Kwarazmian-Georgian War: Jalal al-Din’s Jihad

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:04]After three years of death and devastation at the hand of a singular Mongolian horde, the Georgian Empire kicked off the dust, brushed off each of their shoulders, and concluded that it couldn't get any worse than this.

[00:00:22]Soon enough, their brave, if not reckless, King George IV died from his battlefield wounds sustained while defending his capital of Tisi from the horse lords.

[00:00:34]With more migrations from the step caused by the Mongols in a general softening of the empire from a lack of manpower, George's 8-year-old bastard's son was skipped over in the line of succession. That is, if he even counted in the first place.

[00:00:51]A child and a group of regents could not lead an empire at such a high-risk moment. A civil war on account of his unsavory birth would surely mean its end. There was only one other option.

[00:01:05]One other Bagrition Subli that could lead the empire back to its former glory.

[00:01:12]The Darbazi Noble Council was summoned that day and they in a mostly unanimous decision chose the deceased king's younger sister.

[00:01:24]She would inherit the crown and become only the second ruling queen just ahead of her own mother. She was held in high regard as a second coming of Tamar the Great.

[00:01:38]Her name would be known far and wide throughout the caucuses and all the way to the cyine chapel in Rome, but not for any of the right reasons.

[00:01:48]Queen Rousidan would go down in history as perhaps Georgia's worst monarch and certainly Sakartell's least favorite queen.

[00:01:59]She would be just unlucky enough to preside over the fall of the empire that had been built by nine generations of her ancestors, her own brave but foolish brother included.

[00:02:11]The crows were here and simply waiting for more fields of bodies and arrows and anguish to pick at.

[00:02:20]Every golden age must meet its bloody conclusion.

[00:02:24]This being one of history's most extreme cases.

[00:02:33]Rousedan Bagioni was born 2 years after her own brother in 1194 AD. She was the second and last child of her mother, largely reported as Georgia's greatest queen and possibly greatest monarch, Tamar Meep. and her father, the warrior prince of Elenia himself, David Sauslin.

[00:02:56]From all accounts, Rousidan had won the genetic lottery just like her physically gifted brother had. She was said to have inherited all of her mother's looks and perhaps being even more beautiful than Tamar Meep herself.

[00:03:10]She appeared every bit the pretty face and authoritatively diplomatic voice that her mother was so expertly.

[00:03:18]I keep saying this and I'm going to continue to do so, but it remains true.

[00:03:23]Like her brother, she would develop certain morals that while not wholly evil, were certainly considered unqueenly at the time.

[00:03:33]Her first action as ruling Meep would cement these morals, and once again, she would mimic her older sibling. King George IV, his wounded and infectionfilled body, was traveling to Shervan to marry Rousidan to the Shiran Sha in order to secure the eastern edges of this Caucus' wide empire. But before they reached Baku, King George would die. This prompted the now Queen Rousidan to marry the man she might have been in love with for quite some time now.

[00:04:06]The man in question was named Guas Adin, a tall, handsome, strong youth held as a royal hostage at the Tlisi court, who had at some point caught Rousidan's eye.

[00:04:19]Guas was the son of one of George's own vessel subjects, Turril Shaw, the Sultan of Zarun. Rousidan prompted the marriage as well as Guas's own conversion to Georgian Orthodox Christianity.

[00:04:33]This was no small deal. Rarely did conversion and marriage mix, and even less so between a male Muslim to his more powerful and female Christian.

[00:04:44]It doesn't take much to see how this just doesn't make sense in the faith of Islam and especially at this time. Guas likely wanted to accept, but this was huge. So, he left the choice on his conversion up to his own father. to girl Shaw responded excitedly, accepting the marriage and his son's queenly and Christian lover. I mean, he would be stupid not to marry who was one of the most powerful queens in the world at this point.

[00:05:12]The Darbazi, seeing how well it worked when they didn't let George marry his own peasant-born mistress, decided to just let Rousidan marry the guy. He was still of noble birth after all. And his marriage isn't completely useless.

[00:05:28]Guasadin would change his name to the Georgian Dimmitri after accepting his new faith. And it was clear that Rousidan was the one who wore the pants in this relationship. First off, he converted to Christianity, which looks strange enough, but he was also considerably younger than Queen Rousidan. While she was 29, the now Dimmitri was only 17 years old. She was a cougar, sugar mama, and Dimmitri was some candy to wear on her arm. Perhaps Rousidan did this on purpose to exert full control on her part as queen. Or perhaps she really did love the teenage hostage at Tlisi's court. On top of this, the wouldbe king consort Dmitri was never treated with that respect, which should have been assured to him as Rousidan's own mother had given to her father, David Sauslin.

[00:06:21]In no source is Dmitri denoted as a king or even a consort in any form. Rousedan wanted all the power for herself, it appears. Or maybe the Georgian Darbazi did have a real problem with a Turkish king ruling over them, which I suppose is fair enough.

[00:06:40]Despite my shit-talking nature, when I see a happy relationship, Rousidan would end up giving birth to two children in 2 years. like her mother, one boy and one girl.

[00:06:52]Firstborn would take her grandmother's name, Tamar. The other would take her father's name, David.

[00:07:00]This latter name was only given for the express purpose of confusing future historians.

[00:07:08]Kidding. But seriously, there was already a fully alive Prince David of Georgia. Kind of. King George's bastard son, who was actively being raised by Rousidan herself. Why she did this does baffle me, but I see one reason. She meant to quite literally replace her nephew so he may never gain the throne, replacing the bastard with a legit heir in all, including the name itself.

[00:07:34]This would end up going just about as well as you think it might, but that's a story for another day.

[00:07:41]Rousedan had found her love and that was great. But she had married into a not so powerful vassel, meaning she missed out on a possible alliance. But also this left the east and specifically Sheervan still vulnerable to another Mongolian attack. But please, the Mongols were long gone. The east didn't need completely secured because those Tartars, as Rousidan may have called them, were simply not going to come back. King George had scared them off and they were thousands of miles away.

