The first successor of Húlágú was his son Abáqá (or Abaqá), who was crowned on June 19, 1265, a date chosen as Abáqá, A.D. 1265-1282 auspicious by the famous astronomer and philo­sopher Naṣíru'd-Dín of Ṭús, whose brilliant scientific and dubious political achievements have been discussed in a previous volume. * His life was now drawing towards its close, but we hear of him once again five Last days and death of Naṣíru d-Dín of Ṭús years later, in 669/1270-1, when he was called in to treat Abáqá, who had been gored by a wild cow on one of his hunting expeditions. The wound suppurated and an abscess formed which none of the Íl-khán's other medical advisers dared to open. Naṣíru'd-Dín suc­cessfully performed the operation. He died in the following year at the age of seventy-five. Bar-Hebraeus gives him a brief but laudatory notice in his Mukhtaṣaru'd-Duwal, * describing him as “the Keeper of the Observatory at Marágha and a man of vast learning in all branches of philosophy.” “Under his control,” he continues, “were all the religious endowments in all the lands under Mongol rule. He com­posed many works on logic, the natural sciences and meta­physics, and on Euclid and the Almagest. He also wrote a Persian work on Ethics * of the utmost possible merit wherein he collected all the dicta of Plato and Aristotle on practical Philosophy, confirming the opinions of the ancients and solving the doubts of the moderns and the criticisms advanced by them in their writings.”

Abáqá was thirty-one years of age when he became ruler of Persia, and whether or no there was any truth in the rumour Abáqá favours the Christians that he was actually baptised into the Christian Church at the desire of his bride Despina, the natural daughter of Michael Palaeologus, * he consistently favoured the Christians, and, indeed, appears to have owed his elevation to the throne to their influence, exercised through Doquz Khátún, the widow of his father and predecessor Húlágú, who survived her husband about a year, and who never failed to befriend her co-religionists in every possible way. * Abáqá's diplomatic relations with the Popes and Christian kings of Europe are, however, in all probability to be ascribed rather to political than religious motives. He was in correspondence with Clement IV, who wrote him a letter from Viterbo in 1267; Gregory X in 1274; and Nicolas III, who in 1278 sent to him and to his over­lord the great Qúbiláy (“Kubla”) Khán an embassy of five Franciscan monks. One of his embassies even penetrated as far as England and was apparently received by Edward I, but the records of it seem to be scanty or non-existent. * The political object of these negotiations was to arrange for a combined attack on the still unsubdued Muslims of Egypt and Syria, the natural and deadly foes of the Mongols; and the inducement held out to the Christians was the possession of the Holy Land for which they had so long striven. Fortunately for the Muhammadans, Islám possessed in the Mamlúk Sulṭán Baybars, called al-Malik aẓ-Ẓáhir, a doughty champion well qualified to meet the double peril which menaced his faith and his country. Already in 1260, before he was elected king, he had driven Húlágú's Mongols out of Ghaza and routed them at 'Ayn Jálút, driven back the Crusaders in Syria, and broken the power of the Syrian branch of the Assassins; and in April, 1277, he inflicted on the Mongols another great defeat at Abulustayn, leaving nearly 7000 of them dead on the field of battle. * When Abáqá subsequently visited the battle-field, he was deeply moved, even to tears, by the numbers of the Mongol slain. Bitter hatred subsisted during all this period between the Mongol Íl-kháns and the Egyptian Mamlúks, and no more dangerous or damaging charge could be preferred against a subject of the former than an accusation of being in com­munication with the latter. Every Muslim subject of the Mongols must needs walk very warily if he would avoid such deadly suspicion, and, as we shall see hereafter, the favourite method of ruining a hated rival was to denounce him to the Mongol government as having relations with Egypt.

