political structure of the safavid empire

This was a strategic move that accomplished two things. The Safavids also staged incursions into eastern Anatolia; these triggered a conflict with the Ottoman Empire that continued for the length of the Safavids reign. The most popular of these themes was the Persian, The Ardabil Carpet, Maqsud of Kashan, Persian: Safavid Dynasty, silk warps and wefts with wool pile (25 million knots, 340 per sq. Persian carpets of silk and wool were in high demand in Europe and other parts of the Islamic world. His grandfather had acquired over thirty thousand enslaved people employed as civil servants and palace administrators; turning to the Caucasus region again, Abbas decided to also create an enslaved soldier corps like the Ottoman Janissaries. As Vladimir Minorsky put it, friction between these two groups was inevitable, because the Qezelbash "were no party to the national Persian tradition." Bureaucracy and landed class who were considered the middle classes. They were originally a religious brotherhood who became more powerful because of warlords and political marriages. The hostility between the sects that continues today is usually traced to the Safavid era and the dynastys military rivalry with the Ottomans, especially after the sultan acquired the Sunni title of caliph in 1517. afavid dynasty summary | Britannica The Safavids (Persian: ) were a native Iranian dynasty from Azarbaijan that ruled from 1501 to 1736, and which established Shi'a Islam as Iran's official religion and united its provinces under a single Iranian sovereignty in the early modern period. Creative Commons Attribution License To save content items to your account, For instance, the Qajar dynasty (17891925), the first major dynasty to succeed the Safavids, continued the tradition of Safavid book arts, painting, and architecture. (Azeri is a Turkic language.) what succession rules was followed by the Safavids? The Ottoman Turks and Safavids fought over the fertile plains of Iraq for more than 150 years. By 1511, the Uzbeks in the north-east were driven across the Oxus River where they captured Samarkand establishing the Shaibanid dynasty, and from which they would continue to attack the Safavids. The political structure of the Safavid Empire was structured like a pyramid with the Shah at the very top of the pyramid, similar to a pope. Following the conquest of Iran, Ismail I made conversion mandatory for the largely Sunni population. First, he bargained for peace with the Ottomans in 1590, giving away territory in the north-west. Sultan Muhammad, The Court of Gayumars, Shahnameh for Shah Tahmasp I, c. 152425, opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper, 45 x 30 cm, folio 20v (Aga Khan Museum, Toronto; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0). However, several scholars went one step further and extended the familys history back to the biblical Adam. At the time, he governed only Azerbaijan and part of the Caucasus. 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 Qezelbash 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, Turkic, Mongols, or Turkmens. Our mission is to improve educational access and learning for everyone. The maximum extent of the Safavid Empire under Shah Abbas I (CC BY-SA 4.0), The maximum extent of the Safavid Empire under Shah Abbas I (. Although a majority of the people in the kingdom were Iranians, there were also some Arabs, Turks, and Armenians. To further legitimize his power, Ismail I also added claims of royal Sassanian heritage after becoming Shah of Iran to his own genealogy. (credit: Shah Tahmasp in the mountains by Freer Gallery of Art/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain), This Persian miniature produced in the studio of Shah Tahmasp depicts the Feast of Sada, a mythical event that celebrates the discovery of fire. [2] Shah Abbas I recognized the commercial benefit of promoting the artsartisan's products provided much of Iran's foreign trade. Detail, Sultan Muhammad, The Court of Gayumars, Shahnameh for Shah Tahmasp I, c. 152425, opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper, 45 x 30 cm, folio 20v (Aga Khan Museum, Toronto; photo: Brilliantly painted manuscripts. Not only had Ismails forces occupied the empires border cities, but he had begun recruiting for his army among the ethnic Turkish tribes of eastern Anatolia and encouraging the Shia Muslims in Ottoman lands to revolt against their Sunni rulers. Originally, the Safaviyeh was a spiritual, less denominational response to the upheavals and unrest in northwest Iran/eastern Anatolia in the decades following the Mongol invasion. The article analyses the social and political structure of the Safavid Empire. Except where otherwise noted, textbooks on this site The conversion efforts of the Safavids have left long legacies in the Islamic world. Poetry stagnated under the Safavids; the great medieval ghazal form languished in over-the-top lyricism. Then enter the name part The Safavid. Their capitals were Tabriz, Qazvin, Isfahan. Safi al-Din renamed the order after himselfSafaviyyaand made a number of reforms that reshaped it from a local order to a religious movement that sought followers from around Iran and neighboring countries. