Baydu

Baydu was a short-lived ruler of the Ilkhanate, the Mongol-ruled Persian state that governed parts of the Middle East in the 13th and 14th centuries. He is mentioned in several chronicles as a claimant to the throne during the dynastic fractures that followed the death of Abu Sa'id in the mid-1330s. Details of his origin and exact relationship to previous rulers vary among sources, and some accounts emphasize his rise as a political intrigue within the wider factional rivalries of the time.

His reign, if it can be called that, was brief and marked by instability. Baydu confronted opposition from competing Mongol factions and regional magnates who sought to influence or control succession. The period was characterized by rapid changes of allegiance and short-lived administrations, and Baydu’s government struggled to establish a durable central authority amid the fracturing Ilkhanate.

Baydu’s death or deposition came within about a year of his accession, according to later chronicles. The rapid turnover of rulers during this era contributed to the continued fragmentation of Ilkhanid authority and paved the way for rising regional powers and rival lineages to contest central governance. Consequently, Baydu’s brief tenure is often interpreted by historians as illustrative of the larger pattern of instability that defined the Ilkhanate in its final decades.

See also Ilkhanate; Ghazan; Abu Sa'id. Further details about Baydu are scarce and the subject is debated among scholars.