Safavid dynasty

The Safavid Empire at its 1512 borders.

The Safavid dynasty (1501-1722) were an Azerbaijani-speaking Shi’a dynasty that ruled the Iranian empire. They originated in Ardabil, a city in Azerbaijan region in Iran, and created the greatest Iranian empire since the Islamic conquest of Persia. The Safavids established the Ithnāˤashari (Twelvers) school of Shi'a Islam as the official religion of their empire and reasserted the Iranian identity of the region, thus becoming the first native dynasty since the Sassanids to establish a united Iranian state. Despite their demise in 1722, the Safavids have left their mark down to present era by spreading and establishing Shi'a Islam in major parts of the Caucasus and West Asia, especially in Iran.

Origins: The Sufi order at Ardabil

Main article: Safi al-Din

Unlike with many other dynasties founded by warlords and military chiefs, one of the unique aspects of the Safavids in the post-Islamic Iran was their origin in the Islamic Sufi order called the Safaviyeh. This uniqueness makes Safavid dynasty comparable to the pre-Islamic Sassanid dynasty, which made Zoroastrianism into an official religion, and whose founders were from a priestly class. The origins of the Safavid family are shrouded in a mystery, and the contemporary lack of broad knowledge about them is compounded by the ideological distortions which took place during their political reign.

The Safavid history begins with the establishment of the Safaviyeh Sufi Order by its eponymous founder Safī al-Dīn Abdul Fath Is'haq Ardabilī (1252-1334). In 700/1301, Safi al-Din assumed the leadership of a local Sufi order in Gilan from his spiritual master Sheikh Zahid Gilani who was also his father-in-law. Due to the great spiritual charisma of Sheikh Safi al-Din, from then on, the order was known as the Safaviyeh. Safi ud-Din's origin is not known, but according to some classical sources, he was possibly of Kurdish descent. Extant religious poetry from him, written in Old Tati - a now distinct Northwestern Iranian language related to Kurdish - and in Persian, have survived to this day. Nevertheless, even before their ascent to political power in the 15th century, the Safavid family had become Turkic-speaking and used Azerbaijani Turkish as a medium of communication with their followers

From Sheikh Safi al-Din to Ismail I

After Sheikh Safi al-Din Ardabili, the leadership of the Safaviyeh passed onto Sheikh Sadr al-Din Musa († 794/1391-92). The order at this time was transformed into a religious movement which conducted religious propaganda throughout Persia, Syria and Asia Minor. Still the order most likely had maintained its Sunni Shaf’ite origin at that time. The leadership of the order passed on from Sheikh Sadr al-Din Musa to his son Khwadja Ali († 1429) and in turn to his son Ibrahim († 1429-47).

When Sheikh Junayd, the son of Ibrahim, assumed the leadership of Safaviyeh in 1447, the history of the Safavid movement was radically changed. According to R.M. Savory, "Sheikh Junayd was not content with spiritual authority and he sought material power". At that time, the most powerful dynasty in Persia were the Qara Qoyunlu, whose ruler Jahan Shah ordered Sheikh Junayd to leave Ardabil or else he would bring destruction and ruin upon the city . Junayd sought refuge with the rival of Qara Qoyunlu Jahan Shah, the Aq Qoyunlu Khan Uzun Hassan and cemented his relationship by marrying Khadija Begum, the sister of Uzun Hassan. Sheikh Junayd was killed during an incursion into the territories of the Shirvanshahs and his son Sheikh Haydar assumed the leadership of the Safaviyeh. Sheikh Haydar married Martha , the daughter of Uzun Hassan, who gave birth to future Shah Ismail I. Martha had a Pontic Greek mother Theodora, better known as Despina Hatun , the daughter of the Grand Komnenos John IV of Trebizond, whom Uzun Hassan married in exchange to protection of the Grand Komnenos from the Ottomans.

