[December 15] Alp Arslan, shah of Persia

Local Name: Muhammad bin Dawud Chaghri (آلپ ارسلان)
Sobriquet: "Alp Arslan" (Heroic Lion)
Parents: Chaghri Beg, governor of Khorasan
Date of Birth: 20 January 1029
House: Seljuq
Spouse(s): Aka
Predecessor: Toghrul I
Reign: 1063 – 1072

Brief: Though raised as the grandson of the first Seljuq shah, Alp Arslan began his career as a regional governor in Khorasan. A conflict broke out when his uncle, Toghrul I, died leaving the Seljuq throne open to a brother, Kutalmish, and Alp Arslan. After five years of civil warfare, Alp Arslan finally defeated his uncle and became the sole ruler of Persia. As one of his first moves, he appointed his son, Malik, his heir and successor, to avoid future civil war. He followed the civil war with an expansion campaign, quickly defeating and conquering Armenia and Georgia and annexing them to his empire. In 1068, Alp Arslan pushed into the Byzantine Empire, being defeated in 1070. In 1071, the Byzantines counter-attacked but at the Battle of Manzikert, a large contingent of Byzantine soldiers defected to the Persians, routing the Byzantine army. In the battle, he captured Emperor Romanos IV Diogenes and then released him, with a heavy life debt and guilt. Most of Anatolia fell under Seljuq authority, establishing the current Turkish presence in the peninsula. Alp Arslan reformed the bureaucracy of Persia to make it more stream-lined between Turkish nomads and sedentary Persians. He placed his relatives as governors throughout the lands to satisfy and pacify them. Alp Arslan was in the midst of a campaign to retake Turkestan, the Turkish homeland, when a defeated prince drew a dagger and killed the shah. Alp Arslan's attacks against the Byzantines forced them to call for help from the West, prompting the First Crusade.
Date of Death: 15 December 1072

Successor: Malik-Shah I

Other Monarchs Who Died Today:

• Basil II, emperor of Constantinople (1025)
• Otakar I, king of Bohemia (1230)
• Håkon IV, king of Norway (1263)