[00:08:14]There was no way they would travel all this way from their homeland again just to combat with some mountaineers who had shown themselves at least resilient.

[00:08:23]Sure, they annihilated two Georgian armies and killed their king with ease, but this was a random event, a long raid that would surely never happen again. I hope you feel my sarcasm.

[00:08:35]So confident was Rousidan that she actually wrote to the Pope himself.

[00:08:41]Here she apologized to him on her brother's behalf for him failing to reach the Levant and by extension his promise to join the fifth crusade.

[00:08:51]She completely played off the great Mongol raid much of Georgia and Armenia had endured the utter lying audacity.

[00:09:00]But I suppose why not lie to the one dude who can help you but can never punish you. Ending the letter basically saying, "Yeah, we drove off those Tartars and they are never coming back.

[00:09:10]And even though we just lost nearly 100,000 men on the battlefields to them, we will immediately send an army of 40,000 to the Holy Land." It's not like Georgia was dangerously low on manpower or anything.

[00:09:23]Luckily for everyone involved, Pope Henorius III rejected this far more than generous and potentially empirethreatening offer.

[00:09:32]Queen Rousidan had just blown the one chance that Europe and the Middle East had to prepare for a Mongolian attack.

[00:09:40]But like her brother, Rousidan exuded confidence in an extreme degree.

[00:09:46]Although she used her words instead of a mace and lived a little longer only because of that.

[00:09:53]Like so many rulers in Georgian history, from the start of her reign, Queen Rousedan was looked on as a rebuilder, someone who would restore Georgia to much brighter days, cancelling out the years of the great raid. This role Rousidan filled, but she needed help in that matter. It is at this point where we introduce the new most powerful man in Georgia because it certainly wasn't Queen Rousidan's young stallion, but a much older and experienced breed in the form of Ivan Zakarion, Adabbeg of Georgia and commander of the army, or what was left of it at this point. Ivan had been Adabbeg for a decade and always proved himself to be the most loyal of subjects. His general ship, despite going on a recent losing streak against the Mongols, which understandable, was still wellknown, being a strategic thinker who preferred a cautious approach to warfare. While the Mongolian invasion devastated much of Ivan's native Armenia in modern-day Azerbaijan, only one province officially left the Georgian Empire.

[00:11:03]Adabbeg Usuzbck, ruler of the once mighty Eldusid Empire, and then was forced to go at it alone politically when they simply left.

[00:11:15]Usuzbck had already betrayed King George a time or two before this and was expected to rejoin the Georgian realm as the coward had before.

[00:11:23]But this time, the Georgians couldn't catch him.

[00:11:27]With Adabbeg versus Adabbeg, Ivan invaded Usuzbck's lands and started making way for his capital at Treze.

[00:11:35]But somehow someway, Ivan Zakarian, a man who had traversed the length of northern Iran on campaign in his youth, took a wrong turn down some mountain passes on the way there, and ended up lost at a dead end. This messed up the whole campaign as the Georgians ran out of food while making their escape back north.

[00:11:58]Usuzbck hadn't lifted a finger and the Georgians just beat themselves.

[00:12:03]This is just a bad look on the part of Ivan Zakarion. Literally, all he had to do was properly look at a map. To Breeze was not that hard to get to. Hopefully, this was just a fluke because with the absence of the Mongols and the path of destruction they left to and fro, there came the people they had misplaced along the way. The Kipjacks kept raiding Georgia as they had immediately when the Mongols left. But the Mongols made them less of a serious threat. Rather, they were more of a raiding nuisance.

[00:12:37]But there was one man in particular, one warrior, prince, and wouldbe Shaw who wanted nothing more than revenge in the form of exterminating the Mongols who had taken his inheritance and killing anyone and everyone who may have gotten in the way of these lofty ambitions.

[00:12:58]The name of this young conqueror would go down in history as one of few leaders to actually beat one of Genghis Khan's Mongol hordes Fair and Square not once but multiple times.

[00:13:12]This was the soontobe notorious Jalal Aldin Quarzam Sha.

[00:13:22]Only 20 years old when the Mongols destroyed the Quoresmian Empire and set his father and he running to the ends of the world. Jalal Alin was the real deal and is truly the second Alexander the Great as his father was so famously and inaccurately called.

[00:13:42]After fighting the Mongols as they paged Quorum's greatest cities, Jalal retreated until finally making his final stand. He beat the Mongols once as he neared toward the Indian subcontinent.

[00:13:54]But all this did was summon Chingaskhan himself.

[00:13:58]He could cut the head off the snake right here. And although outnumbered and with his back quite literally against the Indis River, Jalal decided to make one last stand instead of run. Of course, this underdog would lose against the Great Khan and retreated by jumping off a cliff and into the river below.

[00:14:21]Chingis Khan's soldiers could have at least shot at Jalal and probably killed him here, but the Khan gave the order to hold their fire.

[00:14:30]Chingis was in this position himself not too long ago and probably would have appreciated not getting shot at as he had ran for his life.

[00:14:40]I think Chingis knew Jal, the more than capable and young commander that he was, would come back with a similar vengeance to himself in Mongolia.

[00:14:50]And the Khan liked nothing more than to cause havoc wherever the Mongols touched but could not fully conquer. And Jalal had the potential to be a great agent of chaos.

[00:15:03]And so the exiled prince stayed in India for some time managing to reather an army and start fighting his way back to the top of the food chain in the warrior ridden area that is the Punjab.

[00:15:18]After a few years of roughing it, the wouldbe Sha could not establish himself in India. Perhaps the culture was too different or perhaps Jalal was just too bloodthirsty.

[00:15:30]This guy would just make it a habit to take out whole Indian armies seemingly for fun. An action that would grant him a lack of friends, but would train his craft for the real challenge that lay ahead.

[00:15:43]With informants and still loyal subjects in Iran, hearing the Mongols were now gone, Jalal took his rag tag band of experienced and diverse soldiery and crossed the Indis River. Not as a fleeing coward this time, but as a conqueror.

[00:16:01]He would reform the Quarresmian Empire and drive those Mongols back to Siberia when the moment came.

