premise: The Siege of Smyrna involved Timur.
hypothesis: The Siege of Smyrna ( December 1402 ) was fought between the Knights of Rhodes , who held the harbour and sea-castle of Smyrna ( now İzmir ) in western Anatolia , and the army of the Turco-Mongol emir Timur . The main sources for the siege are the Persian historians Sharaf ad-Din Ali Yazdi and Mirkhwand and the Arab Ahmad ibn Arabshah , who wrote in the service of Timur 's successors . Timur . Timur also decisively defeated the Christian Knights Hospitaller at the Siege of Smyrna , styling himself a ghazi .