Охраняемые владения Ирана , [a] обычно называемые Ираном Сефевидов , Персией Сефевидов [b] или Империей Сефевидов , [c] были одной из крупнейших и давних иранских империй. Она находилась под властью династии Сефевидов с 1501 по 1736 год . [25] [26] [27] [28] Ее часто считают началом современной иранской истории , [29] а также одной из пороховых империй . [30] Шах Сефевидов Исмаил I основал двенадцативерскую конфессию шиитского ислама в качестве официальной религии империи , что ознаменовало один из важнейших поворотных моментов в истории ислама . [31]
Иранская династия , уходящая корнями в суфийский орден Сефевидов [32], основанный курдскими [33] шейхами , она активно смешалась с туркменскими , [34] грузинскими , [35] черкесскими , [36] [37] и понтийскими греческими [38] сановниками и была тюркоязычной и тюркизированной . [39] Со своей базы в Ардебиле Сефевиды установили контроль над частями Большого Ирана и восстановили иранскую идентичность региона, [40] таким образом став первой местной династией со времен Буидов, которая основала национальное государство, официально известное как Иран. [41]
Сефевиды правили с 1501 по 1722 год (с кратковременной реставрацией в 1729–1736 и 1750–1773 годах) и в период своего расцвета контролировали всю территорию нынешнего Ирана , Азербайджана , Армении , восточной Грузии , части Северного Кавказа , включая Россию и Ирак , а также части Турции , Сирии , Пакистана , Афганистана , Туркменистана и Узбекистана .
Несмотря на их упадок в 1736 году, наследием, которое они оставили после себя, было возрождение Ирана как экономического оплота между Востоком и Западом , создание эффективного государства и бюрократии, основанной на « сдержках и противовесах », их архитектурные инновации и покровительство изящным искусствам . [29] Сефевиды также оставили свой след вплоть до нашей эры , установив двенадцатикратный шиизм в качестве государственной религии Ирана , а также распространив шиитский ислам в основных частях Ближнего Востока , Центральной Азии , Кавказа , Анатолии , Персидского залива и Месопотамии . [29] [31]
Mamalik-i Mahrusa-yi Iran ( Охраняемые владения Ирана ) было общим и официальным названием государства Сефевидов. [42] [43] Идея охраняемых владений иллюстрировала чувство территориального и политического единообразия в обществе, где персидский язык, культура, монархия и шиитский ислам стали неотъемлемыми элементами развивающейся национальной идентичности. [44] Предположительно, эта концепция начала формироваться во времена монгольского Ильханата в конце XIII века, в период, когда региональные действия, торговля, письменная культура и отчасти шиитский ислам способствовали созданию раннего современного персидского мира. [45] Его сокращенная форма была mamalik-i Iran («Царство Ирана»), и у нее также были другие варианты, такие как mamalik-i mahrusa-yi khusravani («Царские охраняемые владения») и mamalik-i mahrusa-yi humayun («Императорские охраняемые владения»). [46] Также использовалосьпросто Иран . [47]
Фраза мульк-и васи' аль-фаза-йи Иран («обширное царство Ирана») используется как в хронике 17-го века Холд-е барин , так и в путевых заметках 1680-х годов Сафине-йе Солаймани , написанных послом Сефевидов в Сиаме . Это повторяющееся выражение подчеркивает гордость авторов и признание ими своей родины. Это выражение, вероятно, является подходящим персидским способом описания «империи», встречающимся в трудах того времени. [48]
История Сефевидов начинается с основания Сафавийи ее одноименным основателем Сафи-ад-дином Ардабили (1252–1334). В 700/1301 году Сафи ад-Дин принял руководство Захедие , значительным суфийским орденом в Гиляне, от своего духовного учителя и тестя Захеда Гилани . Благодаря большой духовной харизме Сафи ад-Дина, орден позже стал известен как Сафавийа. Орден Сефевидов вскоре приобрел большое влияние в городе Ардебиль, и Хамдуллах Мустауфи отметил, что большинство людей Ардебиля были последователями Сафи ад-Дина.
Религиозная поэзия Сафи ад-Дина, написанная на древнеазарийском языке [49] — ныне вымершем северо-западном иранском языке — и сопровождаемая парафразом на персидском языке, который помогает ее пониманию, сохранилась до наших дней и имеет лингвистическое значение. [49]
После Сафи ад-Дина руководство Сафавийей перешло к Садр ад-Дину Мусе († 794/1391–92). Орден в это время трансформировался в религиозное движение, которое проводило религиозную пропаганду по всему Ирану, Сирии и Малой Азии, и, скорее всего, в то время сохраняло свое суннитское шафиитское происхождение. Руководство орденом перешло от Садр ад-Дина Мусы к его сыну Хвадже Али († 1429) и, в свою очередь, к его сыну Ибрагиму († 1429–47).
Когда шейх Джунайд , сын Ибрагима, взял на себя руководство Сефевидами в 1447 году, история движения Сефевидов радикально изменилась. По словам историка Роджера Сэвори , «шейх Джунайд не был удовлетворен духовной властью и искал материальной власти». [ требуется цитата ] В то время самой могущественной династией в Иране была династия Кара Коюнлу , «Черная овца», правитель которой Джахан Шах приказал Джунайду покинуть Ардебиль , иначе он принесет разрушение и разорение в город. [31] Джунайд нашел убежище у соперника Кара Коюнлу Джахан Шаха, Ак Коюнлу (туркмены Белой Овцы) Хана Узуна Хасана , и укрепил свои отношения, женившись на сестре Узуна Хасана, Хадидже Бегум. Джунейд был убит во время вторжения на территорию Ширваншаха , и ему наследовал его сын Хайдар Сефеви .
Хайдар женился на Марте 'Аламшах Бегом, [38] дочери Узун Хасана, которая родила Исмаила I , основателя династии Сефевидов. Мать Марты Феодора — более известная как Деспина Хатун [50] — была понтийской греческой принцессой, дочерью великого Комнина Иоанна IV Трапезундского . Она была замужем за Узун Хасаном [51] в обмен на защиту великого Комнина от османов.
После смерти Узун Хасана его сын Якуб почувствовал угрозу со стороны растущего религиозного влияния Сефевидов. Якуб вступил в союз с Ширваншахом и убил Хайдара в 1488 году. К этому времени основная часть Сафавийи была кочевыми огузскими тюркоязычными кланами из Малой Азии и Азербайджана и была известна как Кызылбаши «Красные головы» из-за их отличительных красных головных уборов. Кызылбаши были воинами, духовными последователями Хайдара и источником военной и политической власти Сефевидов.
После смерти Хайдара, Сефевиды собрались вокруг его сына Али Мирзы Сефевидов , которого также преследовал и впоследствии убил Якуб. Согласно официальной истории Сефевидов, перед своей смертью Али назначил своего младшего брата Исмаила духовным лидером Сефевидов. [31]
После упадка империи Тимуридов (1370–1506) Иран был политически раздроблен, что привело к возникновению ряда религиозных движений. Падение политической власти Тамерлана создало пространство, в котором несколько религиозных общин, особенно шиитские, смогли выйти на первый план и обрести известность. Среди них было несколько суфийских братств, хуруфиты , нуктавиты и мушашаийя . Из этих различных движений сефевидское кызылбаши было наиболее политически устойчивым, и благодаря его успеху шах Исмаил I получил политическую известность в 1501 году. [52] До иранского государства, основанного Исмаилом, существовало много местных государств. [53] Самыми важными местными правителями около 1500 года были:
Исмаилу удалось объединить все эти земли под властью созданной им Иранской империи.
Династия Сефевидов была основана около 1501 года шахом Исмаилом I. [ 55] Его происхождение оспаривается: язык, который он использовал, не идентичен языку его «расы» или «национальности», и он был двуязычным с рождения. [56] Исмаил был смешанного туркменского , курдского , понтийского греческого и грузинского происхождения и был прямым потомком курдского суфийского мусульманского мистика шейха Сафи ад-Дина . [57] Таким образом, он был последним в линии наследственных великих магистров ордена Сефевидов до его восхождения к правящей династии. Исмаил был известен как храбрый и харизматичный юноша, ревностно исповедовавший шиитский ислам и считавший себя божественным потомком, за что его последователи -кизылбаши буквально поклонялись ему .
В 1500 году Исмаил I вторгся в соседний Ширван , чтобы отомстить за смерть своего отца, шейха Хайдара, убитого в 1488 году правящим ширваншахом Фаррухом Яссаром. После этого Исмаил отправился в завоевательный поход, захватив Тебриз в июле 1501 года, где он возвел себя на престол как шах Азербайджана [58] [59] [60], провозгласил себя королем королей ( шаханшахом ) Ирана [61] [62] [63] и чеканил монеты со своим именем, провозгласив двенадцатикратный шиизм официальной религией своих владений . [31] Установление двенадцатеричного шиизма в качестве государственной религии сефевидского Ирана привело к тому, что различные суфийские ордена ( тарика ) открыто заявили о своей шиитской позиции, а другие быстро приняли шиитский ислам. Среди них основатель одного из самых успешных суфийских орденов, шах Ниматуллах Вали (ум. 1431), прослеживал свое происхождение от первого исмаилитского имама , Мухаммада ибн Исмаила , о чем свидетельствует поэма, а также еще одно неопубликованное литературное произведение. Хотя шах Ниматуллах, по-видимому, был мусульманином-суннитом, орден Ниматуллахи вскоре заявил о своей приверженности шиитскому исламу после возвышения династии Сефевидов. [64]
Хотя Исмаил I изначально овладел только Азербайджаном, Сефевиды в конечном итоге выиграли борьбу за власть над всем Ираном, которая длилась почти столетие между различными династиями и политическими силами. Через год после своей победы в Тебризе Исмаил I объявил большую часть Ирана частью своей территории [ 31] и в течение 10 лет установил полный контроль над всем этим. Исмаил следовал линии иранских и туркменских правителей до принятия им титула «Падишах-и-Иран», ранее носившегося Узун Хасаном и многими другими иранскими царями. [65] Османские султаны обращались к нему как к царю иранских земель и наследнику Джамшида и Кая Хосрова [66] .
Начав с владения только Азербайджаном, Ширваном , южным Дагестаном (с его важным городом Дербентом ) и Арменией в 1501 году, [67] Эрзинджан и Эрзурум попали под его власть в 1502 году, [68] Хамадан в 1503 году, Шираз и Керман в 1504 году, Диярбакыр , Наджаф и Кербела в 1507 году, Ван в 1508 году, Багдад в 1509 году и Герат , а также другие части Хорасана в 1510 году. В 1503 году его вассалами стали также царства Картли и Кахети . [69] К 1511 году узбеки на северо-востоке, во главе с их ханом Мухаммадом Шайбани , были отброшены далеко на север, через реку Оксус , где они продолжали атаковать Сефевидов. Решительная победа Исмаила над узбеками, которые заняли большую часть Хорасана, обеспечила восточные границы Ирана, и узбеки с тех пор никогда не расширялись за пределы Гиндукуша . Хотя узбеки продолжали совершать случайные набеги на Хорасан, империя Сефевидов могла держать их в страхе на протяжении всего своего правления.
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Более проблематичной для Сефевидов была могущественная соседняя Османская империя . Османы, суннитская династия, считали активную вербовку туркменских племен Анатолии для дела Сефевидов главной угрозой. Чтобы противостоять растущей власти Сефевидов, в 1502 году султан Баязид II силой депортировал многих мусульман-шиитов из Анатолии в другие части Османского государства. В 1511 году восстание Шахкулу было широкомасштабным прошиитским и просефевидским восстанием, направленным против Османской империи изнутри империи. [70] Более того, к началу 1510-х годов экспансионистская политика Исмаила отодвинула границы Сефевидов в Малой Азии еще дальше на запад. Вскоре османы отреагировали крупномасштабным вторжением в Восточную Анатолию сефевидских гази под предводительством Нур-Али Халифы. Это действие совпало с восшествием на османский престол в 1512 году султана Селима I , сына Баязида II , и стало поводом к войне, приведшим к решению Селима вторгнуться в соседний Сефевидский Иран два года спустя. [71]
В 1514 году султан Селим I прошел через Анатолию и достиг равнины Чалдиран около города Хой , где произошло решающее сражение . Большинство источников сходятся во мнении, что османская армия была по крайней мере вдвое больше армии Исмаила ; [55] кроме того, у османов было преимущество в артиллерии, которой не хватало армии Сефевидов. По словам историка Роджера Сэвори , «план Салима состоял в том, чтобы перезимовать в Тебризе и завершить завоевание Персии следующей весной. Однако мятеж среди его офицеров, отказавшихся провести зиму в Тебризе, заставил его отступить через территорию, опустошенную войсками Сефевидов, восемь дней спустя». [55] Хотя Исмаил был побежден, а его столица захвачена, империя Сефевидов выжила. Война между двумя державами продолжалась при сыне Исмаила, императоре Тахмаспе I , и османском султане Сулеймане Великолепном , пока шах Аббас не вернул себе территорию, утраченную османами к 1602 году.