[00:16:10]Jalal's own brother had fortified Esvahan in northern Iran and invited him back in which the Sha would arrive in 1224.

[00:16:19]This revived Corezian Empire would start off with a border. A border with none other than Adabbeg Usuzbck of the Elder Guzits, a man who claimed to be an ally of Jal's own father, but like everyone he pledged himself to would eventually betray. Adabuzbck was in no position to beat the man who beat the Mongols. So he did what he did best. He abandoned his family, practically surrendering them to Jalal and ran for the hills.

[00:16:49]The Corzamshaw took all the things Usuzbach had left, marrying his own wife for legitimacy before taking to Breeze and making it the neoquarzesmian capital, slaughtering much of the populace of the city when they revolted shortly after, looking more like post Mongol Ergen than the flourishing step metropolis he had grown up in. As for Adabuz Usuzbck, the last of the Eldaguza dynasty, who for a short period controlled nearly all of Iran and even more than that, would meet his end ironically inside one of the Caucus' mountains most impregnable fortresses, Alinda Tower. But don't worry, he found out his wife married Jalal Dean before his death. Usuzbck was a traitor and more than deserving of punishment, sure, but this is just cold-blooded, man.

[00:17:39]Turning ice in his veins when Usuzbck's widow ended up dead shortly after her forced marriage. This could have been suicide, I suppose, but Jalal had already proven himself more than capable of such unscrupulous actions.

[00:17:52]Anything goes in the post Mongolian invasion of the Caucuses.

[00:17:57]With Usuzbck's lands conquered and his dynasty ended, just on the other side of his territory rested extreme wealth in Mongolian leftovers.

[00:18:07]In the form of the still recovering kingdom and empire of Georgia, the Quoresmians and Georgians nearly came to blows with Usuzbck caught in the middle.

[00:18:17]Had King George Lasha and Sham Muhammad II fought, I can only see an epic alternate history and a legendary war for those involved.

[00:18:26]But now all three of these men, titans of their time, even Usuzbck as a vassel, were dead and gone. Jalal Alaldine would do what his father never got a chance to. He would make war on those most eastern of Christians and bring them into the regrowing Quorasmian sphere of influence.

[00:18:47]Beyond even that sphere of growing infamy was the Quorasam Sha's soldiers which were incredibly diverse and even more experienced on an elite level that likely only the Mongols could truly match. This near nomadic horde some tens of thousands strong had traveled from the Hindu Kush to Ganja and everywhere in between that.

[00:19:11]Meanwhile, Georgia's finest were slaughtered with their king, and an army of old men and green boys would have likely been the file in rank. Not only this, but they were forced to hire mercenaries and rely on soldiers from the peripheries of their empire.

[00:19:26]In fact, there was already 30,000 men ready to take the fight to the east.

[00:19:31]Ivan Zakarion was to take another shot at reigning in Adabuzbck, but was obviously beaten to the punch by the quarrezum shaw. Now the two armies were on a crash course.

[00:19:44]Ivan, who had served three separate monarchs with the utmost loyalty, was likely an old man by 1225. And while he seemed to be no pushover, the guy was still on a losing streak as of late.

[00:19:57]There's always time for his luck to turn around, even if Ivan was the one doing the turning around.

[00:20:04]Before any rash action, Jalal Aline actually gave the Georgians a chance to ponder this fight. With the Mongols inevitable return that somehow only Jalal knew would happen, he would have rather found himself a massive ally in Georgia than a war that would leave both limp and lonely.

[00:20:23]He asked Rousidan to fully submit to himself or face certain consequences.

[00:20:29]Rousedan in her typical cocky writing style rejected the offer and made her mistake when she mentioned how the Mongols had killed his father and destroyed his country. While the Mongols had left Georgia and were driven out, quotation marks driven out just as they would drive out Jalal.

[00:20:48]Queen Rousidan, if good for anything, can deliver a mic drop letter with the best of them.

[00:20:56]Of course, this utterly infuriated the short-tempered Shaw, who was now ready to simply wipe Georgia off the map.

[00:21:05]Rousedan raised the empire's banners, but surely this exiled prince of near nothing that was Jalal Aline couldn't be as unbeatable as the Mongols had been.

[00:21:15]Yet, she had miscalculated.

[00:21:18]Even with the post Mongol hangover, the expansive Georgian Empire could still muster a force of over a 100,000 men.

[00:21:25]But Rousedan only gave Ivan another 30,000 or so, if that, meaning Jalalin and Ivan Zakarion would meet on near equal footing, with the Shaw having a slight numbers and major experience advantage.

[00:21:41]But sure, the Georgians have done way more against way worse odds with way less. So the queen was not worried.

[00:21:50]The Corasm Shaw started marching through southern Armenia. Resistance was futile as he made way to a very symbolic and highly defendable place in Armenian history.

[00:22:02]Here the fate of the Caucuses would be decided with the old gods watching from the hillside village of Garnney, home to numerous natural wonders, including the Garnier Gorge, which were rock cliffs of basalt columns. Then to top it off was an Acropolis that looks like it's straight out of classical Greece built by the first Armenian king from the Arsida dynasty and dedicated to Mir the sun god. Although firmly Christians now, the Georgians and their Armenian brothers would need all the gods they could get to be rid of Jalaline.

[00:22:37]Upon Ivan seeing the scale of his opponent's army, I bet 70,000 more soldiers looked really good right about now. But it was now or never. Make or break and stop them at the gates.

[00:22:51]The Battle of Garnney was probably the most poorly planned in the whole of Ivan Zakarion's long military career. And this is the same guy who fell off his freaking horse in front of a besieged city, got himself captured, and got his ransom paid to the tune of 100,000 dinars.

[00:23:08]Basically, the Georgians would hold off the Corasmians along the cliffs and hills just to the east of Garnney. But Jalal was too wise to fall into this attacking uphill trap. So Ivan would only send a quarter of his army to hold the RGEL line, appearing more like the local defense force.