After Uzun Hassan's death, his son Yaqub felt threatened by the growing Safavid religious influence. Yaqub allied himself with the Shirvanshah and killed Shaykh Haydar in 1488. By this time the bulk of the Safaviyeh followers were Turkish-speaking clans from Asia Minor and Azerbaijan, collectively known as Qizilbash ("Red Heads") for their distinct red headgear. The Qizilbash were warriors, spiritual followers of Sheikh Haydar, and a source of the Safavid military and political power. After the death of Haydar, the spiritual followers of the Safaviyeh gathered around his son Ali, who was also pursued and subsequently killed by Yaqub. According to the official Safavid history, before passing away, Ali designated Ismail, his brother and the son of Shaykh Haydar as the spiritual leader of the Safavid Order .

Founding of the dynasty by Shah Ismail I

Main article: Ismail I

The Safavid ruling dynasty was founded by Shah Ismail I . An ethnic Azeri, Ismail was of mixed Turkic, Iranic, and Pontik Greek descent , and was a direct descendant of Sheikh Safi al-Din. As such, he was the last in the line of hereditary Grand Masters of the Safaviyeh, prior to its ascent to a ruling dynasty. Ismail was a brave and charismatic youth, zealous with regards to his Shi’a faith, and believed himself to be of divine descent. Practically worshipped by his Qizilbash tribal followers, Ismail invaded Shirvan and avenged the death of his father. Afterwards he went on a conquest campaign, capturing Tabriz in July 1501, where he enthroned himself the Shah of Azerbaijan and minted coins in his name and proclaimed Shi’ism the official religion of his domain . Although initially, the masters of Azerbaijan only, the Safavids had, in fact, won the struggle for power in Persia which had been going on for nearly a century between various dynasties and political forces. A year after his victory in Tabriz, Ismail proclaimed most of Persia as his domain , and within 10 years established a complete control over all of it, showing extraordinary valor in battle. Ismail continued to expand his territory adding Hamadan in 1503, Shiraz and Kerman in 1504, Najaf and Karbala in 1507, Van in 1508, Baghdad in 1509, Khorasan and Herat in 1510. By 1511, the Uzbeks in the north-east were driven across the Oxus River where they continued to attack the Safavids. His decisive victory over the Uzbeks, which had occupied most of Khorasan, ensured Iran’s eastern borders and the Uzbeks never since expanded beyond Afghanistan. Although the Uzbeks continued to make occasional raids to Khorasan, the Safavid empire throughout their whole reign was able to keep them at bay. In 1507 Portuguese invaded the Persian Gulf and captured the island of Hormuz. It became a Portuguese naval base and trade outpost, which lasted more than a hundred years until the reign of Shah Abbas I. The Iranian state lacked a navy at the time of Ismail I and thus Shah Ismail had to this European presence.

More problematic for the Safavids were the powerful Ottoman empire. The Ottomans considered the active recruitment of Turkmen tribes of Anatolia for the Safavid cause as a major threat. To counter the rising Safavid power, Sultan Bayazid in 907-8/1502 forcefully deported many Shi'ites from Anatolia, who ended up in Safavid domain. In 1514, Bayazid's son, Sultan Selim I the Grim marched through Anatolia and reached the plain of Chaldiran near the city of Khoy, and a decisive war was fought there. Most sources agree that the Ottoman army was at least double the size of that of Ismail . What gave the Ottomans the advantage was the artillery which the Safavid army lacked. According to R. M. Savory, "Salim's plan was to winter at Tabriz and complete the conquest of Persia the following spring. However, a mutiny among his officers who refused to spend the winter at Tabriz forced him to withdraw across territory laid waste by the Safavid forces, eight days later" . Although Shah Ismail I was defeated and his capital was captured, the Safavid empire survived. The war between two powers continued under Shah Tahmasp I and Sultan Suleiman I, until Shah Abbas I retook the area lost to the Ottomans by 1602.

But the consequences of the defeat at Chaldiran were also psychological for Ismail: the defeat destroyed Ismail's belief in his invincibility, based on his claimed divine status . His relationships with his Qizilbash followers were also fundamentally altered. The tribal rivalries between the Qizilbash tribes, which temporarily ceased before the defeat at Chaldiran, resurfaced in intense form immediately after the death of Ismail, and led to ten years of civil war (930-40/1524-33) until Shah Tahmasp regained control of the affairs of the state.