Последствия поражения при Чалдиране были также психологическими для Исмаила: поражение разрушило веру Исмаила в свою непобедимость, основанную на его заявленном божественном статусе. [31] Его отношения с последователями кызылбашами также были фундаментально изменены. Племенные распри среди кызылбашей, которые временно прекратились до поражения при Чалдиране , возобновились в интенсивной форме сразу после смерти Исмаила и привели к десятилетней гражданской войне (930–040/1524–1533), пока шах Тахмасп не восстановил контроль над делами государства. Большую часть последнего десятилетия правления Исмаила внутренние дела империи курировались таджикским визирем Мирзой Шахом Хоссейном вплоть до его убийства в 1523 году. [72] Чалдыранская битва также имеет историческое значение как начало более чем 300 лет частых и ожесточенных войн, подпитываемых геополитическими и идеологическими разногласиями между османами и иранскими Сефевидами (а также последующими иранскими государствами), в основном за территории в Восточной Анатолии, на Кавказе и в Месопотамии .
Ранняя власть Сефевидов в Иране основывалась на военной мощи кызылбашей. Исмаил использовал первый элемент, чтобы захватить власть в Иране. Но, избегая политики после своего поражения в Чалдыране, он оставил дела правительства в ведении вакиля ( главного администратора, вакил по-турецки). Преемники Исмаила, наиболее очевидным из которых был шах Аббас I, успешно уменьшили влияние кызылбашей на дела государства.
Шах Тахмасп, молодой титулярный губернатор Хорасана , [73] стал преемником своего отца Исмаила в 1524 году, когда ему было десять лет и три месяца. Преемственность, очевидно, была бесспорной. [72] Тахмасп был подопечным могущественного кызылбашского амира Али Бега Румлу (титулованного « Див Солтан Румлу » ), который считал себя фактическим правителем государства. Румлу и Копек Султан Устаджлу (который был последним вакилем Исмаила ) утвердились в качестве соправителей молодого шаха. [72] Кызылбаши, которые все еще страдали от наследия битвы при Чалдыране, были охвачены внутренним соперничеством. Первые два года правления Тахмаспа были поглощены усилиями Див Султана по устранению Устаджлу от власти. [72] Эта дворцовая интрига привела непосредственно к племенному конфликту. Начиная с 1526 года периодически вспыхивали сражения, начавшиеся на северо-западе Ирана, но вскоре охватившие весь Хорасан. [74] В отсутствие харизматичной, мессианской объединяющей фигуры, такой как молодой Исмаил, племенные вожди вернули себе свою традиционную прерогативу и пригрозили вернуться к временам местных военачальников. В течение почти 10 лет соперничающие фракции кызылбашей сражались друг с другом. Во-первых, племя Устаджлу Копек Султана пострадало больше всех, и он сам был убит в битве.
Таким образом, Див Солтан вышел победителем в первой дворцовой борьбе, но он пал жертвой Чухи Султана из Таккалу, который настроил Тахмаспа против его первого наставника. В 1527 году Тахмасп продемонстрировал свое желание, выпустив стрелу в Див Солтана перед собравшимся двором. Таккалу заменили Румлу в качестве доминирующего племени. Их, в свою очередь, сменил Шамлу, чей амир, Хусейн Хан, стал главным советником. Этот последний лидер продержался только до 1534 года, когда он был свергнут и казнен. [75]
После падения Хусейн-хана Тахмасп утвердил свою власть. Вместо того, чтобы полагаться на другое туркменское племя, он назначил персидского вакиля . С 1553 года в течение сорока лет шах был в состоянии избежать попадания в ловушку племенных предательств. Но десятилетие гражданской войны подвергло империю иностранной опасности, и Тахмасп должен был обратить свое внимание на повторяющиеся набеги узбеков. [76]
Узбеки во время правления Тахмаспа нападали на восточные провинции королевства пять раз, а османы под руководством Солеймана I вторгались в Иран четыре раза. [77] Децентрализованный контроль над узбекскими войсками во многом стал причиной неспособности узбеков совершать территориальные вторжения в Хорасан. [78] Оставив в стороне внутренние разногласия, сефевидская знать ответила на угрозу Герату в 1528 году, отправившись на восток с Тахмаспом (тогда 17-м) и нанеся сокрушительное поражение численно превосходящим силам узбеков в Джаме. [79] Победа стала результатом, по крайней мере, частично, использования сефевидами огнестрельного оружия, которое они приобретали и осваивали с момента Чалдырана. [80]
Несмотря на успех с огнестрельным оружием в Джаме, Тахмасп все еще не имел уверенности, чтобы вступить в бой со своими главными соперниками османами, предпочитая вместо этого уступать территорию, часто используя тактику выжженной земли в этом процессе. [81] Целью османов в кампаниях 1534 и 1548–1549 годов, во время Османско-Сефевидской войны 1532–1555 годов , было посадить братьев Тахмаспа (Сэма Мирзу и Алкаса Мирзу соответственно) на трон шахов, чтобы сделать Иран вассальным государством. Хотя в этих кампаниях (и в 1554 году) османы захватили Тебриз , у них не было достаточной линии связи, чтобы занять его надолго. [80] Тем не менее, учитывая небезопасность в Ираке и его северо-западной территории, Тахмасп переместил свой двор из Тебриза в Казвин .
В тяжелейшем кризисе правления Тахмаспа османские войска в 1553–1554 годах захватили Ереван , Карабах и Нахджуван , разрушили дворцы, виллы и сады и угрожали Ардебилю . Во время этих операций агент Самлу (теперь поддерживающий претензии Сэма Мизры) попытался отравить шаха. Тахмасп решил прекратить военные действия и отправил своего посла в зимнюю резиденцию Сулеймана в Эрзуруме в сентябре 1554 года, чтобы просить о мире. [82] За временными условиями последовал Мир Амасии в июне 1555 года, положивший конец войне с османами на следующие два десятилетия. Договор был первым официальным дипломатическим признанием империи Сефевидов османами. [83] По условиям мира османы согласились вернуть Ереван, Карабах и Нахджуван Сефевидам и, в свою очередь, сохранили бы Месопотамию (Ирак) и восточную Анатолию. Сулейман согласился разрешить паломникам-шиитам Сефевидов совершать паломничества в Мекку и Медину, а также к гробницам имамов в Ираке и Аравии при условии, что шах отменит табурру , проклятие первых трех халифов-рашидунов. [84] Это была высокая цена с точки зрения потерянной территории и престижа, но это позволило империи просуществовать, что казалось невероятным в первые годы правления Тахмаспа.
Почти одновременно с возникновением империи Сефевидов в Южной Азии развивалась империя Великих Моголов , основанная наследником Тимуридов Бабуром . Моголы придерживались (в основном) толерантного суннитского ислама, управляя в основном индуистским населением. После смерти Бабура его сын Хумаюн был изгнан со своих территорий и подвергался угрозам со стороны своего сводного брата и соперника, унаследовавшего северную часть территорий Бабура. [85] Вынужденный бежать из города в город, Хумаюн в конце концов нашел убежище при дворе Тахмаспа в Казвине в 1543 году. Тахмасп принял Хумаюна как истинного императора династии Моголов, несмотря на то, что Хумаюн жил в изгнании более пятнадцати лет. [85] [86] После того, как Хумаюн обратился в шиитский ислам (под чрезвычайным давлением), [85] Тахмасп предложил ему военную помощь, чтобы вернуть его территории в обмен на Кандагар , который контролировал сухопутный торговый путь между центральным Ираном и Гангом. В 1545 году объединенные ирано-могольские силы сумели захватить Кандагар и занять Кабул. [87] Хумаюн передал Кандагар, но Тахмасп был вынужден вернуть его в 1558 году, после того как Хумаюн захватил его после смерти сефевидского наместника.
Хумаюн был не единственной королевской фигурой, искавшей убежища при дворе Тахмаспа. В Османской империи возник спор о том, кто должен был стать преемником престарелого Сулеймана Великолепного . Любимая жена Сулеймана, Хюррем Султан , жаждала, чтобы ее сын Селим стал следующим султаном. Но Селим был алкоголиком, а другой сын Хюррем, Баязид , показал гораздо большие военные способности. Два принца поссорились, и в конце концов Баязид восстал против своего отца. Его письмо с раскаянием так и не дошло до Сулеймана, и он был вынужден бежать за границу, чтобы избежать казни. В 1559 году Баязид прибыл в Иран, где Тахмасп оказал ему теплый прием. Сулейман стремился договориться о возвращении своего сына, но Тахмасп отверг его обещания и угрозы, пока в 1561 году Сулейман не пошел с ним на компромисс. В сентябре того же года Тахмасп и Баязид наслаждались пиром в Тебризе, когда Тахмасп внезапно притворился, что получил известие о том, что османский принц участвует в заговоре против его жизни. Собралась разъяренная толпа, и Тахмасп заключил Баязида под стражу, утверждая, что это ради его собственной безопасности. Затем Тахмасп передал принца османскому послу. Вскоре после этого Баязид был убит агентами, посланными его собственным отцом. [88]
Когда молодой шах Тахмасп занял трон, Иран находился в плачевном состоянии. Но, несмотря на слабую экономику, гражданскую войну и внешние войны на двух фронтах, Тахмасп сумел сохранить свою корону и сохранить территориальную целостность империи (хотя и значительно сокращенную со времен Исмаила). В течение первых 30 лет своего долгого правления он смог подавить внутренние разногласия, осуществляя контроль над усиленной центральной военной силой. В войне против узбеков он показал, что Сефевиды стали пороховой империей . Его тактика в борьбе с османской угрозой в конечном итоге позволила заключить договор, который сохранил мир на двадцать лет.
В культурных вопросах Тахмасп руководил возрождением изящных искусств, которые процветали под его покровительством. Культура Сефевидов часто восхищается масштабным городским планированием и архитектурой, достижениями, достигнутыми во время правления более поздних шахов, но искусство персидской миниатюры , переплета книг и каллиграфии , по сути, никогда не получало столько внимания, как во времена его правления. [89]
Тахмасп также посеял семена, которые непреднамеренно привели к переменам гораздо позже. Во время своего правления он понял, глядя как на свою собственную империю, так и на соседние Османы, что существуют опасные соперничающие фракции и внутренние семейные распри, которые представляют угрозу для глав государств. Если не позаботиться об этом должным образом, они представляли серьезную угрозу для правителя или, что еще хуже, могли привести к падению первого или к ненужным дворцовым интригам. Согласно Encyclopaedia Iranica , для Тахмаспа проблема вращалась вокруг военной племенной элиты империи, кезелбашей , которые считали, что физическая близость и контроль над членом ближайшей семьи Сефевидов гарантируют духовные преимущества, политическое состояние и материальное благополучие. [90] Несмотря на то, что Тахмасп мог свести на нет и проигнорировать некоторые из своих опасений относительно потенциальных проблем, связанных с его семьей, регулярно переводя своих близких прямых родственников мужского пола, таких как его братья и сыновья, на различные губернаторские должности в империи, он понимал и осознавал, что любые долгосрочные решения в основном будут заключаться в минимизации политического и военного присутствия Кезелбашей в целом. Согласно Encyclopaedia Iranica , его отец и основатель империи Исмаил I начал этот процесс на бюрократическом уровне, назначив ряд видных персов на влиятельные бюрократические должности, и можно увидеть, что это продолжалось в длительных и тесных отношениях Тахмаспа с главным визирем Кази Джаханом из Казвина после 1535 года. [90] В то время как персы продолжали выполнять свою историческую роль администраторов и духовной элиты при Тахмаспе, до сих пор мало что было сделано для минимизации военной роли Кезелбашей. [90] Поэтому в 1540 году шах Тахмасп начал первое из серии вторжений в Кавказский регион, как в качестве обучения и тренировки для своих солдат, так и в основном для возвращения огромного количества христианских черкесских и грузинских рабов, которые должны были сформировать основу военной рабской системы, [91] подобно янычарам соседней Османской империи, [92] а также в то же время сформировать новый слой в иранском обществе, состоящий из этнических кавказцев . Во время четвертого вторжения в 1553 году стало ясно, что Тахмасп следовал политике аннексии и переселения, поскольку он получил контроль над Тбилиси (Тифлисом) и регионом Картли , физически переселив более 30 000 человек в центральные иранские земли. [90] Согласно Encyclopaedia Iranica, это было бы отправной точкой для корпуса ḡolāmān-e ḵāṣṣa-ye-e šarifa , или королевских рабов , которые доминировали в армии Сефевидов на протяжении большей части империи. Как нетуркмены, принявшие ислам, эти черкесские и грузинские ḡolāmāns (также писались как ghulams ) были совершенно не ограничены клановой лояльностью и родственными обязательствами, что было привлекательной чертой для такого правителя, как Тахмасп, чье детство и воспитание были глубоко затронуты племенной политикой кезелбашей. [90] В свою очередь, многие из этих пересаженных женщин стали женами и наложницами Тахмаспа, и гарем Сефевидов превратился в конкурентную, а порой и смертельную арену этнической политики, поскольку клики туркменских, черкесских и грузинских женщин и придворных соперничали друг с другом за внимание шаха. [90]
Хотя первые солдаты-рабы не были организованы до правления Аббаса I, во времена Тахмаспа кавказцы уже стали важными членами королевского дома, гарема , а также в гражданской и военной администрации, [93] [94] и тем самым стали их способом в конечном итоге стать неотъемлемой частью общества. Одна из сестер Тахмаспа вышла замуж за черкеса, который использовал свою придворную должность, чтобы объединиться с дочерью Тахмаспа, Пари Хан Ханум, чтобы заявить о себе в вопросах наследования после смерти Тахмаспа.