[00:23:25]These 20,000 or so soldiers would be under the command of the Aklas Kelly brothers, whose name was also Ivan and then Shiava, two of George's most trusted and at this point most senior nobles, as well as bannermanmen to the Zakarians themselves.

[00:23:43]Meanwhile, Adabag Ivan and the main army would hide in a nearby forest and wait for either brother to signal for Ivan to circle around and hit Jalal's army from behind while the Quesmians were being held off at the ridge.

[00:23:57]How exactly Ivan planned to encircle a highly immobile force without being seen in time to be cut off remains a mystery to me. But sure, desperate times do call for desperate measures, and Jalal would never be able to guess such a foolish battle plan.

[00:24:13]I just feel like nine times out of 10, you ambush with the smaller part of your army and not the majority of it.

[00:24:20]Otherwise, you'll get caught and there is no ambush. But what do I know?

[00:24:27]Sometime in August of 1225, the battle of Garnney would begin with Jalal Alin Quarzam Sha falling exactly into the trap laid out in front of him. The Alaselli brothers held out against the initial charge, holding their high ground as if their lives depended on it.

[00:24:45]The brothers somehow stabilized this front line as a brutal melee ensued.

[00:24:51]Both sent their own separate messengers to give Ivan the signal.

[00:24:56]But there Ivan would remain. His army unflinching, unmoving, not so unlike the basalt columns beside them.

[00:25:06]Perhaps Ivan Zakarion saw something the Alasellis did not. Maybe Jalal was fully expecting an ambush. Or maybe the old Adabbeg was simply too chicken [ __ ] to risk himself and his entire army here.

[00:25:20]Shelva and Ivan now frantically sent more messengers as their front lines began to falter. Finally, after so much fear, Ivan made his move in the opposite direction.

[00:25:36]Adabbeg Ivan Zakarian, the head general of all of Georgia, abandoned his own bannermanmen to their most certain death, along with so many sons of the Georgian Empire.

[00:25:48]The brothers still had enough time to save their own skin, but they held that ridge for the army and man that had abandoned them. They could never win, but they made Jalal earn every inch of Garnney. Eventually, the brothers called for their own retreat and began running, hoping to catch up to that cowardly Zakarion.

[00:26:09]Ivan Alasali had only one path for his escape. He had to scale a boulder infested cliffside.

[00:26:18]He climbed and climbed until one of his own soldiers made the wrong hand move and sent a large rock cascading down to the ground below, smacking Ivan on the way down. And if that did not kill him, then the fall certainly did the rest.

[00:26:35]That's some real Tom and Jerry [ __ ] in a shameful way for one of Armenia's greatest warriors to go out.

[00:26:42]For Shiava, his route of escape was much flatter and instead of uphill, it was down. He had the best chance to escape, but it was not in Shia to run while so many of his own were slaughtered behind him. With a small group of brave men, Shelva fought his retreat, allowing for the escape of much of his flank. The group fought until only Shiava remained.

[00:27:07]Heavily wounded, he would not put down his sword. Eventually, he was exhausted and could lift it no longer. There he was captured and brought before the Quarzam Sha.

[00:27:19]This fighting action immediately bought him the respect of Jalalin. Shava Alatelli would go down in history as the man who killed 200 Turks and complained that no one, not even Ivan Zakarion, would fight with him. Had there been 200 Shalvas, the battle of Garnney might have just ended differently.

[00:27:41]He was a hostage of great value, being the treasurer and master of ceremonies at court. The quarrezum shaw planned to use him as an intermediary and a pawn to convince Rousidan to his side. As Shia healed from his near mortal wounds, he actually became something of friends with Jalal and was treated as an honored guest.

[00:28:04]He also made other friends inside that war camp, finding a person or persons to covertly send letters to Rousidan, informing his countrymen of enemy war plans.

[00:28:15]If the Aaselli were anything, they were brave to a fault and gained respect through that. These brothers had always been on the very front of the line since the days of David Sausland's great victories some 20 years ago. Something Ivan Zakarion may have just been utterly jealous of or at least fearful of.

[00:28:36]There's only one reason in my mind that Ivan abandoned Georgia's bravest to their early graves.

[00:28:42]Ivan was an old man. The brothers Aaselli were at their peak. Ivan's nephew and son were mostly untested and certainly young. In order for the next generation of Zakarians to claim the title of Adabbeg and Marshall, respectively, the Sunless Shia and the singular son Ivan had to go.

[00:29:03]Once again, court politics would tear the Georgian army apart and much more than that.

[00:29:10]For his cowardice, Ivan was disgraced and while not stripped of his lands, he did lose the title of Adabag, which keep in mind was made for him. He was taken out of the command of the army, instead leaving that to his son, the now Adabag of Vog Zakarian.

[00:29:27]You know, I really liked Ivan Zakary and Mikartzelli at the beginning of his career, but let me just say his brother Zakar was way more talented, at least as a general. Ivan was a tutor to Kings and maybe played a good role in the classroom, but now that I think about how George and Rousedan turned out, I'm not super sure about that either.

[00:29:50]From here, Jalah would take the symbolic Garnney in much of southern Armenia, at least in the countryside, with the cities of Annie under the leadership of Ivan Zakarian's nephew, Shaun Shazakarian holding out along with Kalot under the nominal rule of Ivan Zakarian's own daughter, Tamaha, who had married the usually absent Aayub ruler of the city. And then there was cars, formerly owned by Ivan Akaselli, but now under his son David.

[00:30:20]But completely, unexpectedly, with nothing but advantage ahead of them, the Quoresmians turned around, another rebellion broke out into breeze, which Jalal easily subdued again, thereby deciding to stay in the city to celebrate Ramadan, giving the Georgians some breathing room. And what did Rousidan do with this free time?

[00:30:43]Absolutely nothing. Another army was not gathered. Instead, every province of the empire was instructed to fend for themselves.

[00:30:53]A strategy that only made the job much easier for the return of the Corores Shaw in 1226.

[00:31:00]Both sides wanted peace, knowing full well their matched numbers. A ceasefire was called with half of Armenia still under Quarresmian occupation.