Early Safavid power in Iran was based on the military power of Qizilbash tribes. Ismail exploited the first element to seize power in Iran. But eschewing politics after his defeat in Chaldiran, Shah Ismail I left the affairs of the government to the office of the Wakil. Ismail's successors, and most ostensibly Shah Abbas I successfully diminished the Qizilbash influence on the affairs of the state.

Ismail is also known for his poetry using the pen-name Khatai (Arabic خطائی: sinner) . He is considered an important figure in the literary Azerbaijani and has left approximately 1400 verses in this language. Approximately 50 verses of his Persian poetry have also survived. According to Encyclopedia Iranica, Ismail was a skillful poet who used prevalent themes and images in lyric and didactic-religious poetry with ease and some degree of originality.. Ismail was also deeply influenced by the Persian culture and particularly with the Shahnameh of Ferdowsi, which probably explains the fact that he named all of his sons after the Shahnameh characters. Dickson and Welch suggest that the Shah-Nama-yi Shahi was intended as a present from Ismail I to the young Tahmasp . After defeating the Shaybanids, Ismail asked Hatefi, a famous poet in Jam, Khorasan, to write a Shahnameh-like epic about his victories and his newly established dynasty. Although the epic was left unfinished, it was an example of mathnawis in the heroic style of the Shahnameh written later on for the Safavid kings .

Ismail's greatest legacy established an enduring empire which lasted over 200 years. Even after the fall of Safavids in 1722, their cultural and political legacy endured through the era of Nader Shah Afshar and Zand, Qajar, Pahlavi dynasties into the modern Islamic Republic of Iran, where Shi’a Islam is the official religion as it was during the Safavids. After decline of the Timurid Empire (1370–1506), there were many local states prior to the Iranian state established by Ismail I. The most important local rulers about 1500 were:

• Huṣayn Bāyqarā, the Timurid ruler of Herāt
• Alwand Mīrzā, the Aq Qoyunlu Khan of Tabrīz
• Murad Beg, Aq Qoyunlu ruler of Irāq al-Ajam
• Farrokh Yaṣar, the Shah of Širvan
• Badi Alzamān Mīrzā, local ruler of Balkh
• Huṣayn Kīā Chalavī, the local ruler of Semnān
• Murād Beg Bayandar, local ruler of Yazd

Ismail was able to unite all these lands under the Iranian empire he created.

Shah Tahmasp

Main article: Shah Tahmasp

Shah Tahmasp succeeded his father Shah Ismail I in 930/1524, when he was ten years and three months old. He was the ward of a qizilbash amir who saw himself as the de facto ruler of the state. For around ten years, rival qizilbash factions fought amongst themselves for the control of Iran until Shah Tahmāsp reasserted his authority effectively and ended up by reigning for 52 years, the longest reign in Safavid history. The Uzbeks during the reign of Tahmasp attacked the Khurasan region of Iran five times and the Ottomans under Soleiman II made four invasions of Persia. As a result, Persia lost territory in Baghdad and Tahmasp also moved the Safavid capital from Tabriz to Qazvin. Using diplomacy, he negotiated with the Ottomans the treaty of Amasya and peace remained unbroken during the rest of his era.

After the death of Tahmasp in 984/1576, the struggle for a dominant position in the state was complicated by rival groups and factions. Dominant political factions vied for power and support three different candidates. The mentally unstable Ismail, the son of Tahmasp and the purblind Sultan Muhammad Khudabanda were some of the candidates but did not get the support of all the kizilbash amirs. The Ustalju tribe threw its support behind Haydar, who was of a Georgian mother, but the majority of the kizilbash amirs saw this as a threat to their own power. They placed on the throne Ismail II (1576-1577) and then Sultan Muhammad Shah (1578-1588).