После Амасийского мира Тасмасп подвергся тому, что он назвал «искренним раскаянием». В то же время Тасмасп удалил своего сына Исмаила от его последователей-кизылбашей и заключил его в тюрьму в Кахкахе. Более того, он начал укреплять шиитскую практику такими вещами, как запрет в новой столице Казвине поэзии и музыки, которые не уважали Али и Двенадцать Имамов. Он также снизил налоги в районах, которые традиционно были шиитскими, регулировал службы в мечетях и нанимал шиитских пропагандистов и шпионов. Вымогательство, запугивание и преследование практиковались против суннитов. [95]
Когда Тахмасп умер в 984/1576 году, Иран был спокоен внутри страны, границы были безопасными, и не было непосредственной угрозы со стороны узбеков или османов. Однако неизменной оставалась постоянная угроза местного недовольства слабой центральной властью. Это положение не менялось (и фактически ухудшалось) до тех пор, пока внук Тахмаспа, Аббас I, не занял трон.
После смерти Тахмаспа поддержка преемника объединилась вокруг двух из его девяти сыновей; поддержка разделилась по этническому признаку — Исмаила поддерживало большинство туркменских племен, а также его сестра Пари Хан Ханум , ее черкесский дядя Шамхал Султан , а также остальные черкесы, в то время как Хайдара в основном поддерживали грузины при дворе, хотя он также имел поддержку от туркменских устаджлу. [96] Исмаил был заключен в тюрьму в Кахкахе с 1556 года своим отцом по обвинению в подготовке переворота, но его выбор был обеспечен, когда 30 000 сторонников кызылбашей вышли на демонстрацию возле тюрьмы. [97] Вскоре после вступления на престол Исмаила II 22 августа 1576 года Хайдар был обезглавлен.
14-месячное правление Исмаила было примечательно двумя вещами: постоянным кровопусканием его родственников и других (включая его собственных сторонников) и его отменой религии. Он убил всех своих родственников, за исключением своего старшего брата, Мохаммада Худабанды, который, будучи почти слепым, не был реальным кандидатом на трон, и трех сыновей Мохаммада, Хамзы Мирзы, Аббаса Мирзы и Абу Талиба Мирзы. [98] Хотя убийственные действия Исмаила можно объяснить политическим благоразумием (османские султаны иногда чистили родословную, чтобы предотвратить появление соперников за престол [99] ), его действия против шиитов предполагают возмездие против его отца, который считал себя набожным практикующим. Исмаил стремился восстановить суннитскую ортодоксальность. Но даже здесь могли быть практические политические соображения, а именно: «опасение по поводу чрезмерно сильного положения шиитских сановников, которое было бы подорвано повторным введением Сунны». [100] Его поведение также можно объяснить употреблением наркотиков. В любом случае, в конечном итоге он был убит (согласно некоторым источникам) своей сводной сестрой-черкешенкой, Пари Хан Ханум , которая защищала его против Хайдара. Говорят, что она отравила его опиум. [101]
После смерти Исмаила II было три кандидата на престол: Шах Шуджа, малолетний сын Исмаила (всего несколько недель от роду), брат Исмаила, Мохаммад Ходабанда; и сын Мохаммада, Султан Хамза Мирза, которому в то время было 11 лет. Пари Хан Ханум, сестра Исмаила и Мохаммада, надеялась стать регентом любого из троих (включая своего старшего брата, который был почти слепым). Мохаммад был выбран и получил корону 11 февраля 1579 года. [102] Мохаммад правил в течение 10 лет, а его сестра сначала доминировала при дворе, но она пала в первой из многих интриг, которые продолжались, несмотря на то, что узбеки и османы снова использовали возможность угрожать территории Сефевидов.
Мухаммед позволял другим управлять государственными делами, но ни у кого из них не было ни престижа, ни умения, ни жестокости Тахмаспа, ни Исмаила II, чтобы обуздать этнические или дворцовые фракции, и каждый из его правителей встретил мрачный конец. Младшая сестра Мухаммеда, которая приложила руку к возвышению и свержению Исмаила II и, таким образом, имела значительное влияние среди кызылбашей, была первой. Она не продержалась намного дольше, чем Мохаммед воцарился в Казвине, где она была убита. [103] Она была убита интригами визиря Мирзы Салмана Джабери (который был остатком правления Исмаила II) и главной жены Мухаммеда Хайр аль-Ниса Бегум , известной как Махд-и 'Улья. Есть некоторые указания на то, что Мирза Салман был главным заговорщиком. [104] Пари Хан Ханум могла заручиться сильной поддержкой среди кызылбашей, а ее дядя, Шамхал Султан , был видным черкес, занимавшим высокое официальное положение. [105] Мирза Салман покинул столицу до того, как Пари Хан Ханум закрыла ворота, и смог встретиться с Мохаммадом Ходабандой и его женой в Ширазе, которым он предложил свои услуги. [106] Он, возможно, полагал, что будет править, как только их враг будет уничтожен, но Махд-и 'Улья оказался сильнее из них двоих.
Она ни в коем случае не довольствовалась тем, чтобы оказывать более или менее косвенное влияние на государственные дела: вместо этого она открыто выполняла все основные функции сама, включая назначение главных должностных лиц королевства. Вместо обычной королевской аудиенции эти высокие сановники должны были собираться каждое утро у входа в женские покои, чтобы получить приказы Бегум. В этих случаях составлялись и скреплялись печатью королевские указы. [103]
The amirs demanded that she be removed, and Mahd-i Ulya was strangled in the harem in July 1579 on the ground of an alleged affair with the brother of the Crimean khan, Adil Giray,[103] who was captured during the 1578–1590 Ottoman war and held captive in the capital, Qazvin.[107] None of the perpetrators were brought to justice, although the shah lectured the assembled amirs on how they departed from the old ways when the shah was master to his Sufi disciples. The shah used that occasion to proclaim the 11-year-old Sultan Hamza Mirza (Mahd-i ‘Ulyā's favorite) crown-prince.[108]
The palace intrigues reflected ethnic unrest which would soon erupt into open warfare. Iran's neighbors seized the opportunity to attack. The Uzbeks struck in the Spring of 1578 but were repelled by Murtaza Quli Sultan, governor of Mashhad.[109] More seriously the Ottomans ended the Peace of Amasya and commenced a war with Iran that would last until 1590 by invading Iran's territories of Georgia and Shirvan. While the initial attacks were repelled, the Ottomans continued and grabbed considerable territory in Transcaucasia, Dagestan, Kurdistan and Lorestan and in 993/1585 they even took Tabriz.[110]
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In the midst of these foreign perils, rebellion broke out in Khorasan fomented by (or on behalf of) Mohammad's son, Abbas. Ali Quli Khan Shamlu, the lala of Abbas and Ismail II's man in Herat proclaimed Abbas shah there April 1581.[111] The following year the loyal Qizilbash forces (the Turkmen and Takkalu who controlled Qazvin), with vizier Mirza Salman and crown prince Sultan Hamza Mirza at their head, confronted the rebelling Ustajlu-Shamlu coalition which had assumed control of Khorasan under the nominal rule of young Abbas.[112] The Ustajlu chief, Murshid Quli Khan, immediately acquiesced and received a royal pardon. The Shumlu leader, Ali Quli Khan, however, holed himself inside Herat with Abbas. The vizier thought that the royal forces failed to prosecute the siege sufficiently and accused the forces of sedition. The loyal Qizibash recoiled at their treatment by Mirza Salman, who they resented for a number of reasons (not least of which was the fact that a Tajik was given military command over them), and demanded that he be turned over to them. The crown prince (the vizier's son-in-law) meekly turned him over, and the Qizilbash executed him and confiscated his property.[113] The siege of Herat thus ended in 1583 without Ali Quli Khan's surrender, and Khorasan was in a state of open rebellion.
In 1585 two events occurred that would combine to break the impasse among the Qizilbash. First, in the west, the Ottomans, seeing the disarray of the warriors, pressed deep into Safavid territory and occupied the old capital of Tabriz. Crown prince Hamza Mirza, now 21 years old and director of Safavid affairs, led a force to confront the Ottomans, but in 1586 was murdered under mysterious circumstances. In the east Murshid Quli Khan, of the Ustajlu tribe, managed to snatch Abbas away from the Shamlus. Two years later in 1587, the massive invasion of Khorasan by the Uzbeks proved the occasion whereby Murshid Quli Khan would make a play for supremacy in Qazvin. When he reached the capital with Abbas a public demonstration in the boy's favor decided the issue, and Shah Mohammad voluntarily handed over the insignia of kingship to his son, who was crowned Abbas I on October 1, 1588. The moment was grave for the empire, with the Ottomans deep in Iranian territory in the west and north and the Uzbeks in possession of half of Khorasan in the east.[114]
The 16-year-old Abbas I was installed as nominal shah in 1588, but the real power was intended to remain in the hands of his "mentor," Murshid Quli Khan, who reorganized court offices and principal governorships among the Qizilbash[115] and took the title of wakīl for himself.[116] Abbas' own position seemed even more dependent on Qizilbash approval than Mohammad Khodabanda's was. The dependence of Abbas on the Qizilbash (which provided the only military force) was further reinforced by the precarious situation of the empire, in the vice of Ottoman and Uzbek territorial plunder. Yet over the course of ten years Abbas was able, using cautiously-timed but nonetheless decisive steps, to affect a profound transformation of Safavid administration and military, throw back the foreign invaders, and preside over a flourishing of Persian art.
Whether Abbas had fully formed his strategy at the onset, at least in retrospect his method of restoring the shah's authority involved three phases: (1) restoration of internal security and law and order; (2) recovery of the eastern territories from the Uzbeks; and (3) recovery of the western territories from the Ottomans.[117] Before he could begin to embark on the first stage, he needed relief from the most serious threat to the empire: the military pressure from the Ottomans. He did so by taking the humiliating step of coming to peace terms with the Ottomans by making, for now, permanent their territorial gains in Iraq and the territories in the north, including Azerbaijan, Karabakh, Ganja, eastern Georgia (comprising the Kingdom of Kartli and Kakheti), Dagestan, and Kurdistan.[118][119] At the same time, he took steps to ensure that the Qizilbash did not mistake this apparent show of weakness as a signal for more tribal rivalry at the court. Although no one could have bristled more at the power grab of his "mentor" Murshid Quli Khan, he rounded up the leaders of a plot to assassinate the wakīl and had them executed. Then, having made the point that he would not encourage rivalries even purporting to favor his interests, he felt secure enough to have Murshid Quli Khan assassinated on his own orders in July 1589.[120] It was clear that Abbas' style of leadership would be entirely different from Mohammad Khodabanda's leadership.