[00:31:11]Adabag of auxicarian personally met Jalalaldin in a scene that couldn't be any more fitting for reasons that would soon become ironic at a bridge that crossed the demilitarized Harzden River.

[00:31:25]Their armies on either bank. This conversation was a short one.

[00:31:31]Jalal proposed an alliance between Georgia and the neoquaresmian Empire, if only to combat the Mongolian hordes together. Avag found himself in agreement. Neither Quarisma nor Georgia could defeat the Mongols without one or the other. Then the Sha suggested something so incredibly ridiculous that Avag could not even answer for his country or his queen.

[00:31:55]He wished for Rous Sidan to divorce her husband, the father of Georgia's young heir, and marry the possibly wife killing Jalal Aline in his third marriage. And that was simply a bridge too far.

[00:32:10]Rousedan of course rejected this, but again she talked her usual trash in letter form. Jalal, you and your father both ran from the Mongols. How can I trust and marry a coward and the son of one?

[00:32:23]Once again furious, Jalaline crumbled this letter, threw it in the fire, and decided to show the Georgians a fate much worse than the Mongols.

[00:32:33]He was going to make this empire his, and he was going to rid the Caucuses of the Christians who clung on to their cliffside churches.

[00:32:42]Jalal was going on his own jihad of sorts, and the infidels would convert or face death a Christian. He had already mostly cleared the way to Tlisi. All he had to do now was take that ancient city from its many defenders on its old walls.

[00:33:00]Jalal decided to split his army into bands of 5 to 10,000 men and sent them to raid all over Sakartelloo. North, south, and west were all looted.

[00:33:12]This was a diversionary action as the Cororazam Shaw himself went all the way to the coast of the Black Sea in abcasia which had previously been untouched by the Mongols, matching this region to the others, plundering all the way.

[00:33:28]Then he turned around and it is here that the recovered but still hostage Shava Akaselli got his final secret letter out to Rousidan. And just in the nick of time, he told his lege that despite what it may have appeared, Jalal was coming for Tlisi very soon. Shortly after this, someone snitched on Shia. And despite gaining the friendship of the Corzamshaw, he was given the choice that so many innocent non-combatants were soon to be given.

[00:34:01]Convert or die.

[00:34:06]Even when facing death itself, the brave shave would lead from the front and be the first of many martyrs in this quoresmian invasion of Georgia. For this, he was canonized as a saint. His legacy still lives on to this day. The popular folk song Shave Lego was dedicated to him and is still sang. It is a song of resistance used during the Soviet occupation and the modern-day protests against the Russian puppet government.

[00:34:35]Rousidan luckily took Shelva's last words to heart.

[00:34:41]She took her court, evacuated Slissi, and moved west to the previous capital city at the much more defensible Coutasi.

[00:34:50]Many people, Georgians included, see this as an act of utter cowardice. But we have to think, these same people forget that Rousidan was the one thing Jalal needed to claim all of Georgia for himself. If she was captured, Jalal would forcefully marry her and Georgia would be his that easily.

[00:35:12]Arused didn't just leave Tisia alone to face the seemingly jihading Jalal.

[00:35:17]The Dariel Pass which separated Georgia from the many tribes of the northern Caucuses was opened and through it were summoned these hearty mountain warriors.

[00:35:27]Lesgans, Allens, Chetchkins, and Ingush all answered the call to defend a city most had never even seen.

[00:35:36]To lead this defense were another pair of brothers. The disgraced Jacqu Kelly brothers, who had disobeyed Rousidan's mother and befriended her brother, were finally given the chance to reprove their loyalty. A victory meant a total pardon and a return to glory.

[00:35:54]If Tlisi was going to fall, Menma and Batso Jacelli with their Mountaineer warriors at their side would not go down without a fight.

[00:36:04]At this point, even as the Georgian Golden Age was being snuffed out, Tlisi was still one of the wealthiest cities in the world and hadn't had a proper sacking for more than a few centuries.

[00:36:16]churches, mosques, hot springs, and the center of trade in the caucuses. And beyond that were the city's claim to riches.

[00:36:27]On the 8th of March, 1226, one of those roaming, raiding bands of Coresians arrived at the gates, and that night brought the fight to the defenders.

[00:36:38]Scaling ladders were thrown from the walls as Menma and Batau pushed back their foe with a fury of tens of thousands.

[00:36:46]Little did they know that this was all just part of the plan. As dawn broke on one of the most infamous days in Georgian history, March 9th of 1226, it appeared the Coresmians had left a few thousand exposed in their camp just outside the city's gates. "This would be easy picking," thought the Jelly brothers as they sied out to defeat their besiegers on the field.

[00:37:12]But just as their soldiers engaged the Quarresmian camp, Jalaladin and the whole of the Cororezmian cavalry thundered towards them. He had tricked them. And now the Jaelli ran back as fast as they could, hoping to beat the horses in a race to the open gates.

[00:37:31]Half the garrison was left in the field to buy time for the whole city.

[00:37:36]But just as the brothers made it through the gates, a local Muslim took advantage of the confusion and struck down Menma Jacelli.

[00:37:45]Tlisi was and remains to this day one of the most diverse cities in the world.

[00:37:50]Linguistically, ethnically, and most certainly religiously. In fact, at this time, Muslims and Christians were near equal in number. And with the Muslim Corism shot at their gates, the Sons of Islam revolted with Menma being their first victim. As Batu and what was left of these ragtag defenders made it back to the safety of the inner fortress named Asani, they destroyed a bridge on the way to block their path. Meanwhile, the Muslims of the city kept the gates open for Jalal Aline to storm his entire army through. As the city fell, Batau knew he had done all he could. They might both be dead now or close to it, but the Jacqueli brothers had redeemed themselves. They couldn't save the city, but one went down with it, and the other had one more chance to save the civilians. Asani was truly a tough nut to crack, even with only a few hundred in defense of it. Bots held his own until he saw the lengths at which the Coresians were ravaging, he surrendered, hoping this would spare his fellow Christians.