Shah Abbas

The greatest of the Safavid monarchs, Shah Abbas I (1587–1629) came to power in 1587 aged 16 following the forced abdication of his father, Shah Muhammad Khudābanda, having survived Qizilbashi court intrigues and murders. He recognized the ineffectualness of his army which was consistently being defeated by the Ottomans who had captured Georgia and Armenia and by Uzbeks who had captured Mashhad and Sistan in the east. First he sued for peace in 1590 with the Ottomans giving away territory in the north-west. Then two Englishmen, Robert Sherley and his brother Anthony, helped Abbas I to reorganize the Shah's soldiers into an officer-paid and well-trained standing army similar to a European model (which the Ottomans had already adopted). He wholeheartedly adopted the use of gunpowder (See Military history of Iran). The army divisions were: Ghulams غلام (crown servants or slaves usually conscripted from Armenian, Georgian and Circassian lands), Tofongchis تفگنچى (musketeers), and Topchis توپچى (artillery-men).

Abbas I first fought the Uzbeks, recapturing Herat and Mashhad in 1598. Then he turned against the Ottomans recapturing Baghdad, eastern Iraq and the Caucasian provinces by 1622. He also used his new force to dislodge the Portuguese from Bahrain (1602) and the English navy 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 I was able to break the dependence on the Qizilbash for military might and therefore was able to centralize control.

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 1623 yet lost it again to Murad IV in 1638. Henceforth a treaty, signed in Qasr-e Shirin, 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 1609-1610, 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 the Book "Alam Ara Abbasi") and resettled the Turkish Afshar tribe in the region while deporting many Kurdish tribes to Khorasan. (see 1 and ISBN 0-89158-296-7). Also see " O. Dzh. Dzhalilov, Kurdski geroicheski epos Zlatoruki Khan" (The Kurdish heroic epic Gold-hand Khan), Moscow, 1967. Nowadays There is a community of nearly 1.7 million people who are descendants of the tribes deported from Kurdistan to Khurasan (Northeastern Iran) by the Safavids. For a map of these areas see this map.

Due to his obsessive fear of assassination, Shah Abbas either put to death or blinded any member of his family who aroused his suspicion. In this way one of his sons was executed and two blinded. Since two other sons had predeceased him, the result was personal tragedy for Shah Abbas. When he died on 19 January 1629, he had no son capable of succeeding him. ( see Encyclopaedia Iranica at [2] under "Abbas I the Great", page 75). The beginning of the 17th century saw the power of the Qizilbash decline, the original militia that had helped Ismail I capture Tabriz and which had gained many administrative powers over the centuries. Power was shifting to a new class of merchants, many of them ethnic Armenians, Georgians and Indians.

At its zenith, during the long reign of Shah Abbas I the empire's reach comprised Iran, Iraq, Armenia, Azerbaijan Republic, Georgia, and parts of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

Decline of the Safavid state

View of Chehel-sotoon Palace, Isfahan, Iran.

In addition to fighting its perennial enemies, the Ottomans and Uzbeks, as the 17th century progressed Iran had to contend with the rise of two more neighbors. Russian Muscovy in the previous century had deposed two western Asian khanates of the Golden Horde and expanded its influence into the Caucasus Mountains and Central Asia. In the east, the Mughal dynasty of India had expanded into Afghanistan at the expense of Iranian control, taking Kandahar.

Furthermore by the 17th century, trade routes between East and West had shifted away from Iran, causing a loss of commerce and trade. Moreover, Shah Abbas had a conversion to a ghulam-based military, though expedient in the short term.

Except for Shah Abbas II, the Safavid rulers after Abbas I were ineffectual. The end of his reign, 1666, marked the beginning of the end of the Safavid dynasty. Despite falling revenues and military threats, later shahs had lavish lifestyles.

The country was repeatedly raided on its frontiers — Kerman by Baluchi tribesmen in 1698, Khorasan by Afghans in 1717, constantly in Mesopotamia by peninsula Arabs. Shah Sultan Hosein tried to forcibly convert his Afghan subjects in eastern Iran from Sunni to Shi'a Islam. In response, a Ghilzai Pashtun chieftain named Mir Wais Khan began a rebellion against the Georgian governor, Gurgin Khan, of Kandahar and defeated a Safavid army. Later, in 1722 an Afghan army led by Mir Wais' son Mahmud marched across eastern Iran, besieged, and sacked Isfahan and proclaimed Mahmud 'Shah' of Persia (see the Hotaki dynasty).

