Kadi Burhan al-Din

Kadi Ahmad Burhan al-Din (1345–c. 1398) was a Turcoman judge, poet and ruler born at Kayseri. Trained in Islamic law in Damascus and Cairo, he became qadi of Kayseri in 1364 and later vizier to the Eretnid rulers. In 1381 he seized the Eretnid lands around Sivas and took the title sultan.

For eighteen years he fought off the Ottomans, Mamluks and other neighbours. In 1398 the Aq Qoyunlu chief Qara Yuluk Osman captured and executed him, and the Ottomans then occupied Sivas. His Turkic collection is counted the first divan in the language; he also wrote in Persian and Arabic.