Abbas was able to begin gradually transforming the empire from a tribal confederation to a modern imperial government by transferring provinces from mamalik (provincial) rule governed by a Qizilbash chief and the revenue of which mostly supported local Qizilbash administration and forces to khass (central) rule presided over by a court appointee and the revenue of which reverted to the court. Particularly important in this regard were the Gilan and Mazandaran provinces, which produced Iran's single most important export; silk. With the substantial new revenue, Abbas was able to build up a central, standing army, loyal only to him. This freed him of his dependence on Qizilbash warriors loyal to local tribal chiefs.[121]
What effectively fully severed Abbas's dependence on the Qizilbash, however, was how he constituted this new army. In order not to favor one Turkic tribe over another and to avoid inflaming the Turk-Persian enmity, he recruited his army from the "third force", a policy that had been implemented in its baby-steps since the reign of Tahmasp I – the Circassian, Georgian and to a lesser extent Armenian ghulāms (slaves) which (after conversion to Islam) were trained for the military or some branch of the civil or military administration. The standing army created by Abbas consisted of: (1) 10,000–15,000 cavalry ghulām regiments solely composed of ethnic Caucasians, armed with muskets in addition to the usual weapons (then the largest cavalry in the world[122]); (2) a corps of musketeers, tufangchiyān, mainly Iranians, originally foot soldiers but eventually mounted, and (3) a corps of artillerymen, tūpchiyān. Both corps of musketeers and artillerymen totaled 12,000 men. In addition the shah's personal bodyguard, made up exclusively of Caucasian ghulāms, was dramatically increased to 3,000.[123] This force of well-trained Caucasian ghulams under Abbas amounted to a total of near 40,000 soldiers paid for and beholden to the Shah.[124][125]
Abbas also greatly increased the number of cannons at his disposal, permitting him to field 500 in a single battle.[125] Ruthless discipline was enforced and looting was severely punished. Abbas was also able to draw on military advice from a number of European envoys, particularly from the English adventurers Sir Anthony Shirley and his brother Robert Shirley, who arrived in 1598 as envoys from the Earl of Essex on an unofficial mission to induce Iran into an anti-Ottoman alliance.[126] As mentioned by the Encyclopaedia Iranica, lastly, from 1600 onwards, the Safavid statesman Allāhverdī Khan, in conjunction with Robert Sherley, undertook further reorganizations of the army, which meant among other things further dramatically increasing the number of ghulams to 25,000.[127]
Abbas also moved the capital to Isfahan, deeper into central Iran. Abbas I built a new city next to the ancient Persian one. From this time the state began to take on a more Persian character. The Safavids ultimately succeeded in establishing a new Persian national monarchy.
Abbas I first fought the Uzbeks, recapturing Herat and Mashhad in 1598. Then he turned against Iran's archrival, the Ottomans, recapturing Baghdad, eastern Iraq and the Caucasian provinces by 1616, all through the 1603–1618, marking the first grand Safavid pitched victory over the Ottomans. He also used his new force to dislodge the Portuguese from Bahrain (1602) and, with English help, from Hormuz (1622), in the Persian Gulf (a vital link in Portuguese trade with India). He expanded commercial links with the English East India Company and the Dutch East India Company. Thus Abbas was able to break dependence on the Qizilbash for military might indefinitely, and therefore was able to fully centralize control for the first time since the foundation of the Safavid state.
The Ottoman Turks and Safavids fought over the fertile plains of Iraq for more than 150 years. The capture of Baghdad by Ismail I in 1509 was only followed by its loss to the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman I in 1534. After subsequent campaigns, the Safavids recaptured Baghdad in 1624 during the Ottoman–Safavid War (1623–39) yet lost it again to Murad IV in 1638 after Abbas had died. Henceforth a treaty, signed in Qasr-e Shirin known as the Treaty of Zuhab was established delineating a border between Iran and Turkey in 1639, a border which still stands in northwest Iran/southeast Turkey. The 150-year tug-of-war accentuated the Sunni and Shi'a rift in Iraq.
In 1614–16 during the Ottoman–Safavid War (1603–1618), Abbas suppressed a rebellion led by his formerly most loyal Georgian subjects Luarsab II and Teimuraz I (also known as Tahmuras Khan) in the Kingdom of Kakheti. In 1613, Abbas had appointed these trusted Georgian gholams of his on the puppet thrones of Kartli and Kakheti, the Iranian Safavid ruled areas of Georgia. Later that year, when the shah summoned them to join him on a hunting expedition in Mazandaran, they didn't show up due to the fear they would be either imprisoned or killed.[128] Ultimately forming an alliance, the two sought refuge with the Ottoman forces in Ottoman ruled Imereti. This defection of two of the shah's most trusted subjects and gholams infuriated the shah, as reported by the Safavid court historian Iskandar Beg Munshi.[128]
The following spring in 1614, Abbas I appointed a grandson of Alexander II of Imereti to the throne of Kartli, Jesse of Kakheti also known as "Isā Khān".[128] Raised at the court in Isfahan and a Muslim, he was fully loyal to the shah. Subsequently, the shah marched upon Grem, the capital of Imereti, and punished its peoples for harbouring his defected subjects. He returned to Kartli, and in two punitive campaigns he devastated Tbilisi, killed 60–70,000 Kakheti Georgian peasants, and deported between 130,000 and 200,000 Georgian captives to mainland Iran.[129][130][131][132] After fully securing the region, he executed the rebellious Luarsab II of Kartli and later had the Georgian queen Ketevan, who had been sent to the shah as negotiator, tortured to death when she refused to renounce Christianity, in an act of revenge for the recalcitrance of Teimuraz.[133][134] Kakheti lost two-thirds of its population in these years by Abbas' punitive campaign. The majority were deported to Iran, while some were slaughtered.[135]
Teimuraz returned to eastern Georgia in 1615 and defeated a Safavid force. It was just a brief setback, however, as Abbas had already been making long-term plans to prevent further incursions. He was eventually successful in making the eastern Georgian territories an integral part of the Safavid provinces. In 1619 he appointed the loyal Simon II (or Semayun Khan) on the symbolic throne of Kakheti, while placing a series of his own governors to rule of districts where rebellious inhabitants were mostly located.[128] Moreover, he planned to deport all nobles of Kartli. Iranian rule had been fully restored over eastern Georgia, but the Georgian territories would continue to produce resistance to Safavid enroachments from 1624 until Abbas' death.[136]
In 1609–10, a war broke out between Kurdish tribes and the Safavid Empire. After a long and bloody siege led by the Safavid grand vizier Hatem Beg, which lasted from November 1609 to the summer of 1610, the Kurdish stronghold of Dimdim was captured. Shah Abbas ordered a general massacre in Beradost and Mukriyan (Mahabad, reported by Eskandar Beg Monshi, Safavid Historian (1557–1642), in "Alam Ara Abbasi") and resettled the Turkic Afshar tribe in the region while deporting many Kurdish tribes to Khorasan.[137][138] Nowadays, there is a community of nearly 1.7 million people who are descendants of the tribes deported from Kurdistan to Khorasan (Northeastern Iran) by the Safavids.[139]
Abbas's tolerance towards Christians was part of his policy of establishing diplomatic links with European powers to try to enlist their help in the fight against their common enemy, the Ottoman Empire. The idea of such an anti-Ottoman alliance was not a new one – over a century before, Uzun Hassan, then ruler of part of Iran, had asked the Venetians for military aid – but none of the Safavids had made diplomatic overtures to Europe. Shah Ismail I was the first of the Safavids to try to establish once again an alliance against the common Ottoman enemy through the earlier stages of the Habsburg–Persian alliance, but this also proved to be largely unfruitful during his reign.[140] Abbas's attitude, however, was in marked contrast to that of his grandfather, Tahmasp I, who had expelled the English traveller Anthony Jenkinson from his court on hearing he was a Christian.[141] For his part, Abbas declared that he "preferred the dust from the shoe soles of the lowest Christian to the highest Ottoman personage."[142] Abbas would take active and all measures needed in order to seal the alliances.
In 1599, Abbas sent his first diplomatic mission to Europe. The group crossed the Caspian Sea and spent the winter in Moscow before proceeding through Norway and Germany (where it was received by Emperor Rudolf II) to Rome, where Pope Clement VIII gave the travellers a long audience. They finally arrived at the court of Philip III of Spain in 1602. Although the expedition never managed to return to Iran, being shipwrecked on the journey around Africa, it marked an important new step in contacts between Iran and Europe. The Europeans began to be fascinated by the Iranians and their culture – Shakespeare's Twelfth Night (1601–02), for example, makes two references (at II.5 and III.4) to 'the Sophy', then the English term for the Shahs of Iran.[143][144] Henceforward, the number of diplomatic missions to and fro greatly increased.[145]
The shah had set great store on an alliance with Spain, the chief opponent of the Ottomans in Europe. Abbas offered trading rights and the chance to preach Christianity in Iran in return for help against the Ottomans. But the stumbling block of Hormuz remained, a vassal kingdom that had fallen into the hands of the Spanish Habsburgs when the King of Spain inherited the throne of Portugal in 1580. The Spanish demanded Abbas break off relations with the English before they would consider relinquishing the town. Abbas was unable to comply. Eventually Abbas became frustrated with Spain, as he did with the Holy Roman Empire, which wanted him to make his over 400,000 Armenian subjects swear allegiance to the Pope but did not trouble to inform the shah when the Emperor Rudolf signed a peace treaty with the Ottomans. Contacts with the Pope, Poland and Moscow were no more fruitful.[146]
More came of Abbas's contacts with the English, although England had little interest in fighting against the Ottomans. The Shirley brothers arrived in 1598 and helped reorganize the Iranian army, which proved to be crucial in the Ottoman–Safavid War (1603–18), which resulted in Ottoman defeats in all stages of the war and the first clear pitched Safavid victory of their archrivals. One of the Shirley brothers, Robert Shirley, would lead Abbas's second diplomatic mission to Europe from 1609 to 1615.[147] The English East India Company also began to take an interest in Iran, and in 1622 four of its ships helped Abbas retake Hormuz from the Portuguese in the capture of Ormuz. This was the beginning of the English East India Company's long-running interest in Iran.[148]
Due to his obsessive fear of assassination, Shah Abbas either put to death or blinded any member of his family who aroused his suspicion. His oldest son, the crown prince Mohammad Baqer Mirza, was executed following a court intrigue in which several Circassians were involved, while two others were blinded. Since two other sons had predeceased him, the result was a personal tragedy for Shah Abbas. When he died on 19 January 1629, he had no son capable of succeeding him.[149]
During the early 17th century the power of the Qizilbash drastically diminished, the original militia that had helped Ismail I capture Tabriz and that had gained many administrative powers over the centuries. Power was shifting to the new class of Caucasian deportees and imports, many of the hundreds of thousands ethnic Georgians, Circassians, and Armenians. This new layer of society would continue to play a vital role in Iranian history up to and including the fall of the Qajar dynasty, some 300 years after Abbas' death.
At its zenith, during the long reign of Shah Abbas I, the empire's reach comprised Iran, Iraq, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Dagestan, Kabardino-Balkaria, Bahrain, and parts of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Turkey.
In addition to fighting its perennial enemies, their archrival the Ottomans and the Uzbeks as the 17th century progressed, Iran had to contend with the rise of new neighbors. Russian Muscovy in the previous century had deposed two western Asian khanates of the Golden Horde and expanded its influence into Europe, the Caucasus Mountains and Central Asia. Astrakhan came under Russian rule, nearing the Safavid possessions in Dagestan. In the far eastern territories, the Mughals of India had expanded into Khorasan (now Afghanistan) at the expense of Iranian control, briefly taking Kandahar.
In 1659, the Kingdom of Kakheti rose up against the Safavid Iranian rule due to a change of policy that included the mass settling of Qizilbash Turkic tribes in the region in order to repopulate the province, after Shah Abbas' earlier mass deportations of between 130,000[150] – 200,000[130][131][151] Georgian subjects to Iran's mainland and massacre of another thousand in 1616 virtually left the province without any substantial population. This Bakhtrioni Uprising was successfully defeated under personal direction of Shah Abbas II himself. However, strategically it remained inconclusive.[152] The Iranian authority was restored in Kakheti, but the Qizilbash Turkics were prevented from settling in Kakheti, which undermined the planned Iranian policies in the respective province.
