The Byzantine Empire and the Mongols in the Near East

Nicholas Morton is the author of an excellent book on the Mongols. The Mongol invasions of the Near East began in sort of 1218, 1220. There's multiple waves of Mongol attacks coming in as the 13th century develops. And so three main areas of resistance coalesced: Epirus on the Adriatic coastline, one at Trebizond in northern Anatolia. But perhaps the most important was the Empire of Nicaea at the western tip of Anatolia and this offered the greatest resistance to the Latin Empire of Constantinople.