Uzun Hasan Sultan of the Ak Koyunlu dynasty, or
White Sheep Turkmen
From The Cambridge modern history,
Battle of Tercan.
Throughout the
years of the Venetian war Mohammad (Mehmed II) had
been busy and fortunate elsewhere, in the east and in
the north. Of the small principalities which had
sprung up after the collapse of the Seljuk power in
Asia Minor, only that of Caramania (Lycaonia and
Isauria with parts of Galatia, Cappadocia, and
Cilicia) still remained independent. The death of its
lord, Ibrahim (1463), was followed by a war among his
sons, which gave Mohammad an opportunity. The capture of
Konia (Iconium) and Caraman
(Laranda) secured him the rule of the whole land
except Seleucia on the south-eastern coast, and he
assigned this important province, which he
systematically dispeopled, to his youngest son
Mustafa. This conquest, following upon that of
Trebizond, brought on the inevitable struggle with
the rival oriental monarch, Uzun Hasan the Turkmen. He
had extended his sovereignty from the Oxus to the
limits of Caramania, and a large part of Persia
was under his dominion. Caramania
was a useful "buffer-State." Uzun Hasan
wrote to Mohammad demanding the cession of Trabzon
and Cappadocia, and complaining of the execution of
King David Comnenus. Mohammad (Mehmed II) promised
to meet him at the head of an army. The Turkmen
invaded Caramania
to restore the dethroned princes and took Tokat
(1471); but in the next year Mustafa defeated him in
a hard-fought battle by the shores of Lake Caralis.
The decisive battle was fought in 1473 (July 26) on
the banks of the Euphrates near Tercan. Mustafa and
his brother Bayazid led each a wing of their father's
army, and were opposed respectively to the two sons
of Uzun Hasan. The strife swayed long, before it was
decided by the Ottoman artillery. Mohammad (Mehmed II) wrote
himself: "the fight was bloody, costing me the
bravest of my pashas and many soldiers; without my
artillery, which terrified the Persian horses, the
issue would have been longer doubtful." The
significance of this victory, of which Mohammad (Mehmed II) probably
thought more than of all his achievements except the
capture of Constantinople, lay in its securing Caramania
and Asia Minor. He was now free to follow out his
schemes of conquest in Europe.
The Cambridge modern history, Volume 1
, Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton Acton,
Ernest Alfred Benians Editors Sir Adolphus William
Ward, Sir George Walter Prothero, Stanley Mordaunt
Leathes, The University press, 1912
It was upon Uzun Hasan, Prince of the Turkmen of
the White Sheep, that they above all relied. In 1459
David wrote to the Duke of Burgundy announcing the
conclusion of such a league, and expressing the
conviction that, if east and west were to strike
together now, the Ottoman could be abolished from the
earth. But the league availed not David, when two
years later Mohammad came to destroy the empire of
Trebizond (1461), and Uzun Hasan left him in the
lurch. He surrendered on the offer of favourable
treatment; but he was not more fortunate than the
King of Bosnia; he and his family were afterwards put
to death. At the same time Mohammad seized Genoese
Amastris, and
likewise Sinope, an independent Seljuk state: and
thus he became master of the whole southern board of
the Pontic Sea. Trabzon
/ Trebizond, Turkey