More importantly, European trading companies used their superior means of maritime power to control trade routes in the western Indian Ocean. As a result, Safavid Iran's overseas links to East Africa, the Arabian peninsula and South Asia were greatly diminished.[153] Overland trade grew notably however, as Iran was able to further develop its overland trade with North and Central Europe during the second half of the seventeenth century.[154] In the late seventeenth century, Iranian merchants established a permanent presence as far north as Narva on the Baltic Sea, in what now is Estonia.[155]
Iranian trade with European merchants led to the depletion of much of Iran's metal supplies. Except for Shah Abbas II, the Safavid rulers after Abbas I were therefore rendered ineffectual, and the Iranian government declined and finally collapsed when a serious military threat emerged on its eastern border in the early eighteenth century.[156] The end of the reign of Abbas II, 1666, thus marked the beginning of the end of the Safavid dynasty. Despite falling revenues and military threats, later shahs had lavish lifestyles. Soltan Hoseyn (1694–1722) in particular was known for his love of wine and disinterest in governance.[157]
The country was repeatedly raided on its frontiers – Kerman by Baloch tribes in 1698, Khorasan by the Hotakis in 1717, Dagestan and northern Shirvan by the Lezgins in 1721, constantly in Mesopotamia by Sunni peninsula Arabs. Sultan Hosein tried to forcibly convert his Afghan subjects in Qandahar from Sunni to Twelverism. In response, a Ghilzai Afghan chieftain named Mirwais Hotak revolted and killed Gurgin Khan, the Safavid governor of the region, along with his army. In 1722, an Afghan army led by Mir Wais' son Mahmud advanced on the heart of the empire and defeated the government forces at the Battle of Gulnabad. He then besieged the capital of Isfahan, until Shah Soltan Hoseyn abdicated and acknowledged him as the new king of Iran.[158][full citation needed] At the same time, the Russians led by Peter the Great attacked and conquered swaths of Safavid Iran's North Caucasian, Transcaucasian, and northern mainland territories through the Russo-Iranian War (1722-1723). The Safavids' archrivals, the neighbouring Ottomans, invaded western and northwestern Safavid Iran and took swaths of territory there, including the city of Baghdad. Together with the Russians, they agreed to divide and keep the conquered Iranian territories for themselves as confirmed in the Treaty of Constantinople (1724).[159]\
The tribal Afghans dominated their conquered territory for seven years but were prevented from making further gains by Nader Shah, a former slave who had risen to military leadership within the Afshar tribe in Khorasan, a vassal state of the Safavids. Quickly making a name as a military genius both feared and respected amongst the empire's friends and enemies (including Iran's archrival the Ottoman Empire, and Russia; both empires Nader would deal with soon afterwards), Nader Shah easily defeated the Afghan Hotaki forces in the 1729 Battle of Damghan. He had removed them from power and banished them from Iran by 1729. In 1732 by the Treaty of Resht and in 1735 Treaty of Ganja, he negotiated an agreement with the government of Empress Anna Ioanovna that resulted in the return of the recently annexed Iranian territories, making most of the Caucasus fall back into Iranian hands, while establishing an Irano-Russian alliance against the common neighbouring Ottoman enemy.[160][161] In the Ottoman–Iranian War (1730–35), he retook all territories lost by the Ottoman invasion of the 1720s, as well as beyond. With the Safavid state and its territories secured, in 1738 Nader conquered the Hotaki's last stronghold in Kandahar; in the same year, in need of fortune to aid his military careers against his Ottoman and Russian imperial rivals, he started his invasion of the wealthy but weak Mughal Empire accompanied by his Georgian subject Erekle II,[162] occupying Ghazni, Kabul, Lahore, and as far as Delhi, in India, when he completely humiliated and looted the militarily inferior Mughals. These cities were later inherited by his Abdali Afghan military commander, Ahmad Shah Durrani, who would go on to found the Durrani Empire in 1747. Nadir had effective control under Shah Tahmasp II and then ruled as regent of the infant Abbas III until 1736 when he had himself crowned shah.
Immediately after Nader Shah's assassination in 1747 and the disintegration of his short-lived empire, the Safavids were re-appointed as shahs of Iran in order to lend legitimacy to the nascent Zand dynasty. However, the brief puppet regime of Ismail III ended in 1760 when Karim Khan felt strong enough to take nominal power of the country as well and officially end the Safavid dynasty.
While large in terms of land area, the large proportion of deserts and mountains in its territory meant density was very low; the empire's population is estimated to have probably numbered between eight and ten million in 1650, as compared to c. 20 million for the Ottoman Empire in 1600.[163]
Safavid society was a meritocracy where officials were appointed on the basis of worth and merit, and not on the basis of birth. It was certainly not an oligarchy, nor was it an aristocracy. Sons of nobles were considered for the succession of their fathers as a mark of respect, but they had to prove themselves worthy of the position. This system avoided an entrenched aristocracy or a caste society.[164] There are numerous recorded accounts of laymen that rose to high official posts as a result of their merits.[165]
Nevertheless, the Iranian society during the Safavids was that of a hierarchy, with the Shah at the apex of the hierarchical pyramid, the common people, merchants and peasants at the base, and the aristocrats in between. The term dowlat, which in modern Persian means "government", was then an abstract term meaning "bliss" or "felicity", and it began to be used as concrete sense of the Safavid state, reflecting the view that the people had of their ruler, as someone elevated above humanity.[166]
Also among the aristocracy, in the middle of the hierarchical pyramid, were the religious officials, who, mindful of the historic role of the religious classes as a buffer between the ruler and his subjects, usually did their best to shield the ordinary people from oppressive governments.[166]
The power structure of the Safavid state was mainly divided into two groups: the Turkic-speaking military/ruling elite – whose job was to maintain the territorial integrity and continuity of the Iranian empire through their leadership – and the Persian-speaking administrative/governing elite – whose job was to oversee the operation and development of the nation and its identity through their high positions. Thus came the term "Turk and Tajik" to describe the Persianate, or Turko-Persian, nature of many dynasties which ruled over Greater Iran between the 12th and 20th centuries, in that these dynasties promoted and helped continue the dominant Persian linguistic and cultural identity of their states, although the dynasties themselves were of non-Persian (e.g. Turkic) origins. The relationship between the Turkic-speaking 'Turks' and Persian-speaking 'Tajiks' was symbiotic, yet some form of rivalry did exist between the two. As the former represented the "people of the sword" and the latter, "the people of the pen", high-level official posts would naturally be reserved for the Persians. Indeed, this had been the situation throughout Persian history, even before the Safavids, ever since the Arab conquest.[167][failed verification]
Shah Tahmasp introduced a change to this, when he, and the other Safavid rulers who succeeded him, sought to blur the formerly defined lines between the two linguistic groups, by taking the sons of Turkic-speaking officers into the royal household for their education in the Persian language. Consequently, they were slowly able to take on administrative jobs in areas which had hitherto been the exclusive preserve of the ethnic Persians.[168]
From 1540 and onwards, Shah Tahmasp initiated a gradual transformation of the Iranian society by slowly constructing a new branch and layer solely composed of ethnic Caucasians. The implementation of this branch would be completed and significantly widened under Abbas the Great (Abbas I). According to the Encyclopædia Iranica, for Tahmasp, the background of this initiation and eventual composition that would be only finalized under Shah Abbas I, circled around the military tribal elite of the empire, the Qizilbash, who believed that physical proximity to and control of a member of the immediate Safavid family guaranteed spiritual advantages, political fortune, and material advancement.[90] This was a huge impedance for the authority of the Shah, and furthermore, it undermined any developments without the agreeing or shared profit of the Qizilbash. As Tahmasp understood and realized that any long-term solutions would mainly involve minimizing the political and military presence of the Qizilbash as a whole, it would require them to be replaced by a whole new layer in society, that would question and battle the authority of the Qizilbash on every possible level, and minimize any of their influences. This layer would be solely composed of hundreds of thousands of deported, imported, and to a lesser extent voluntarily migrated ethnic Circassians, Georgians, and Armenians. This layer would become the "third force" in Iranian society, alongside the other two forces, the Turkomans and Persians.
The series of campaigns that Tahmāsp subsequently waged after realising this in the wider Caucasus between 1540 and 1554 were meant to uphold the morale and the fighting efficiency of the Qizilbash military,[169] but they brought home large numbers (over 70,000)[170] of Christian Georgian, Circassian and Armenian slaves as its main objective, and would be the basis of this third force; the new (Caucasian) layer in society.[91] According to the Encyclopædia Iranica, this would be as well the starting point for the corps of the ḡolāmān-e ḵāṣṣa-ye-e šarifa, or royal slaves, who would dominate the Safavid military for most of the empire's length, and would form a crucial part of the third force. As non-Turcoman converts to Islam, these Circassian and Georgian ḡolāmāns (also written as ghulams) were completely unrestrained by clan loyalties and kinship obligations, which was an attractive feature for a ruler like Tahmāsp whose childhood and upbringing had been deeply affected by Qizilbash tribal politics.[90] Their formation, implementation, and usage was very much alike to the janissaries of the neighbouring Ottoman Empire.[92] In turn, many of these transplanted women became wives and concubines of Tahmasp, and the Safavid harem emerged as a competitive, and sometimes lethal, arena of ethnic politics as cliques of Turkmen, Circassian, and Georgian women and courtiers vied with each other for the king's attention.[90] Although the first slave soldiers would not be organized until the reign of Abbas I, during Tahmasp's reign, Caucasians already became important members of the royal household, Harem and in the civil and military administration,[93][94] and were on their way of becoming an integral part of society. Tahmasp I's successor, Ismail II, brought another 30,000 Circassians and Georgians to Iran of which many joined the ghulam force.[171]
Following the full implementation of this policy by Abbas I, the women (only Circassian and Georgian) now very often came to occupy prominent positions in the harems of the Safavid elite, while the men who became part of the ghulam "class" as part of the powerful third force were given special training on completion of which they were either enrolled in one of the newly created ghilman regiments, or employed in the royal household.[172] The rest of the masses of deportees and importees, a significant portion numbering many hundreds of thousands, were settled in various regions of mainland Iran, and were given all kinds of roles as part of society, such as craftsmen, farmers, cattle breeders, traders, soldiers, generals, governors, woodcutters, etc., all also part of the newly established layer in Iranian society.[173]
Shah Abbas, who significantly enlargened and completed this program and under whom the creation of this new layer in society may be mentioned as fully "finalized", completed the ghulam system as well. As part of its completion, he greatly expanded the ghulam military corps from just a few hundred during Tahmāsp's era, to 15,000 highly trained cavalrymen,[174] as part of a whole army division of 40,000 Caucasian ghulams. He then went on to completely reduce the number of Qizilbash provincial governorships and systematically moved qizilbash governors to other districts, thus disrupting their ties with the local community, and reducing their power. Most were replaced by a ghulam, and within short time, Georgians, Circassians, and to a lesser extent Armenians had been appointed to many of the highest offices of state, and were employed within all other possible sections of society. By 1595, Allahverdi Khan, a Georgian, became one of the most powerful men in the Safavid state, when he was appointed the Governor-General of Fars, one of the richest provinces in Iran. And his power reached its peak in 1598, when he became the commander-in-chief of the armed forces.[175] Thus, starting from the reign of Tahmāsp I but only fully implemented and completed by Shah Abbas, this new group solely composed of ethnic Caucasians eventually came to constitute a powerful "third force" within the state as a new layer in society, alongside the Persians and the Qizilbash Turks, and it only goes to prove the meritocratic society of the Safavids.
It is estimated that during Abbas' reign alone some 130,000–200,000 Georgians,[176][131][130][132] tens of thousands of Circassians, and around 300,000 Armenians[177][178] had been deported and imported from the Caucasus to mainland Iran, all obtaining functions and roles as part of the newly created layer in society, such as within the highest positions of the state, or as farmers, soldiers, craftspeople, as part of the Royal harem, the Court, and peasantry, amongst others.
Even though the Safavids were not the first Shiʻi rulers in Iran, they played a crucial role in making Shiʻa Islam the official religion in the whole of Iran, as well as what is nowadays the Republic of Azerbaijan.[179] There were large Shiʻi communities in some cities like Qom and Sabzevar as early as the 8th century. In the 10th and 11th centuries the Buwayhids, who were of the Zaidiyyah branch of Shiʻa Islam, ruled in Fars, Isfahan and Baghdad. As a result of the Mongol conquest and the relative religious tolerance of the Ilkhanids, Shiʻi dynasties were re-established in Iran, Sarbedaran in Khorasan being the most important. The Ilkhanid ruler Öljaitü converted to Twelver Shiʻism in the 13th century.
Following his conquest of Iran and Azerbaijan, Ismail I made conversion mandatory for the largely Sunni population. The Sunni Ulema or clergy were either killed or exiled[citation needed]. Ismail I, brought in mainstream Twelver Shi'a religious leaders and granted them land and money in return for loyalty. Later, during the Safavid and especially Qajar period, the Shiʻi Ulema's power increased and they were able to exercise a role, independent of or compatible with the government.
