Toghrul III

Toghrul III
Last Sultan of the Great Seljuq Empire
Reign	1175 or 1176 -
Predecessor	Arslan Shah
Successor	Office abolished
Died	March 19, 1194 killed near Rey
Father	Arslan Shah

Toghrul III (Persian: طغرل سوم‎‎; Modern Turkish: Tuğrul) (died 1194) was the last sultan of the Great Seljuq Empire.

The son of sultan Arslan Shah, he succeeded him in 1175 or 1176. In 1190 he tried to free himself from the tutelage of the Atabeg of Azerbaijan, Kizil Arslan, but he was overthrown and imprisoned by the latter, who proclaimed himself sultan.^[1] The usurper was assassinated the following year and Toghrul regained his throne. During his brief reign, Toghrul would become quite proficient in Persian poetry.^[2]

On 19 March 1194, he was defeated and killed near Rey^[3] in the war that he had waged against the Shah of Khwarezm, Ala ad-Din Tekish. Toghrul's head was sent to the Caliph Al-Nasir who displayed it in front of his palace in Baghdad. The Great Seljuq Empire disappeared with Toghrul's death.

References

1. Grousset, Rene, The Empire of the Steppes, (Rutgers University Press, 1991), 158.
2. A.C.S. Peacock, The Great Seljuk Empire, (Edinburgh University Press, 2015), 185.
3. Grousset, 167.

.