[00:38:58]For this his life was spared and he would go on to live to an old ripe age.

[00:39:04]But he would never be truly redeemed.

[00:39:07]His surrender had no impact on what Jalal Alin was about to do.

[00:39:12]As the city was utterly looted and ransacked, any who resisted were killed on the spot, while those who fled and surrendered were all gathered as if they were a flock of sheep to the Turks.

[00:39:23]Here the Christian populace would be gathered at the end of the MKI bridge where they were forced to watch as the cross that adorned the dome of Cion Cathedral was thrown down clanking onto the bridge below.

[00:39:37]Then the Corasmians collapsed the dome itself and looted the church. Jalal Aline then made his throne where the dome once stood. A little overcompensation if you ask me.

[00:39:49]Priceless relics from all over the city's many churches, including Sioni, gathered from hundreds of years of history were piled up, covering the length of the Mitaki Bridge.

[00:40:01]As the Christians watched, their pastors held firm in the front. Horrified, I'm sure, but staying strong if not for the faith itself.

[00:40:13]Jalal Aldine walked over the relics to meet these thousands of Christians. He informed them to convert to Islam, spit on, and then walk over their very own religious relics to prove it, and cross the bridge.

[00:40:30]The choice at the end was convert or die.

[00:40:39]If you know anything about the Georgians as a people, then you should already know how many crossed the bridge on that fateful day.

[00:40:47]The holy men led by example, unflinching until their heads rolled from their shoulders.

[00:40:54]Parents urged their children to cross, but the children stood between mother and father. Jalal Aline's plan conversion fell through as head after head was lobbed from what could have been his new subjects.

[00:41:08]As these men, women, and children were executed for their own faith, their bodies were dumped into the Cura River, which began to run red, and by some accounts stayed that way for two whole weeks.

[00:41:25]Some say 10,000 Christians were killed on this day. Others say 100,000.

[00:41:33]Regardless, every single one of them would be remembered as a martyr and a saint.

[00:41:40]The 100,000 martyrs of Tlisi would be remembered forever as likely the largest Christian massacre in history up until this point and would remain that way for quite some time. The feast day of these 100,000 is coincidentally enough on Halloween day.

[00:41:57]The Mitki bridge is still used as a point of protest to this day. somewhere you can stand shoulderto-shoulder with an ancestors ghost to fight the forces that wish to subdue the Cartellian people.

[00:42:11]It represents the stubborn nature of the Georgians better than anything else could.

[00:42:18]No matter how many were truly martyed, only more would be added. As Jalalin left the ransack city to finish his conquest of Armenia's three holdout cities, he installed one Sharaf Al-Muk as governor who took the fight beyond Tisi's peripheries, raiding all the way to Tao and even Urzeroom and not so far from Rousidan's Coutasian retreat. Here, Governor Sherov enslaved so many Christians that the price of slaves throughout the Middle East drastically fell.

[00:42:51]As Jalaladine was trying and somehow failing to take the surrounded cars, Annie and Kot, the greatest news from the east was sounded.

[00:43:03]Changing Khan, the man who had taken everything from a young and helpless Jalal was dead.

[00:43:09]The Mongol army that was actively marching towards the Caucuses, halted, turned around for Ulan Bar for a coral tie and the election of a new con.

[00:43:20]The Mongols would return, but now Jalal had at least a few years to prepare for what would be that infamous meeting.

[00:43:30]Sheriff Al- Mulk did nothing to heal Tissi from the gaping religious wound that Jalal had ripped through the city.

[00:43:37]And life, even for the Muslim and Jewish population, only got worse, more strict, and embracing a martial law.

[00:43:46]Now the very Muslims who had killed Menma Jacelli and held the gates open to the Sha were regretting their decision.

[00:43:54]Tli was a free city where everyone lived in relative harmony despite their many differences.

[00:44:02]The citizens Muslim and Christian alike now begged for the return of their queen Rousidan to return to the capital. But while all these atrocities were going down, Rousidan was, let's just say, a little busy in the royal bed chambers of Kazi, Queen Rousidan was caught in bed with a Turkish slave soldier by her own husband.

[00:44:28]Guasadin immediately divorced the queen, converted back to Islam, and joined Jalalin's army. here. He informed the Corasmians everything he knew about the Kingdom of Georgia's plans, strengths, and weaknesses.

[00:44:44]But when we talk about a medieval female in any position of power who committed infidelity, I feel like we should always take that with a grain of salt. After all, let's just compare the number of female historians to males in that same time period. I'm not saying it didn't happen. I mean, Rousidan did have an eye for Turkish men, but all I'm saying is Guas's own brother in Özar was forced vaselized by Jalal at around the same time. So, would this cheating have that effect? Or was it the scapegoat for Guas to join the winning side?

[00:45:16]In my personal opinion, seeing as Rousidan gained the nickname of the maiden king from her Muslim allies and enemies alike, I find it likely she was acting more like a king than a queen.

[00:45:30]While her mother Tamar embodied feminine traits in her much kinder style of ruling, Rousidan made her husband her subordinate and cheated on him. This somehow probably gained the respect of her Muslim contemporaries as the queen acted much more like a king in these gender roles. Without getting too far into the gender thing, the now reconverted Guasadin after spilling all the beans was frustrated by the Quorasam Shaw. Guas's brother's ally was the Aayubid ruler of Kalot which Jalal tried but simply could not take. He tried again in 1227 after promising Guas that he would not.

[00:46:09]For this, Guas returned to his cheating wife in Coutazi and rather embarrassingly converted back to Christianity, becoming a double agent, revealing Jalal's hand and begged for his own wife's hand back. Rousedan listened to Guas as an informant telling her that fear alone was the only thing holding Tlisi in Quarasmian hands. But after this he was exiled and is never heard from again.

[00:46:35]Rousidan was a total player. This was not the only sexual deviants Rousidan has claimed to have been a part of, but this would be her first and last husband.

[00:46:45]any more children could be a death sentence to her now fatherless son and supposed to be future king.