The Afghans rode roughshod over their conquered territory for a dozen years but were prevented from making further gains by Nadir Shah, a former slave who had risen to military leadership within the Afshar tribe in Khorasan, a vassal state of the Safavids. Nadir Shah defeated the Afghans in the Battle of Damghan, 1729. He had driven out the Afghans, who were still occupying Persia, by 1730. In 1738, Nadir Shah reconquered Eastern Persia, starting with Qandahar; in the same year he occupied Ghazni, Kabul, and Lahore, later conquering as far as east as Delhi, but not fortifying his Persian base and exhausting his army's strength. He 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 Nadir Shah's assassination in 1747, 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 take nominal power of the country as well and officially end the Safavid dynasty.

Shia Islam as the state religion

Even though Safavids were not the first Shia rulers in Iran, they played a crucial role in making Shia Islam the official religion in the whole of Iran. There were large Shia communities in some cities like Qom and Sabzevar as early as 8th century. In the 10th and 11th centuries the Buwayhids, who were of Zeydi a branch of Shia, ruled in Fars, Isfahan and Baghdad. As a result of Mongol conquest and the relative religious tolerance of the Ilkhanids, Shia dynasties were re-established in Iran - Sarbedaran in Khorasan being the most important. Shah Öljeitü - the sultan of Ilkhanate converted to Twelver Shiism in 13th century, however the population of Iran stayed largely Sunni until the Safavid period.

File:Hatemipersianarmy.JPG

Persian Army- Watercolor by Haydar Hatemi-2002

Following his conquest of Iran, Ismail I made conversion mandatory for the largely Sunni population. The Sunni Ulema or clergy were either killed or exiled. Ismail I, despite his heterodox Shia beliefs (Momen, 1985), brought in Shi'a religious leaders and granted them land and money in return for loyalty. Later, during the Safavid and especially Qajar period, the Shia Ulema's power increased and they were able to exercise a role, independent of or compatible with the government. Despite Safavid's Sufi origins, most Sufi groups were prohibited, bar the Nimatullahi order.

Iran became a feudal theocracy; the Shah was held to be the divinely ordained head of both. In the following centuries, this religious stance would cement both Iran's internal cohesion and national feelings and provoke attacks by its Sunni neighbors.

Constant wars with the Ottomans made Shah Tahmasp I move the capital from Tabriz to the interior city of Qazvin in 1548. Later, Shah Abbas I moved the capital to Isfahan, even 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.

Shah Abbas I of Safavid at a banquet.
Detail from a celing fresco; Chehel Sotoun Palace; Isfahan.

Turcoman-Persian conflict

Main article: Kizilbash

Shah Suleiman I and his courtiers, Isfahan, 1670. Painter is Ali Qoli Jabbador, and is kept at The St. Petersburg Institute of Oriental Studies in Russia, ever since it was acquired by Tsar Nicholas II. Note the two Georgian figures with their names at the top left.

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 Turkmens, the "men of the 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 Persia, 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 .

The Qizilbashi 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).

Economy

What fueled the growth of Safavid economy was 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 to India 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 specie in India. The main imports were specie, textiles (woolens from Europe, cottons from Gujarat), spices, metals, coffee, and sugar.

Culture

Culture within the Safavid family

The Safavid family was a literate family from its early origin. There are extant Tati and Persian poetry from Shaykh Safi ad-din Ardabili as well as extant Persian poetry from Shaykh Sadr ad-din. Most of the extant poetry of Shah Ismail I is in Azerbaijani pen-name of Khatai. . Sam Mirza, the son of Shah Esmail as well as some later authors assert that Ismail composed poems both in Turkish and Persian but only a few specimens of his Persian verse have survived. A collection of his poems in Azeri were published as a Divan. Shah Tahmasp who has composed poetry in Persian was also a painter, while Shah Abbas II was known as a poet, writing Azerbaijani verses with the pen name of Tani.. Sam Mirza, the son of Ismail I was himself a poet and composed his poetry in Persian. He also compiled an anthology of contemporary poetry. .

Culture in the empire

In the Safavid era the Persian Architecture flourished again and saw many new monuments, such as Naghsh-i Jahan Square, the biggest historic square in the world.

