Koten

Köten
Terter Khan
Coat of arms
Reign	1223–1239
Predecessor	?
Successor	?
Issue (see section)
Noble family	Terteroba
Died	1239 Pest, Hungary
Religion	Tengriism, Roman Catholicism (by conversion)
Occupation	Cuman khan

Köten or Kotyan son of Sutoi (variously Kutan, Kuthen, Kuthens, Kotyan, Kotjan, Koteny, Kötöny, Kuethan, or Zayhan) (fl. 1223–39) was a Cuman military commander and khan (lord) of the Terteroba clan during the mid–13th century. He later accepted Catholicism and was baptised as Jonas.

He forged the Cuman–Kievan Rus alliance against the Tatars. His son-in-law Mstislav the Bold, the Prince of Halych and Volhynia. Köten was allegedly of the Terteroba clan. He participated in the power struggles between the princes of Kyivan Rus' in 1202, 1225 and 1228. After the defeat by the Mongols in 1222, he convinced the princes of Kyivan Rus' to forge an alliance against the Mongols. He fought in the war against the Mongols (allied with the Russians) in the Battle of Kalka River, where the Rus-Cuman alliance was defeated.

The Cuman–Kipchak confederation under Köten and a Rus army of 80,000 men under his son-in-law Mstislav the Bold fought a battle at the Kalka River (Kalchik, near Mariupol) against a Mongol contingent commanded by Jebe and Sübötäi. The Rus-Cuman army was routed and had to retreat (31 May 1223). Köten was deposed from power in that year, but he remained leader of the Terter tribe.

In the early spring of 1237, the Mongols attacked the Cuman-Kipchaks. Some of the Kuman-Kipchaks surrendered; it was this element that was later to form the ethnic and geographic basis of the Mongol khanate known to the former lords of the country as the "Kipchak khanate". Known also as the Golden Horde, the Kipchak khanate belonged to one of the branches of Jochi's house -Genghis Khan's eldest son. A Kipchak or Cuman chief named Batchman hid on the Volga banks, but was captured at a river island in the winter 1236-37; Möngke had him cut in half.

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