[00:46:53]Ultimately, Guas's absence had no impact on this story and that is just a sad cuck moment.

[00:47:01]In February of 1227, just as the winter was ending, a Georgian army descended from the mountains with the melting snow behind them. They were welcomed back into Tlisi as liberators.

[00:47:14]Sharaf Al-Nulk was executed while the Christians and Muslims of the city mended their wounds and differences under the Bagrion banner, both now adored as saviors from Jalal's jihad.

[00:47:28]There would be an early and unseasonably warm spring that year, and a very silent one for Tisi.

[00:47:36]Upon learning that the city had thrown its gates open to the Georgians as they had for him, the Coresam Shaw returned with much hatred and frustration in his heart.

[00:47:47]As he approached that jewel of the Caucuses, that city of hot springs got even hotter.

[00:47:55]Billowing smoke filled the banks of the Cira River until reaching the cliffs overlooking the city.

[00:48:02]Jalal would not be welcomed back into DLI with open arms through the front door and onto his throne adorned church this time around because every single gate was part of the inferno. A pile of burning rubble being the only thing left to give him a warm welcome.

[00:48:19]If the Georgians and their group of diverse friends couldn't call the city home, if the bagion couldn't rule from their capital, then nobody would.

[00:48:28]Jalalin could only watch as the city and his hopes of ruling it burned itself out.

[00:48:35]Here he became Napoleon in Moscow.

[00:48:40]He had the city, but he didn't have the queen. And it was clear that after 100,000 martyrs, fire and sword that the Georgians would never be ready to roll over and give up. At least not to him.

[00:48:54]There is of course another version of this story where an anger Jalal lights the fire himself turning Tissi into his old Urgent and himself into the Mongolian threat he vowed to destroy.

[00:49:05]Regardless of who set the hellfire the relics of the Georgian golden age from churches, architecture, marketplaces, manuscripts, paintings, fresco, and more all went up in flames in a black smoke.

[00:49:19]The Georgian Golden Age with the city at the heart of it. after enduring for more than an entire century was now officially over.

[00:49:30]And who else would have the final say but the Cartellians themselves.

[00:49:36]While the days of David IVth, George III, and Tamar Mep were fading, while the ashes settled, for the Georgians, as we all well know, the fight was never truly over.

[00:49:47]It would take another h 100red years to reclaim a remnant of this age of god, gold, and glory.

[00:49:53]The burning of Tlisi would end up causing enough distraction for Jalal to turn back to inner Iran to deal with the return of the only thing he feared more than a city he himself didn't burn.

[00:50:04]After selecting Ogodai as great Khan, the Mongols were back to subdue the Middle East in full force.

[00:50:12]After making war for his entire adult life, Jalal had become the agent of chaos in the region Chingis Khan had always hoped he would be. The Corzamshaw wanted to create an anti- Mongolian coalition. But all he did was make just as many enemies.

[00:50:30]As the Mongols beat him in the east, Jal went back to running. Not toward India, but back into the occupied portion of the Georgian Empire.

[00:50:40]Here he attempted to summon his Iubid and rune vassels and allies, but found no help from either.

[00:50:48]His aggression against Iubid Kalot was more than enough reason for either Sultan to reject an alliance with the Mongolian Empire's biggest rival, and I don't blame them at all. But as always, Jalal did not simply retreat without a fight, but still made merry war with Georgia the whole way, likely plundering gold and taking slaves as a last stitch attempt to purchase allies, hiring them in the form of mercenaries.

[00:51:12]With Jalal Aline at the weakest he'd been since his backstroke swim across the Indis, the Georgians decided to finally rid themselves of the Shaw of increasingly nothing.

[00:51:24]Adabag Avagad Zakarian, son of the disgraced and now likely dead Ivan Zakarian gathered. Only what was left.

[00:51:32]Some 40,000 men of various backgrounds.

[00:51:35]Georgians from Speneti fought alongside Allens, Kevsers, Emiratians, Chetchkins, and Kipchacks who all banded together.

[00:51:44]United now as Rousidan should have let them be from the start. Not far from that ruined Tlisi, the Quarresmians and Georgians would meet one last time on the battlefield.

[00:51:56]And with one battle to decide this war, Jalalian had one more trick up his Swiss army knife of a sleeve.

[00:52:04]See, the Kipchacks and Kasmians were both Turk groups with a split off but somewhat shared history if you go back far enough. Just as the kipchacks north of the caucuses made best friends of the Georgians, so did the Kipchacks north of the Seir Daria River make alliance with the Quorresmian Empire. The only difference is Jalal Alaldin was a Turk and Adabbeg Aag despite his Turkish title was not.

[00:52:34]The Kipchacks flipped sides at the last moment and together with their corres.

[00:52:39]They crushed the last serious army the Georgian Empire had the ability to muster. A Vag Zakarion was defeated and limped back to Couti.

[00:52:52]Meanwhile, Jalal and his fresh band of horse archers took the province of Lori and beyond that utterly looted Georgia for all it had left. Only the cliffside villages on top of the highest mountains were spared from his devastation.

[00:53:06]With this, he could now pay his new kipchek mercenaries.

[00:53:12]Eventually, Jalal returned south, needing to secure those strongholds in Armenia with hopes of outlasting the Mongols in long sieges rather than facing them now outnumbered in the field again. The following year with Jalal distracted in the south, the Cartellians reclaimed their capital of ash and rubble and began rebuilding the city at the center of their world.

[00:53:35]It would be quite some time before that capital was restored as a proper city, but it would one day flourish, but never again would it return to its past glory.

[00:53:46]By 12:30, after three separate attempts, the Cororzam Sha was at last able to take Kalot from Tamta Zakarion in the same way he first took toi. Muslims inside the city, tired of siege, opened the gates for their Shaw, and he repaid them by destroying the place and slaughtering many. Even the Muslim Kurdish population would not be spared.

[00:54:09]The brave older sister of Aog had held out for 5 years, and her punishment came in the Corasum Shaw's usual way for powerful females.

