196                     THE PERIOD OF TIMljR                  [bk ii

The campaign on which Timur was now embarked, and
which included some of his most remarkable achievements,
is called by Sharafu'd-Din 'Ali Yazdi (ii, 206) thej' Seven
Years' Campaign." As it began about Muharram 8, 802
(Sept. 10, 1399), and as Timur returned to his capital,
Samarqand, in Muharram, 807 (July, 1404), this appellation
must be regarded as a misnomer. Even the abridged
account of the many bloody battles and brilliant victories
included in this period which is given in Price's Chrono¬
logical Retrospect^ fills 166 quarto pages, and in this place
it must suffice to indicate only its chief events.

The winter of A.D. 1399-1400 was spent by Timur in
Qarabagh near the Araxes, and ere spring had melted the
snows he once more invaded Georgia, devastated the country,
destroyed the churches and monasteries, and slew great
numbers of the inhabitants. In August, 1400, he began his
march into Asia Minor by way of Avnik, Erzeroum, Erzinjan
and Sivas. The latter place offered a stubborn resistance,
and when it finally capitulated Timur caused all the Arme¬
nian and Christian soldiers to the number of four thousand
to be buried alive; but the Muhammadans he spared^
Meanwhile an animated correspondence was taking place
between him and the Ottoman Sultan Bayazid, called Yil¬
dirim, (the " Thunder-bolt"), from whom Timur demanded
the surrender of Sultan Ahmad of Baghdad and Qara
Yusuf the Turkman. This Bayazid refused, as, until a very
recent occasion, the Turks have ever been wont to refuse
such betrayal of guests; and, moreover, as must be admit¬
ted, and as will presently be seen, he couched his refusal in
language little calculated to appease his great rival. With
the Sultan of Egypt also (al-Maliku'n-Nasir Faraj) Timur
became embroiled by reason of the unlawful detention of
his ambassador at Cairo, and thus the campaign became
diverted not only against the territories over which the two

1  Published in London in 4 vols., 1811-1821.  The portforT'to which
reference is here made is vol. iii, Part i, pp. 297-463.

2  Zafar-ndma, ii, p. 269.