Shah 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 sixteenth 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 misnamed 'Polonaise' carpets were made in Iran during the seventeenth 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 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 the 1000AD for Sultan Mahmood Ghaznawi) Another manuscript is the Khamsa by Nezami executed 1539-43 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 Imami Mosque,Masjid-e Imami, the Lutfullah Mosque and the Royal Palace.

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 Safavid era gave way to a flowering of philosophy in Iran with such figures Mulla Sadra of Shirza, Shaikh Bahai and Mir Damad. According to Professor Richard Nelson Frye: 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. One of the most renowned Muslim philosophers, Mulla Sadra, lived during Shah Abbas I's reign and wrote the Asfar, a meditation on what he called 'meta philosophy' which brought to a synthesis the philosophical mysticism of Sufism, the theology of Shi'ism, and the Peripatetic and Illuminationist philosophies of Avicenna and Suhrawardi. Iskander Beg Monshi’s History of Shah Abbas the Great written a few years after its subject's death, achieved a nuanced depth of history and character.

Political legacy

Safavids patronized Iranian culture in the manner of their predecessors, with the difference that they were themselves from Iran (they rose to power from Azerbaijan region of Iran). It was Safavids who made Iran the spiritual bastion of Shi’ism against the onslaughts of orthodox Sunni Islam, and the repository of Persian cultural traditions and self-awareness of Iranianhood. and acting as a bridge to modern Iran. The founder of the dynasty, Shah Isma'il adopted the title of "Persian Emperor" Pādišah-ī Īrān, with its implicit notion of an Iranian state stretching from the Afghanistan as far as Euphrates, and from the Oxus to the southern Territories of Persian Gulf.

Architecture

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.

The appearance of new patterns base on geometrical networks in the development of cities gave order to open urban spaces, and took into account the conservation of natural elements(water and plants) within cities. The establishment of distinctive public spaces is one of the most important urban features of the Safavid period, as manifested for example in Naghsh-e Jahan Square, Chahar Bagh and the royal gardens of Isfahan.

Distinctive monuments like the Sheikh Lotfallah (1603), Hasht Behesht (Eight Paradise Palace)(1699) 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.

Safavid Shahs of Iran

Shah Ismail I, the founder of the Safavid State. Medieval European rendering

• Ismail I 1501–1524
• Tahmasp I 1524–1576
• Ismail II 1576–1578
• Mohammed Khodabanda 1578–1587
• Abbas I 1587–1629
• Safi 1629–1642
• Abbas II 1642–1666
• Suleiman I 1666–1694
• Sultan Hoseyn I 1694–1722
• Tahmasp II 1722–1732
• Abbas III 1732–1736
• Suleiman II 1749–1750
• Ismail III 1750–1760

Literature

• Persian Historiography and Geography: Bertold Spuler on Major Works Produced in Iran, the Caucasus, Central Asia, India and Early Ottoman Turkey, M. Ismail Marcinkowski, Singapore: Pustaka Nasional, 2003, ISBN 9971-77-488-7.
• Mirza Rafi‘a's Dastur al-Muluk: A Manual of Later Safavid Administration. Annotated English Translation, Comments on the Offices and Services, and Facsimile of the Unique Persian Manuscript, M. Ismail Marcinkowski, Kuala Lumpur, ISTAC, 2002, ISBN 983-9379-26-7.
• From Isfahan to Ayutthaya: Contacts between Iran and Siam in the 17th Century, M. Ismail Marcinkowski, Singapore, Pustaka Nasional, 2005, ISBN 9971-77-491-7.
• Adam Olearius, "The Voyages and Travels of the Ambassadors", Translated by John Davies (1662), (excerpts)

External links

• Encyclopedia Iranica
• History of the Safavids from Iran Chamber
• The History Files: Rulers of Persia
• BBC History of Religion
• Iranian Culture and history Site
• Artistic and cultural history of the Safavids from the Metropolitan Museum of Art
• History of Safavid Art
• A Study of the Migration of Shi'i Works from Arab Regions to Iran at the Early Safavid Era.
• Why is Safavid history important? (Iran Chamber Society)
• BBC: The Safavid Empire.