TR EN DE FR ARAtlas of the Sultans · Wars, battles and treaties

First Treaty of Erzurum

Treaty · 1823

Using as a pretext the search of the caravan of the shah's wife on pilgrimage, the Iranian crown prince Abbas Mirza crossed the border in autumn 1821, took Kars and Bayazıt and besieged Erzurum; at the same time Iranian troops attacked northern Iraq and the province of Baghdad, taking Sulaymaniyah and besieging Kirkuk. According to the TDV articles on Iran and Erzurum, Ottoman resistance and a cholera epidemic in the Iranian army forced Iran to withdraw and sue for peace. The Treaty of Erzurum, signed on 28 July 1823, ended the war, and Iran returned the places it had taken. Border disputes continued, and a second Treaty of Erzurum was made in 1847.

About the event

Signed	28 July 1823
Place of signing	Erzurum
Parties	Ottoman Empire, Qajar Iran

Terms of the treaty

The Ottoman–Iranian war begun in 1821 was ended
Iranian forces were to evacuate the lands they had occupied within sixty days

Aftermath

Border disputes continued; the Second Treaty of Erzurum was signed in 1847.

This event in the atlas

Took place during the reign of Mahmud II (1808–1839). Mahmud II

Open the reign of Mahmud II on the map

Context of the period

By the atlas's calculation the Ottoman lands covered about 4,549,000 km² in 1823; at the start of Mahmud II's reign they measured 4,551,000 km², at its end 3,803,000 km².

During Mahmud II (1808–1839) the atlas records 0 regions gained and 6 regions lost.

Regions lost: Cyclades (Naxos) (1821), Morea (Peloponnese) (1828), Akhaltsikhe (Childir) (1828), Athens–Central Greece (1829), Algiers (1830), Euboea (Negroponte) (1833).

Mahmud II in brief

He recentralised the state: he abolished the Janissaries and founded modern ministries, schools and the census. The territorial losses were heavy (Greece, Algiers, Bessarabia), but the administrative structure he built made the Tanzimat possible.

Other battles and treaties of Mahmud II

Alemdar Incident (1808)
Treaty of the Dardanelles (1809)
Ottoman–Wahhabi war (1811)
Treaty of Bucharest (1812) (1812)
Second Serbian Uprising (1815)
Revolt of Ali Pasha of Yanina (1820)
Egyptian conquest of Sudan (1820–1824) (1820)
Greek War of Independence (1821)
Auspicious Incident (1826)
Akkerman Convention (1826)
Battle of Navarino (1827)
Treaty of Adrianople (1829) (1829)
Battle of Kulevicha (1829)
French conquest of Algeria (1830)
Revolt of Mehmed Ali Pasha of Egypt (1831)
Bosnian uprising (1831–1832) (1831)
Treaty of Hünkâr İskelesi (1833)
Treaty of Balta Liman (1838)

Areas are land area computed from the atlas's region data; see Method and sources.

Source: TDV Encyclopedia of Islam, “ERZURUM” (Turkish); text written for the atlas.

Cite as: Atlas of the Sultans, “First Treaty of Erzurum (1823): Terms, Date and Outcome”, https://padisahlaratlasi.com/en/events/first-treaty-of-erzurum/ (last updated 12 November 2026). Corrections