An important feature of the Safavid society was the alliance that emerged between the ulama (the religious class) and the merchant community. The latter included merchants trading in the bazaars, the trade and artisan guilds (asnāf) and members of the quasi-religious organizations run by dervishes (futuvva). Because of the relative insecurity of property ownership in Iran, many private landowners secured their lands by donating them to the clergy as so called vaqf. They would thus retain the official ownership and secure their land from being confiscated by royal commissioners or local governors, as long as a percentage of the revenues from the land went to the ulama. Increasingly, members of the religious class, particularly the mujtahids and the seyyeds, gained full ownership of these lands, and, according to contemporary historian Iskandar Munshi, Iran started to witness the emergence of a new and significant group of landowners.[180]
The Akhbari movement "crystalized" as a "separate movement" with the writings of Muhammad Amin al-Astarabadi (died 1627 AD). It rejected the use of reasoning in deriving verdicts and believed that only the Quran, hadith, (prophetic sayings and recorded opinions of the Imams) and consensus should be used as sources to derive verdicts (fatāwā). Unlike Usulis, Akhbari did and do not follow marjas who practice ijtihad.[181]
It achieved its greatest influence in the late Safavid and early post-Safavid era, when it dominated Twelver Shiʻi Islam.[182] However, shortly thereafter Muhammad Baqir Behbahani (died 1792), along with other Usuli mujtahids, crushed the Akhbari movement.[183] It remains only a small minority in the Shiʻi world. One result of the resolution of this conflict was the rise in importance of the concept of ijtihad and the position of the mujtahid (as opposed to other ulama) in the 18th and early 19th centuries. It was from this time that the division of the Shiʻa world into mujtahid (those who could follow their own independent judgment) and muqallid (those who had to follow the rulings of a mujtahid) took place. According to author Moojan Momen, "up to the middle of the 19th century there were very few mujtahids (three or four) anywhere at any one time," but "several hundred existed by the end of the 19th century."[184]
Muhammad Baqir Majlisi, commonly referenced to using the title Allamah, was a highly influential scholar during the 17th century (Safavid era). Majlisi's works emphasized his desire to purge Twelver Shiʻism of the influences of mysticism and philosophy, and to propagate an ideal of strict adherence to the Islamic law (sharia).[185] Majlisi promoted specifically Shiʻi rituals such as mourning for Hussein ibn Ali and visitation (ziyarat) of the tombs of the Imams and Imamzadas, stressing "the concept of the Imams as mediators and intercessors for man with God."[186]
The Safavid state was one of checks and balance, both within the government and on a local level. At the apex of this system was the Shah, with total power over the state, legitimized by his bloodline as a sayyid, or descendant of Muhammad. So absolute was his power, that the French merchant, and later ambassador to Iran, Jean Chardin thought the Safavid Shahs ruled their land with an iron fist and often in a despotic manner.[187] To ensure transparency and avoid decisions being made that circumvented the Shah, a complex system of bureaucracy and departmental procedures had been put in place that prevented fraud. Every office had a deputy or superintendent, whose job was to keep records of all actions of the state officials and report directly to the Shah. The Shah himself exercised his own measures for keeping his ministers under control by fostering an atmosphere of rivalry and competitive surveillance. And since the Safavid society was meritocratic, and successions seldom were made on the basis of heritage, this meant that government offices constantly felt the pressure of being under surveillance and had to make sure they governed in the best interest of their leader, and not merely their own.
There probably did not exist any parliament, as we know them today. But the Portuguese ambassador to the Safavids, De Gouvea, still mentions the Council of State[188] in his records, which perhaps was a term for governmental gatherings of the time.
The highest level in the government was that of the Prime Minister, or Grand Vizier (Etemad-e Dowlat), who was always chosen from among doctors of law. He enjoyed tremendous power and control over national affairs as he was the immediate deputy of the Shah. No act of the Shah was valid without the counter seal of the Prime Minister. But even he stood accountable to a deputy (vak’anevis), who kept records of his decision-makings and notified the Shah. Second to the Prime Minister post were the General of the Revenues (mostoufi-ye mamalek), or finance minister,[189] and the Divanbegi, Minister of Justice. The latter was the final appeal in civil and criminal cases, and his office stood next to the main entrance to the Ali Qapu palace. In earlier times, the Shah had been closely involved in judicial proceedings, but this part of the royal duty was neglected by Shah Safi and the later kings.[190]
Next in authority were the generals: the General of the Royal Troops (the Shahsevans), General of the Musketeers, General of the Ghulams and The Master of Artillery. A separate official, the Commander-in-Chief, was appointed to be the head of these officials.[190]
As for the royal household, the highest post was that of the Nazir, Court Minister. He was perhaps the closest advisor to the Shah, and, as such, functioned as his eyes and ears within the Court. His primary job was to appoint and supervise all the officials of the household and to be their contact with the Shah. But his responsibilities also included that of being the treasurer of the Shah's properties. This meant that even the Prime Minister, who held the highest office in the state, had to work in association with the Nazir when it came to managing those transactions that directly related to the Shah.[190]
The second most senior appointment was the Grand Steward (Ichik Agasi bashi), who would always accompany the Shah and was easily recognizable because of the great baton that he carried with him. He was responsible for introducing all guests, receiving petitions presented to the Shah and reading them if required. Next in line were the Master of the Royal Stables (Mirakor bashi) and the Master of the Hunt (Mirshekar bashi). The Shah had stables in all the principal towns, and Shah Abbas was said to have about 30,000 horses in studs around the country.[191] In addition to these, there were separate officials appointed for the caretaking of royal banquets and for entertainment.
Chardin specifically noticed the rank of doctors and astrologers and the respect that the Shahs had for them. The Shah had a dozen of each in his service and would usually be accompanied by three doctors and three astrologers, who were authorized to sit by his side on various occasions.[190] The Chief Physician (Hakim-bashi) was a highly considered member of the Royal court,[192] and the most revered astrologer of the court was given the title Munajjim-bashi (Chief Astrologer).[193]
The Safavid court was furthermore a rich mix of peoples from its earliest days.[194] As David Blow states, foremost among the courtiers were the old nobility of Turkoman Qizilbash lords and their sons. Although already by the early years of king Abbas' reign (r. 1588–1629) they were no longer controlling the state, the Turkoman Qizilbash continued to provide many of the senior army officers and to fill important administrative and ceremonial offices in the royal household.[194] There were the Persians who still dominated the bureaucracy and under Abbas held the two highest government offices of Grand Vizier and Comptroller-General of the Revenues (mostoufi-ye mamalek), which was the nearest thing to a finance minister.[194] There were also the large number of gholams or "slaves of the shah", who were mainly Georgians, Circassians and Armenians.[194] As a result of Abbas' reforms, they held high offices in the army, the administration and the royal household. Last but by no means least there were the palace eunuchs who were also ghulams – "white" eunuchs largely from the Caucasus, and "black" eunuchs from India and Africa.[194] Under Abbas, the eunuchs became an increasingly important element at the court.[194]
During the first century of the dynasty, the primary court language remained Azeri,[189] although this increasingly changed after the capital was moved to Isfahan.[12] David Blow adds; "it seems likely that most, if not all, of the Turkoman grandees at the court also spoke Persian, which was the language of the administration and culture, as well as of the majority of the population. But the reverse seems not to have been true. When Abbas had a lively conversation in Turkish with the Italian traveller Pietro Della Valle, in front of his courtiers, he had to translate the conversation afterwards into Persian for the benefit of most of those present."[194] Lastly, due to the large amount of Georgians, Circassians, and Armenians at the Safavid court (the gholams and in the harem), the Georgian, Circassian and Armenian languages were spoken as well, since these were their mother tongues.[195] Abbas himself was able to speak Georgian as well.[196]
On a local level, the government was divided into public land and royal possessions. The public land was under the rule of local governors, or Khans. Since the earliest days of the Safavid dynasty, the Qizilbash generals had been appointed to most of these posts. They ruled their provinces like petty shahs and spent all their revenues on their own province, only presenting the Shah with the balance. In return, they had to keep ready a standing army at all times and provide the Shah with military assistance upon his request. It was also requested from them that they appoint a lawyer (vakil) to the Court who would inform them on matters pertaining to the provincial affairs.[197] Shah Abbas I intended to decrease the power of the Qizilbash by bringing some of these provinces into his direct control, creating so called Crown Provinces (Khassa). But it was Shah Safi, under influence by his Prime Minister, Saru Taqi, that initiated the program of trying to increase the royal revenues by buying land from the governors and putting in place local commissioners.[197] In time, this proved to become a burden to the people that were under the direct rule of the Shah, as these commissioners, unlike the former governors, had little knowledge about the local communities that they controlled and were primarily interested in increasing the income of the Shah. And, while it was in the governors’ own interest to increase the productivity and prosperity of their provinces, the commissioners received their income directly from the royal treasury and, as such, did not care so much about investing in agriculture and local industries. Thus, the majority of the people suffered from rapacity and corruption carried out in the name of the Shah.[197]
In 16th and 17th century Iran, there existed a considerable number of local democratic institutions. Examples of such were the trade and artisan guilds, which had started to appear in Iran from the 1500s. Also, there were the quazi-religious fraternities called futuvva, which were run by local dervishes. Another official selected by the consensus of the local community was the kadkhoda, who functioned as a common law administrator.[198] The local sheriff (kalantar), who was not elected by the people but directly appointed by the Shah, and whose function was to protect the people against injustices on the part of the local governors, supervised the kadkhoda.[199]
In Safavid Iran there was little distinction between theology and jurisprudence, or between divine justice and human justice, and it all went under Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh). The legal system was built up of two branches: civil law, which had its roots in sharia, received wisdom, and urf, meaning traditional experience and very similar to the Western form of common law. While the imams and judges of law applied civil law in their practice, urf was primarily exercised by the local commissioners, who inspected the villages on behalf of the Shah, and by the Minister of Justice (Divanbegi). The latter were all secular functionaries working on behalf of the Shah.[200]
The highest level in the legal system was the Minister of Justice, and the law officers were divided into senior appointments, such as the magistrate (darughah), inspector (visir), and recorder (vak’anevis). The lesser officials were the qazi, corresponding a civil lieutenant, who ranked under the local governors and functioned as judges in the provinces.
According to Chardin:[201]
There were no particular place assigned for the administration of justice. Each magistrate executes justice in his own house in a large room opening on to a courtyard or a garden which is raised two or three feet above the ground. The Judge is seated at one end of the room having a writer and a man of law by his side.
Chardin also noted that bringing cases into court in Iran was easier than in the West. The judge (qazi) was informed of relevant points involved and would decide whether or not to take up the case. Having agreed to do so, a sergeant would investigate and summon the defendant, who was then obliged to pay the fee of the sergeant. The two parties with their witnesses pleaded their respective cases, usually without any counsel, and the judge would pass his judgment after the first or second hearing.[201]
Criminal justice was entirely separate from civil law and was judged upon common law administered through the Minister of Justice, local governors and the Court minister (the Nazir). Despite being based on urf, it relied upon certain sets of legal principles. Murder was punishable by death, and the penalty for bodily injuries was invariably the bastinado. Robbers had their right wrists amputated the first time, and sentenced to death on any subsequent occasion. State criminals were subjected to the karkan, a triangular wooden collar placed around the neck. On extraordinary occasions when the Shah took justice into his own hand, he would dress himself up in red for the importance of the event, according to ancient tradition.[200]
The Qizilbash were a wide variety of Shiʻi Muslims (ghulāt) and mostly Turcoman militant groups who helped found the Safavid Empire. Their military power was essential during the reign of the Shahs Ismail and Tahmasp. The Qizilbash tribes were essential to the military of Iran until the rule of Shah Abbas I – their leaders were able to exercise enormous influence and participate in court intrigues (assassinating Shah Ismail II for example).
A major problem faced by Ismail I after the establishment of the Safavid state was how to bridge the gap between the two major ethnic groups in that state: the Qizilbash ("Redhead") Turcomans, the "men of sword" of classical Islamic society whose military prowess had brought him to power, and the Persian elements, the "men of the pen", who filled the ranks of the bureaucracy and the religious establishment in the Safavid state as they had done for centuries under previous rulers of Iran, be they Arabs, Mongols, or Turkmens. As Vladimir Minorsky put it, friction between these two groups was inevitable, because the Qizilbash "were no party to the national Persian tradition".
Between 1508 and 1524, the year of Ismail's death, the shah appointed five successive Persians to the office of vakil. When the second Persian vakil was placed in command of a Safavid army in Transoxiana, the Qizilbash, considering it a dishonor to be obliged to serve under him, deserted him on the battlefield with the result that he was slain. The fourth vakil was murdered by the Qizilbash, and the fifth was put to death by them.[55]
Shah Abbas realized that in order to retain absolute control over his empire without antagonizing the Qizilbash, he needed to create reforms that reduced the dependency that the shah had on their military support. Part of these reforms was the creation of the 3rd force within the aristocracy and all other functions within the empire, but even more important in undermining the authority of the Qizilbash was the introduction of the Royal Corps into the military. This military force would serve the shah only and eventually consisted of four separate branches:[202]
Despite the reforms, the Qizilbash would remain the strongest and most effective element within the military, accounting for more than half of its total strength.[205] But the creation of this large standing army, that, for the first time in Safavid history, was serving directly under the Shah, significantly reduced their influence, and perhaps any possibilities for the type of civil unrest that had caused havoc during the reign of the previous shahs.
