The Battle of Parwan (1221)

As the Khwarazmshah Muhammad lay dying on a Caspian island at the end of 1220, he passed power to his son Jalal al-Din. Escaping the Mongols, Jalal al-Din reached Ghazni and raised a new army there, joined by Turkic, Khalaj and Afghan contingents.

Jalal al-Din first attacked a small Mongol detachment near Waliyan. In response Genghis Khan sent an army of about 30,000 under his general Shigi Qutuqu. In September 1221, in the Parwan valley north of Kabul, the Mongol army was defeated after two days of fighting.

As news of Parwan spread, cities such as Merv and Herat rose against the Mongols. But Jalal al-Din's commanders quarrelled over the division of the spoils and half his army deserted him, opening the way to the disaster on the Indus two months later.