ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the focus will shift from the large urban centers of thirteenth-century Anatolia-exemplified by Konya, Sivas, and Erzurum in the previous chapters-to smaller cities that were nonetheless strategically important due to their location on trade routes. Specifically, the emphasis will be on Tokat, Amasya, and Ankara, cities located between the center of Anatolia and the Black Sea, and hence important stops along the various long-distance trade routes that connected the Mediterranean to the Black Sea, Tabriz to Konya, and, ultimately, the entire region to the larger system of the so-called Silk Road. During the period under investigation here, around 1300, trade routes moved due to shifting conflicts between the Ilkhanids, Mamluks, the newly restored Byzantine Empire, the Golden Horde, Venice and Genoa. The two Italian city-states were primarily interested in maintaining their trade connections with the Middle East-initially in the Mediterranean region and, in the late thirteenth century, on the Black Sea, which provided access to Iran and the Dasht-i Qipchāq.1