The growth of Safavid economy was fuelled by the stability which allowed the agriculture to thrive, as well as trade, due to Iran's position between the burgeoning civilizations of Europe to its west and India and Islamic Central Asia to its east and north. The Silk Road which led through northern Iran was revived in the 16th century. Abbas I also supported direct trade with Europe, particularly England and The Netherlands which sought Persian carpet, silk and textiles. Other exports were horses, goat hair, pearls and an inedible bitter almond hadam-talka used as a spice in India. The main imports were spice, textiles (woolens from Europe, cottons from Gujarat), metals, coffee, and sugar.
In the late 17th century, Safavid Iran had higher living standards than in Europe. According to traveller Jean Chardin, for example, farmers in Iran had higher living standards than farmers in the most fertile European countries.[206]
According to the historian Roger Savory, the twin bases of the domestic economy were pastoralism and agriculture. And, just as the higher levels of the social hierarchy was divided between the Turkish "men of the sword" and the Persian "men of the pen"; so were the lower level divided between the Turcoman tribes, who were cattle breeders and lived apart from the surrounding population, and the Persians, who were settled agriculturalists.[207]
The Safavid economy was to a large extent based on agriculture and taxation of agricultural products. According to the French jeweller Jean Chardin, the variety in agricultural products in Iran was unrivaled in Europe and consisted of fruits and vegetables never even heard of in Europe. Chardin was present at some feasts in Isfahan were there were more than fifty different kinds of fruit. He thought that there was nothing like it in France or Italy:[208]
Tobacco grew all over the country and was as strong as that grown in Brazil. Saffron was the best in the world... Melons were regarded as excellent fruit, and there were more than 50 different sorts, the finest of which came from Khorasan. And in spite of being transported for more than thirty days, they were fresh when they reached Isfahan... After melons the finest fruits were grapes and dates, and the best dates were grown in Jahrom.
Despite this, he was disappointed when travelling the country and witnessing the abundance of land that was not irrigated, or the fertile plains that were not cultivated, something he thought was in stark contrast to Europe. He blamed this on misgovernment, the sparse population of the country, and lack of appreciation of agriculture amongst the Persians.[209]
In the period prior to Shah Abbas I, most of the land was assigned to officials (civil, military and religious). From the time of Shah Abbas onwards, more land was brought under the direct control of the shah. And since agriculture accounted for by far largest share of tax revenue, he took measures to expand it. What remained unchanged, was the "crop-sharing agreement" between whoever was the landlord, and the farmer. This agreement consisted of five elements: land, water, plough-animals, seed and labour. Each element constituted 20 percent of the crop production, and if, for instance, the farmer provided the labour force and the animals, he would be entitled to 40 percent of the earnings.[210][211] According to contemporary historians, though, the landlord always had the worst of the bargain with the farmer in the crop-sharing agreements. In general, the farmers lived in comfort, and they were well paid and wore good clothes, although it was also noted that they were subject to forced labour and lived under heavy demands.[212]
Horses were the most important of all the beasts of burden, and the best were brought in from Arabia and Central-Asia. They were costly because of the widespread trade in them, including to Turkey and India. The next most important mount, when traveling through Iran, was the mule. Also, the camel was a good investment for the merchant, as they cost nearly nothing to feed, carried a lot weight and could travel almost anywhere.[213]
Under the governance of the strong shahs, especially during the first half of the 17th century, traveling through Iran was easy because of good roads and the caravanserais, that were strategically placed along the route. Thévenot and Tavernier commented that the Iranian caravanserais were better built and cleaner than their Turkish counterparts.[214] According to Chardin, they were also more abundant than in the Mughal or Ottoman Empires, where they were less frequent but larger.[215] Caravanserais were designed especially to benefit poorer travelers, as they could stay there for as long as they wished, without payment for lodging. During the reign of Shah Abbas I, as he tried to upgrade the Silk Road to improve the commercial prosperity of the Empire, an abundance of caravanserais, bridges, bazaars and roads were built, and this strategy was followed by wealthy merchants who also profited from the increase in trade. To uphold the standard, another source of revenue was needed, and road toll, that were collected by guards (rah-dars), were stationed along the trading routes. They in turn provided for the safety of the travelers, and both Thevenot and Tavernier stressed the safety of traveling in 17th century Iran, and the courtesy and refinement of the policing guards.[216] The Italian traveler Pietro Della Valle was impressed by an encounter with one of these road guards:[217]
He examined our baggage, but in the most obliging manner possible, not opening our trunks or packages, and was satisfied with a small tax, which was his due...
The Portuguese Empire and the discovery of the trading route around the Cape of Good Hope in 1487 not only hit a death blow to Venice as a trading nation, but it also hurt the trade that was going on along the Silk Road and especially the Persian Gulf. They correctly identified the three key points to control all seaborne trade between Asia and Europe: The Gulf of Aden, The Persian Gulf and the Straits of Malacca by cutting off and controlling these strategic locations with high taxation.[218] In 1602, Shah Abbas I drove the Portuguese out of Bahrain, but he needed naval assistance from the newly arrived English East India Company to finally expel them from the Strait of Hormuz and regain control of this trading route.[219] He convinced the English to assist him by allowing them to open factories in Shiraz, Isfahan and Jask.[220][221] With the later end of the Portuguese Empire, the English, Dutch and French in particular gained easier access to Persian seaborne trade, although they, unlike the Portuguese, did not arrive as colonisers, but as merchant adventurers. The terms of trade were not imposed on the Safavid shahs, but rather negotiated.
Furthermore, the Safavids maintained a sizeable sphere of influence overseas, particularly in the Deccan region of India. The Sultanates of Ahmednagar, Bijapur, and Golconda all sought Persian suzerainty not just because of religious or cultural ties, but also because of the need for a counterweight to Mughal expansion.[222] The Persians complied, and thousands of Persians emigrated to the Deccan during the 16th and 17th centuries, continuing a process that already began under the Bahmani Sultanate of the Deccan. From here, Persian traders ventured eastwards to Southeast Asian kingdoms, most notably Ayutthaya Siam, where influential Persian families like the Bunnag helped foster cordial diplomatic relations between Thailand and Iran, as evidenced in the expedition of Suleyman's Ship.[223] The Persians were also active in the Aceh Sultanate, the Brunei Sultanate, the Demak Sultanate, and Dai Viet.[224][225][226]
In the long term, however, the seaborne trade route was of less significance to the Persians than was the traditional Silk Road. Lack of investment in ship building and the navy provided the Europeans with the opportunity to monopolize this trading route. The land-borne trade would thus continue to provide the bulk of revenues to the Iranian state from transit taxes. The revenue came not so much from exports, as from the custom charges and transit dues levied on goods passing through the country.[227] Shah Abbas was determined to greatly expand this trade, but faced the problem of having to deal with the Ottomans, who controlled the two most vital routes: the route across Arabia to the Mediterranean ports, and the route through Anatolia and Istanbul. A third route was therefore devised which circumvented Ottoman territory. By travelling across the Caspian Sea to the north, they would reach Russia. And with the assistance of the Muscovy Company they could cross over to Moscow, reaching Europe via Poland. This trading route proved to be of vital importance, especially during times of war with the Ottomans.[228]
By the end of the 17th century, the Dutch had become dominant in the trade that went via the Persian Gulf, having won most trade agreements, and managed to strike deals before the English or French were able to. They particularly established monopoly of the spice and porcelain trade between the Far East and Iran.[229] Protected by Dutch naval power, competition from Bengali silk and Sino-Japanese porcelain contributed to the decline of the Safavid economy during the late 17th century.[230][231]
Jean Chardin, the 17th-century French traveler, spent many years in Iran and commented at length on their culture, customs and character. He admired their consideration towards foreigners, but he also stumbled upon characteristics that he found challenging. His descriptions of the public appearance, clothes and customs are corroborated by the miniatures, drawings and paintings from that time which have survived.[232] He considered them to be a well-educated and well-behaved people.[233]
Unlike Europeans, they much disliked physical activity, and were not in favor of exercise for its own sake, preferring the leisure of repose and luxuries that life could offer. Travelling was valued only for the specific purpose of getting from one place to another, not interesting themselves in seeing new places and experiencing different cultures. It was perhaps this sort of attitude towards the rest of the world that accounted for the ignorance of Persians regarding other countries of the world. The exercises that they took part in were for keeping the body supple and sturdy and to acquire skills in handling of arms. Archery took first place. Second place was held by fencing, where the wrist had to be firm but flexible and movements agile. Thirdly there was horsemanship. A very strenuous form of exercise which the Persians greatly enjoyed was hunting.[234]
Abbas I recognized the commercial benefit of promoting the arts – artisan products provided much of Iran's foreign trade. In this period, handicrafts such as tile making, pottery and textiles developed and great advances were made in miniature painting, bookbinding, decoration and calligraphy. In the 16th century, carpet weaving evolved from a nomadic and peasant craft to a well-executed industry with specialization of design and manufacturing. Tabriz was the center of this industry. The carpets of Ardabil were commissioned to commemorate the Safavid dynasty. The elegantly baroque yet famously 'Polonaise' carpets were made in Iran during the 17th century.
Using traditional forms and materials, Reza Abbasi (1565–1635) introduced new subjects to Persian painting – semi-nude women, youth, lovers. His painting and calligraphic style influenced Iranian artists for much of the Safavid period, which came to be known as the Isfahan school. Increased contact with distant cultures in the 17th century, especially Europe, provided a boost of inspiration to Iranian artists who adopted modeling, foreshortening, spatial recession, and the medium of oil painting (Shah Abbas II sent Muhammad Zaman to study in Rome). The epic Shahnameh ("Book of Kings"), a stellar example of manuscript illumination and calligraphy, was made during Shah Tahmasp's reign. (This book was written by Ferdousi in 1000 AD for Sultan Mahmood Ghaznawi) Another manuscript is the Khamsa by Nizami executed 1539–1543 by Aqa Mirak and his school in Isfahan.
Isfahan bears the most prominent samples of the Safavid architecture, all constructed in the years after Shah Abbas I permanently moved the capital there in 1598: the Imperial Mosque, Masjid-e Shah, completed in 1630, the Imam Mosque (Masjid-e Imami) the Lutfallah Mosque and the Royal Palace.
According to William Cleveland and Martin Bunton,[235] the establishment of Isfahan as the Great capital of Iran and the material splendor of the city attracted intellectual's from all corners of the world, which contributed to the city's rich cultural life. The impressive achievements of its 400,000 residents prompted the inhabitants to coin their famous boast, "Isfahan is half the world".
A new age in Iranian architecture began with the rise of the Safavid dynasty. Economically robust and politically stable, this period saw a flourishing growth of theological sciences. Traditional architecture evolved in its patterns and methods leaving its impact on the architecture of the following periods.
Indeed, one of the greatest legacies of the Safavids is the architecture. In 1598, when Shah Abbas decided to move the capital of his Iranian empire from the north-western city of Qazvin to the central city of Isfahan, he initiated what would become one of the greatest programmes in Iranian history; the complete remaking of the city. By choosing the central city of Isfahan, fertilized by the Zāyande roud ("The life-giving river"), lying as an oasis of intense cultivation in the midst of a vast area of arid landscape, he both distanced his capital from any future assaults by the Ottomans and the Uzbeks, and at the same time gained more control over the Persian Gulf, which had recently become an important trading route for the Dutch and English.[236]
The Chief architect of this colossal task of urban planning was Shaykh Bahai (Baha' ad-Din al-`Amili), who focused the programme on two key features of Shah Abbas's master plan: the Chahar Bagh avenue, flanked at either side by all the prominent institutions of the city, such as the residences of all foreign dignitaries. And the Naqsh-e Jahan Square ("Examplar of the World").[237] Prior to the Shah's ascent to power, Iran had a decentralized power-structure, in which different institutions battled for power, including both the military (the Qizilbash) and governors of the different provinces making up the empire. Shah Abbas wanted to undermine this political structure, and the recreation of Isfahan, as a Grand capital of Iran, was an important step in centralizing the power.[238] The ingenuity of the square, or Maidān, was that, by building it, Shah Abbas would gather the three main components of power in Iran in his own backyard; the power of the clergy, represented by the Masjed-e Shah, the power of the merchants, represented by the Imperial Bazaar, and of course, the power of the Shah himself, residing in the Ali Qapu Palace.
Distinctive monuments like the Sheikh Lotfallah (1618), Hasht Behesht (Eight Paradise Palace) (1469) and the Chahar Bagh School (1714) appeared in Isfahan and other cities. This extensive development of architecture was rooted in Persian culture and took form in the design of schools, baths, houses, caravanserai and other urban spaces such as bazaars and squares. It continued until the end of the Qajar reign.[239]
Poetry stagnated under the Safavids; the great medieval ghazal form languished in over-the-top lyricism. Poetry lacked the royal patronage of other arts and was hemmed in by religious prescriptions.
