Bishop Komitas of Prusa (born 1232) was an Orthodox Christian bishop from present-day Bursa, Turkey. In 1260 he converted the Mongol ruler Hulegu Khan to Christianity after visiting Qom.
Biography[]
Komitas was born in 1232 to a lowborn Orthodox Christian family of Greeks in Prusa (present-day Bursa, Turkey) in the Byzantine Empire. Komitas was ordained as a priest and rose to become a bishop, and he spread the word of Jesus Christ through the Ilkhanate after Hulegu Khan tolerated Muslim and Christian missionaries to travel through his lands. He gathered a larger and larger audience at Hulegu's court in Qom, and Hulegu decided to convert to Orthodox Christianity along with his close relatives. Hulegu Christianized the empire, having almost every powerful noble convert as a part of a new caste system.