[00:54:18]The people of Kalot loved their Armenian lady and did well to hide her from the grasp of her twice widowed, likely homicidally so, Jalal Aline. Eventually, her disguise was found, and Jalal took her as his wife. and in revenge for the past 5 years of sieges. Her brother and her father fighting against him at every turn. He consummated the marriage that night. But unlike his previous two wives, Tampa Zakarion would outlive her captor, and she would go on to live a welltraveled and rather incredible life.

[00:54:51]We will hear more about her in the future, I'm sure.

[00:54:55]Meanwhile, in the wartime capital getaway, Rousedan, when she wasn't in bed with slave soldiers and the likes, actually found some time to make what is quite possibly her only politically savvy move.

[00:55:07]Rousedan allied with the Room Sultanate and what was left of thy Yubid Kurds, the former of which was on its own rebirth of sorts, headed by an energetic sultan named Kubad, who had actually just got done defeating Armenian Cicia, taking some of their land and making them his vassel. A small number of Cician Armenian troops, although under a room banner, now marched back to the homeland, the first band to do so for more than a century.

[00:55:37]They planned to meet the Iubid army and once and for all rid the region of the sha of no shadam.

[00:55:44]He was a threat, something that becomes extremely obvious when the Kurds, Turks, Armenians, and Georgians all ally against you. I'm not sure if that's ever happened before, but the Georgians were nowhere to be found in or coming toward this coalition. They couldn't spare another army, losing the better part of four in under 10 years.

[00:56:10]All this despite Rousidan seeming to be the one to organize the Sant.

[00:56:15]If I was a fool, I would say that these men were competing for the hand of the maiden king or perhaps something beyond that.

[00:56:22]Jalal Aline caught wind of this and already slightly weakened by his encounter with the Georgians, was forced to act before the Kurds in Room could merge their armies. Jal was likely talented enough to pull off defeating the army separately, but he was barely almost exactly too late. And now this left him outnumbered 3 to one. I only say Jalal could defeat both separately because the battle lasted 3 days and Jalal didn't start losing until the third day. Jalal Alien the would-be corzam Shaw after losing was once again left with nothing ran away and went into hiding and this time instead of trying to fight his way back to the top the dude just said you know what [ __ ] it and got drunk as [ __ ] while laying low.

[00:57:13]Eventually he got caught going west. A Kurdish man from Kot recognized him a loyalist to Tam Zakarion and a brother of someone killed by one of the three sieges.

[00:57:24]He killed that broken man on the spot.

[00:57:28]Jalal Alian goes down as one of history's greatest warriors and generals of all time. In my opinion, I can't think of another conqueror who had done more with less over the distance that he went. He was truly the second Alexander the Great.

[00:57:46]But where Alexander could accept other cultures and religions on an empire building level, the quoresum shaw could not and showed that in full display during his Georgian campaign.

[00:57:57]He had become the very thing he sought to destroy. An endless wave of unstoppable devastation.

[00:58:04]I truly think if this guy played his cards right, he could have formed the anti- Mongolian coalition that he was trying to forcefully put together. And if there was only one guy who could have stopped the Mongolian conquest of the Middle East, I'm 100% sure it was the Quorum Shaw. In the end, he would be proven right. Every country, every city, and person besides the Pope himself we have talked about would fall to the Mongolian Empire sooner or later.

[00:58:34]But for Georgia, the age of devastation brought by the Mongols and the Corasmians was now to be topped off with a betrayal by Kubad of the Room Sultanate.

[00:58:45]The Sultan took all Jalal, currently controlled of the former Georgian Empire, which I mean, yeah, fair enough.

[00:58:51]He did just fight off one of the country's worst tormentors. Then the Turkish Sultan became what I think to be the only man to conquer not one but two different Armenia.

[00:59:06]Oh man, some things just don't change now, do they? But then he started to go for Georgia proper itself and even raided Tlisi, which at the moment wasn't really worth a whole lot.

[00:59:19]Queen Rousedan offered up her uh how do I say this? eight-year-old daughter is a token of peace which was young even for both nations medieval standards saying in a typical but more low-key roasting fashion that her daughter Tamar was of the line of David and the Seljuks which her ancestor David IV was called the Seljuk Slayer. So man, even when she loses, she can really just sneak one in there. Just remember in tomorrow's lifetime the room Sultan had attempted a forceful conquest of Georgia for her own marriage on top of some not so nice words. The betroal was agreed upon but Tamar, daughter of Rousidan luckily did not leave for quite some time. Somehow Queen Rousedan who had already forced her Muslim husband to convert to Christianity now broke down even more barriers. Tamar would only marry the room Sultan if she was to stay a Christian.

[01:00:19]And somehow it worked, which is just crazy.

[01:00:23]She truly was given the title of maiden king as a sign of respect from the Islamic world that surrounded her. And just like that, after more than a decade of Kipchack, Mongol, Coresbian, and finally room conquests, defeats, and massacres, it was finally over.

[01:00:47]While her brother hadn't survived, Queen Rousidan had. While much of Armenia and the south and eastern part of the empire fell, Georgia itself, while shaken, did not.

[01:01:00]And after doing I mean pretty much nothing but some dudes in her bed, Rousidan was finally given a proper window to start rebuilding Georgia, if not to recover in her own than for the lifetime of her young son and future King David.

[01:01:19]This time Tlisi itself would need to be rebuilt from the ashes up. Blood washed off her bridges and relics returned to her churches.

[01:01:30]And for a few years, peace was finally found in what was left of the Georgian Empire.

[01:01:35]But these 10 previous years of total war were only and somehow the calm before the ultimate storm of the century.

[01:01:48]Not even an earthquake could match.

[01:01:51]There was a sound so loud, so deep, so guttural, it could overtake the world.

[01:02:08]If you want to support this stoic historian, feel free to do so on Patreon for as little as a dollar a month and join Derek Clark, Dallinar, and Moisty Lord. Or become a YouTube channel member like Derek Clark again.

[01:02:22]What?

[01:02:25]Why?

[01:02:27]Heath Dion and John Fritz, thank you guys for supporting the channel. I really appreciate it.