The arguably most renowned historian from this time was Iskandar Beg Munshi. His History of Shah Abbas the Great written a few years after its subject's death, achieved a nuanced depth of history and character.
Islamic philosophy[240] flourished in the Safavid era in what scholars commonly refer to the School of Isfahan. Mir Damad is considered the founder of this school. Among luminaries of this school of philosophy, the names of Iranian philosophers such as Mir Damad, Mir Fendereski, Shaykh Bahai and Mohsen Fayz Kashani standout. The school reached its apogee with that of the Iranian philosopher Mulla Sadra who is arguably the most significant Islamic philosopher after Avicenna. Mulla Sadra has become the dominant philosopher of the Islamic East, and his approach to the nature of philosophy has been exceptionally influential up to this day.[241] He wrote the Al-Hikma al-muta‘aliya fi-l-asfar al-‘aqliyya al-arba‘a ("The Transcendent Philosophy of the Four Journeys of the Intellect"),[242] a meditation on what he called 'meta philosophy' which brought to a synthesis the philosophical mysticism of Sufism, the theology of Shi'a Islam, and the Peripatetic and Illuminationist philosophies of Avicenna and Suhrawardi.
According to the Iranologist Richard Nelson Frye:[243]
They were the continuers of the classical tradition of Islamic thought, which after Averroes died in the Arab west. The Persians schools of thought were the true heirs of the great Islamic thinkers of the golden age of Islam, whereas in the Ottoman empire there was an intellectual stagnation, as far as the traditions of Islamic philosophy were concerned.
The status of physicians during the Safavids stood as high as ever. Whereas neither the ancient Greeks nor the Romans accorded high social status to their doctors, Iranians had from ancient times honored their physicians, who were often appointed counselors of the Shahs. This would not change with the Arab conquest of Iran, and it was primarily the Persians that took upon them the works of philosophy, logic, medicine, mathematics, astronomy, astrology, music and alchemy.[244]
By the sixteenth century, Islamic science, which to a large extent meant Persian science, was resting on its laurels. The works of al-Razi (865–892) (known to the West as Razes) were still used in European universities as standard textbooks of alchemy, pharmacology and pediatrics. The Canon of Medicine by Avicenna (c. 980–1037) was still regarded as one of the primary textbooks in medicine throughout most of the civilized world.[245] As such, the status of medicine in the Safavid period did not change much, and relied as much on these works as ever before. Physiology was still based on the four humours of ancient and mediaeval medicine, and bleeding and purging were still the principal forms of therapy by surgeons, something even Thevenot experienced during his visit to Iran.[192]
The only field within medicine where some progress were made was pharmacology, with the compilement of the "Tibb-e Shifa’i" in 1556. This book was translated into French in 1681 by Angulus de Saint, under the name "Pharmacopoea Persica".[246]
Since pre-Islamic times, the sport of wrestling had been an integral part of the Iranian identity, and the professional wrestlers, who performed in Zurkhanehs, were considered important members of the society. Each town had their own troop of wrestlers, called Pahlavans. Their sport also provided the masses with entertainment and spectacle. Chardin described one such event:[247]
The two wrestlers were covered in grease. They are present on the level ground, and a small drum is always playing during the contest for excitement. They swear to a good fight and shake hands. That done, they slap their thighs, buttocks and hips to the rhythm of the drum. That is for the women and to get themselves in good form. After that they join together in uttering a great cry and trying to overthrow each other.
As well as wrestling, what gathered the masses was fencing, tightrope dancers, puppet-players and acrobats, performing in large squares, such as the Royal square. A leisurely form of amusement was to be found in the cabarets, particularly in certain districts, like those near the mausoleum of Harun-e Velayat. People met there to drink liqueurs or coffee, to smoke tobacco or opium, and to chat or listen to poetry.[248]
As noted before, a key aspect of the Persian character was its love of luxury, particularly on keeping up appearances. They would adorn their clothes, wearing stones and decorate the harness of their horses. Men wore many rings on their fingers, almost as many as their wives. They also placed jewels on their arms, such as on daggers and swords. Daggers were worn at the waist. In describing the lady's clothing, he noted that Persian dress revealed more of the figure than did the European, but that women appeared differently depending on whether they were at home in the presence of friends and family, or if they were in the public. In private they usually wore a veil that only covered the hair and the back, but upon leaving the home, they put on manteaus, large cloaks that concealed their whole bodies except their faces. They often dyed their feet and hands with henna. Their hairstyle was simple, the hair gathered back in tresses, often adorned at the ends with pearls and clusters of jewels. Women with slender waists were regarded as more attractive than those with larger figures. Women from the provinces and slaves pierced their left nostrils with rings, but well-born Persian women would not do this.[249]
The most precious accessory for men was the turban. Although they lasted a long time it was necessary to have changes for different occasions like weddings and the Nowruz, while men of status never wore the same turban two days running. Clothes that became soiled in any way were changed immediately.[250]
The Safavids by the time of their rise were Azerbaijani-speaking although they also used Persian as a second language. The language chiefly used by the Safavid court and military establishment was Azerbaijani.[14][21] But the official[8] language of the empire as well as the administrative language, language of correspondence, literature and historiography was Persian.[14] The inscriptions on Safavid currency were also in Persian.[251]
Safavids also used Persian as a cultural and administrative language throughout the empire and were bilingual in Persian.[56] According to Arnold J. Toynbee,[252]
In the heyday of the Mughal, Safawi, and Ottoman regimes New Persian was being patronized as the language of litterae humaniores by the ruling element over the whole of this huge realm, while it was also being employed as the official language of administration in those two-thirds of its realm that lay within the Safawi and the Mughal frontiers
According to John R. Perry,[253]
In the 16th century, the Turcophone Safavid family of Ardabil in Azerbaijan, probably of Turkicized Iranian, origin, conquered Iran and established Turkic, the language of the court and the military, as a high-status vernacular and a widespread contact language, influencing spoken Persian, while written Persian, the language of high literature and civil administration, remained virtually unaffected in status and content.
According to Zabiollah Safa,[21]
In day-to-day affairs, the language chiefly used at the Safavid court and by the great military and political officers, as well as the religious dignitaries, was Turkish, not Persian; and the last class of persons wrote their religious works mainly in Arabic. Those who wrote in Persian were either lacking in proper tuition in this tongue, or wrote outside Iran and hence at a distance from centers where Persian was the accepted vernacular, endued with that vitality and susceptibility to skill in its use which a language can have only in places where it truly belongs.
According to É. Á. Csató et al.,[254]
A specific Turkic language was attested in Safavid Persia during the 16th and 17th centuries, a language that Europeans often called Persian Turkish ("Turc Agemi", "lingua turcica agemica"), which was a favourite language at the court and in the army because of the Turkic origins of the Safavid dynasty. The original name was just turki, and so a convenient name might be Turki-yi Acemi. This variety of Persian Turkish must have been also spoken in the Caucasian and Transcaucasian regions, which during the 16th century belonged to both the Ottomans and the Safavids, and were not fully integrated into the Safavid empire until 1606. Though that language might generally be identified as Middle Azerbaijanian, it is not yet possible to define exactly the limits of this language, both in linguistic and territorial respects. It was certainly not homogenous – maybe it was an Azerbaijanian-Ottoman mixed language, as Beltadze (1967:161) states for a translation of the gospels in Georgian script from the 18th century.
According to Rula Jurdi Abisaab,[255]
Although the Arabic language was still the medium for religious scholastic expression, it was precisely under the Safavids that hadith complications and doctrinal works of all sorts were being translated to Persian. The 'Amili (Shiite scholars of what is now South Lebanon) operating through the Court-based religious posts, were forced to master the Persian language; their students translated their instructions into Persian. Persianization went hand in hand with the popularization of 'mainstream' Shiʻi belief.
According to Cornelis Versteegh,[256]
The Safavid dynasty under Shah Ismail (961/1501) adopted Persian and the Shiʻite form of Islam as the national language and religion.
According to David Blow,[194]
The primary court language [with Abbas I's reign (r. 1588–1629)] remained Turkish. But it was not the Turkish of Istanbul. It was a Turkish dialect, the dialect of the Qizilbash Turkomans, which is still spoken today in the province of Azerbaijan, in north-western Iran. This form of Turkish was also the mother-tongue of Shah Abbas, although he was equally at ease speaking Persian. It seems likely that most, if not all, of the Turkoman grandees at the court also spoke Persian, which was the language of the administration and culture, as well as of the majority of the population. But the reverse seems not to have been true. When Abbas had a lively conversation in Turkish with the Italian traveller Pietro Della Valle, in front of his courtiers, he had to translate the conversation afterwards into Persian for the benefit of most of those present.
Regarding the usage of Georgian, Circassian and Armenian at the Royal Court, David Blow states,[195]
Georgian, Circassian and Armenian were also spoken, since these were the mother-tongues of many of the ghulams, as well as of a high proportion of the women of the harem. Figueroa heard Abbas speak Georgian, which he had no doubt acquired from his Georgian ghulams and concubines.
According to Willem Floor and Hasan Javadi,[257]
During the Safavid period Azerbaijani Turkish, or, as it was also referred to at that time, Qizilbash Turkish, occupied an important place in society, and it was spoken both atcourt and by the common people. Although Turkish was widely spoken in Safavid Iran this fact is rarely mentioned. Usually neither Persian nor European authors mention in which language people communicated with each other. The Turkish spoken in Safavid Iran was mostly what nowadays is referred to as Azeri or Azerbaijani Turkish. However, at that time it was referred to by various other names. It would seemthat the poet and miniaturist Sadeqi Afshar (1533–1610), whose mother tongue was not Azerbaijani Turkish, but Chaghatay (although he was born in Tabriz), was the first to refer to speakers of Qizilbashi (motakallemin-e Qizilbash), but he, and one century later ‘Abdol-Jamil Nasiri, were the exception to this general rule of calling the language "Turki".
According to Stephen Dale,[258]
Shah Ismail's Azeri dialect never became a state language and its use remained largely confined to Azerbaijan, where it is still spoken by many Iranians. Otherwise, Turkic speech in Iran largely remained a tribal/Qizilbash and provincial Azerbaijani phenomenon, subordinate to Persian as the language of formal education and the dominant literary culture.
It was the Safavids who made Iran the spiritual bastion of Shiʻism, and the repository of Persian cultural traditions and self-awareness of Iranianhood, acting as a bridge to modern Iran. The founder of the dynasty, Shah Isma'il, adopted the title of "King of Iran" (Pādišah-ī Īrān), with its implicit notion of an Iranian state stretching from Khorasan as far as Euphrates, and from the Oxus to the southern Territories of the Persian Gulf.[259] According to Professor Roger Savory:[260][261]
In a number of ways the Safavids affected the development of the modern Iranian state: first, they ensured the continuance of various ancient and traditional Persian institutions, and transmitted these in a strengthened, or more 'national', form; second, by imposing Ithna 'Ashari Shi'a Islam on Iran as the official religion of the Safavid state, they enhanced the power of mujtahids. The Safavids thus set in train a struggle for power between the turban and the crown that is to say, between the proponents of secular government and the proponents of a theocratic government; third, they laid the foundation of alliance between the religious classes ('Ulama') and the bazaar which played an important role both in the Persian Constitutional Revolution of 1905–1906, and again in the Islamic Revolution of 1979; fourth the policies introduced by Shah Abbas I conduced to a more centralized administrative system.
According to Donald Struesand, "although the Safavid unification of the eastern and western halves of the Iranian plateau and imposition of Twelver Shiʻi Islam on the region created a recognizable precursor of modern Iran, the Safavid polity itself was neither distinctively Iranian nor national."[262] Rudolph Matthee concluded that "though not a nation-state, Safavid Iran contained the elements that would later spawn one by generating many enduring bureaucratic features and by initiating a polity of overlapping religious and territorial boundaries."[263]
Shah Ismāʿīl's enthronement took place in Tabrīz immediately after the battle of Sharūr, on 1 Jumādā II 907/22 December 1501.
Safavid power with its distinctive Persian-Shiʻi culture, however, remained a middle ground between its two mighty Turkish neighbors. The Safavid state, which lasted at least until 1722, was essentially a "Turkish" dynasty, with Azeri Turkish (Azerbaijan being the family's home base) as the language of the rulers and the court as well as the Qizilbash military establishment. Shah Ismail wrote poetry in Turkish. The administration nevertheless was Persian, and the Persian language was the vehicle of diplomatic correspondence (insha'), of belles-lettres (adab), and of history (tarikh).
qizilbash normally spoke Azari brand of Turkish at court, as did the Safavid shahs themselves; lack of familiarity with the Persian language may have contributed to the decline from the pure classical standards of former times
The Shah was a native Turkic speaker and wrote poetry in the Azerbaijani language.
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