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn's name that Mamai gave trade privileges to the Polish city of Cracow in 1372.
More disappointment awaited Mamai, as his protégé Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn was chased out of Sarai in 1372 by Urus Khan, a distant cousin also descended from Jochi's son Tuqa-Timur, who had taken over the former Ulus of Orda in the eastern part of the Golden Horde. Urus Beg was expelled by a Shibanid, êl Beg, in 1374. Mamai seized the city again, and reinstated Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn later in 1374, before having to attend to the Lithuanian threat on his western frontier. Left to his own devices, Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn was expelled from Sarai once more by Urus Beg in 1374. These reverses eroded Mamai's authority over the Russian princes, and in 1374 Dmitrij of Moscow refused to recognize Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn as his overlord and to pay tribute to the khan and his beglerbeg. Mamai retaliated, by sacking Dmitrij's ally Novosil' and raiding the lands of Dmitrij's father-in-law Dmitrij of Suzdal'. On the death of Mamai's rival ḤÃÂjjë Cherkes in (old) Astrakhan in 1375, Mamai was able to induce the new ruler of the city to recognize Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn as khan. However, Mamai's subsequent attempt to displace Dmitrij of Moscow through Mihail Aleksandroviàof Tver' failed, again. At Sarai Urus Beg was replaced by QÃÂghÃÂn Beg, the son of êl Beg, who incited the Russian princes to force Bolghar into submission to him, rather than Mamai and Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn. Dmitrij of Moscow duly availed himself of this opportunity for plunder, blocking Mamai's way and sending Dmitrij of Suzdal' and Dmitrij MihajloviàVolynskij to attack Bolghar. They met with success, forcing the local ruler Asan (Ḥasan) to submit to QÃÂghÃÂn Beg in 1377. Khan Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn was present in Bolghar, and together with Ḥasan had to plead for peace and pay an indemnity to the Russian princes. For reasons that are unclear, his regular coinage at Orda ceased about this time, although coins continued to be minted in his name elsewhere, at Kungur, until 1379. While Mamai was able to use the subsequent dissent between the Russian princes and QÃÂghÃÂn Beg to defeat the forces of Suzdal' and sack Nià ¾nij Novgorod in 1377, he suffered a defeat at the hands of Dmitrij of Moscow at the Voà ¾a river in 1378.
Mamai's difficulties and Muḥammad-Sulá¹ÂÃÂn reaching more mature years may have led to tension between them, possibly reflected in the khan's absence in Bolghar in 1377 and the end of his coinage at Orda. Despite his embarrassing defeat at the hands of the Russian princes, Mamai still exercised complete control at the court of "his Tsar... who controlled nothing by himself in the Horde, and did not dare do anything before Prince Mamai." The Nikon Chronicle proceeds to relate that Mamai now murdered his own 18-year-old khan and his supporters, fearing the people's attachment to him. Whether this was so, Mamai replaced this khan with a new protégé, Tà «lÃÂk, in whose name a diploma of investiture was issued on 28 February 1379 for the would-be Russian Metropolitan Mihail (Mitjaj) on his way to Constantinople in 1379.
(as identified by Gaev 2002)