From our present point of view we are less concerned with the Mongol rulers and generals than with the Persian The Juwayní family functionaries whom they found indispensable in the civil service (like the Arabs in earlier times), and amongst whom were included men of remark­able talents. Conspicuous amongst these was the Juwayní family, notably Shamsu'd-Dín Muḥammad the Ṣáḥib-Díwán , his brother 'Alá'u'd-Dín 'Aṭá Malik, and his son Bahá'u'd-Dín. The Ṣáḥib-Díwán's grandfather, also en­titled Shamsu'd-Dín, but distinguished by the epithets Buzurg (“the Great”) and Múy-diráz (“the long-haired”), had been Prime Minister to Quṭbu'd-Dín Khwárazmsháh, while his father, Bahá'u'd-Dín, had held the office of Mustawfi'l-Mamálik (approximately equivalent to Chan­cellor of the Exchequer). He himself had held the office of Prime Minister for ten years under Húlágú Khán, and was continued in this position by Abáqá. His brother, 'Alá'u'd-Dín is chiefly interesting to us as one of the finest historians whom Persia ever produced, and in this capacity he will be considered in the next chapter; but he was also a great administrator, and was for twenty-four years gover­nor of Baghdád. * His son Bahá'u'd-Dín was governor of Persian 'Iráq and Fárs, while another son Sharafu'd-Dín Hárún was a poet and a patron of poets. * A full and critical account of this talented family, based on researches equally extensive and minute, is given by Mírzá Muḥammad of Qazwín, one of the finest and most critical Persian scholars whom I ever met, in his Introduction to the Ta'ríkh-i-Jahán-gushá (vol. i, pp. xix-xcii), to which the reader may refer for much detailed information which considerations of space render it impossible to reproduce here. The Juwayní family, alike in their love of literature and learning, their princely generosity, their administrative capacity, and their tragic fate, irresistibly recall to one's mind another great Persian family of statesmen, the celebrated House of Barmak or Barmecides of “the Golden Prime of good Haroun Alraschid.” * Their influence was great and wide­spread; their connection with literature, both as writers and as patrons of poets and men of learning, extensive; and the jealousy of less fortunate rivals which embittered their lives and finally brought about their destruction commen­surate with the power and high positions which they so long enjoyed. The first to die of those mentioned above, and one of the few who was fortunate enough to die a Death and char­acter of Bahá'u 'd-Dín Juwayní natural death, was Bahá'u'd-Dín, son of the Ṣáḥib-Díwán and governor of Persian 'Iráq. His death took place in 678/1279 at the early age of thirty. He was a terribly stern governor, who inspired the utmost terror in the hearts of his subjects, and whose ferocity went so far that he caused his little son, and he a favourite child, to be put to death by his executioner because in play he had caught hold of his beard. The historian Waṣṣáf gives many other instances of his implac­able sternness, of which a selection will be found in Howorth's History of the Mongols; * but it is fair to add that under his stern administration the utmost security prevailed in the provinces which he administered, while he eagerly cultivated the society of poets, scholars and artists. His father the Ṣáḥib-Díwán mourned his death in the following verse:

<text in Arabic script omitted>

“Muḥammad's son! Thy slave is Heaven high;
One hair of thee the Age's Mart might buy;
Thy Sire's support wert thou: bereft of thee
His back is bent as brow o'er beauty's eye.”

The following verse was composed by Hindúsháh to com­memorate the date of his death:

<text in Arabic script omitted>

“On the eve of Saturday the seventeenth of Sha'bán's month
In the year three score and eighteen and six hundred from the Flight *
From the world Bahá'u'd-Dín, that great wazír, in Iṣfahán
Fled. Ah, when on such another ruler shall Time's eyes alight?”

This was the first of the misfortunes which befel the Juwayní family, and which were largely due to their un- Misfortunes of Juwayní family grateful protégé Majdu'l-Mulk of Yazd, whose ambition led him to calumniate both the Ṣáḥib-Díwán and his brother 'Alá'u'l-Mulk 'Aṭá Malik. While still subordinate to the Ṣáḥib-Díwán, Majdu 'l-Mulk addressed to him the following quatrain: