Medieval Islamic World

Alp Arslan (c. 1029-1072) was the second Seljuk sultan, whose victory over the Byzantine emperor Romanos IV at Manzikert in 1071 broke Byzantine defences in Asia Minor and opened Anatolia to Turkish settlement. He was killed the following year on campaign in Transoxiana.

Ertuğrul Ghazi was leader of the Kayı tribe of Oghuz Turks and father of Osman I, founder of the Ottoman Empire. Operating on the Seljuk-Byzantine frontier in thirteenth-century Anatolia, his modest gains at Söğüt laid the groundwork for an enduring Islamic empire.

Malik-Shah I (1055-1092) was the third Seljuk sultan, under whom the empire reached its greatest extent and its administrative and cultural height. His reign produced the Jalali solar calendar, and it ended with the deaths of both his vizier Nizam al-Mulk and himself within weeks.

Nur al-Din Zengi (1118-1174) united Muslim Syria under a single authority, made the recovery of Jerusalem a stated public purpose, and built the network of madrasas and institutions that carried the Sunni revival. His intervention in Egypt brought Saladin to power there.