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. During his reign, the official language at the royal court was Azerbaijanian. Safavid miniatures are highly prized today; some of the best examples have sold for millions of dollars at auction. When Shah Abbas I came to power in 1588, he immediately began making plans to move the Safavid capital to Isfahan, a city in central Iran. The carpets of Ardebil were commissioned to commemorate the Safavid dynasty. Based on the idea that the religiosity of the Turkish-speaking milieu that constituted the Safavid movement's grassroots was primarily shaped by this Karbala-oriented epic literature, this essay argues that Shaykh Jonayd, Shaykh Haydar, and especially Shah Esmil successfully reformulated the Safavid Sufi program to address the codes of . He was a disciple of the famed Sufi Grand Master Sheikh Zahed Gilani (12161301) of Lahijan. In the fifteenth century, the Safaviyeh gradually gained political and military clout in the power vacuum precipitated by the decline of the Timurid dynasty. Safavid military history had three phases. Isfahan Define Anarchy Lawless and disorder; no one leader, no government Define Orthodoxy Traditional (not flexible) manner to follow a religion Define Shah King of the Safavid empire Define warfare in the Safavid Empire .They had a system similar to the janissaries. At the apex of this structure was the shah. Culture flourished under Safavid patronage. According to many historians, the Safavid empire marked the beginning of modern Persia. Shah ljeitthe sultan of Ilkhanate converted to Twelver Shiism in thirteenth century. This genealogy was most likely invented by court historians during the sixteenth-century reign of Shah Ismail I. Thus, the end of his reign, 1666, marked the beginning of the end of the Safavid dynasty. Despite these similarities, however, significant differences . At the height of their reign, the Safavids controlled not only Iran, but also the countries we now know as Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Armenia, eastern Georgia, parts of the North Caucasus, Iraq, Kuwait, and Afghanistan, as well as parts of Turkey, Syria, Pakistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. During his reign, the Safavid state reached the height of its military, political, and economic power. @kindle.com emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply. It was perhaps to perpetuate the distinction of Persian from Arabic culture that attracted the Iranians towards Shi'a Islamthe heartland and sacred sites of Sunni Islam would always be in the Arabian peninsula. What was the Safavid Empire's political contributions to the world Isfahan bears the most prominent samples of the Safavid architecture, all constructed in the years after Shah Abbas I permanently moved the capital to that city in 1598: The Imperial Mosque, Masjid-e Shah, completed in 1630, the Imami Mosque,Masjid-e Imami, the Lutfullah Mosque and the Royal Palace. Like Europe, it has a long history of big empires and small states. BBC - Religions - Islam: Safavid Empire (1501-1722) Women in Safavid Empire: Recent evidence suggests otherwise: There was a struggle against these restrictions Some women openly refused to wear face covers while in public Women donned bright clothing in defiance @ court women played an important political role (indirectly) and were often deeply involved in political conspiracies It became more identifiably Shi'a in its orientation around the year 1400. To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org The Ottomans sued for peace in 1612, relinquishing the Caucasus to the Iranians. In 1501, the Safavid Shahs declared independence when the Ottomans outlawed Shi'a Islam in their territory. Christians elsewhere in the Safavid realm, however, were given considerable freedom to build churches and honor their own customs and beliefs. Chardin declares emphatically that outside court circles there was no arbitrary exercise of power by the shah, and both Chardin and Malcolm assert that the awe in which the shah was held by the court and the nobility was the primary reason for the relative security and freedom from oppression enjoyed by the lower classes. is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings 28 March 2008. Museums around the world commissioned Pope and Ackerman to organize symposia and exhibitions on the topic of Persian art, where works from the Safavid Empire were especially of interest. In 1598, Abbas moved his capital from Qazvin to Isfahan in the central Iranian plateau, far from the constantly shifting borders with the Ottomans and Uzbeks and closer to the Persian Gulf and the newly arrived traders of the British and Dutch East India Companies. Miniatures were an important form of Persian art long before Islam appeared; Persian artists were prized at the court of the Abbasids, and artistic styles derived from their work, such as the nonfigurative elements used in the borders of miniatures, were later used to decorate manuscripts of the Quran. are not subject to the Creative Commons license and may not be reproduced without the prior and express written Direct link to hdarwish825's post what succession rules was. It was founded by Isml I, who, by converting his people from Sunnite to Shite Islam and adopting the trappings of Persian monarchy, planted the seeds of a unique national and religious identity. Updates? Sunnis who resisted conversion but remained in Iran faced death. Shah Mosque (Royal Mosque), Isfahan, Iran, begun 1611 (photo: Another singular characteristic of Safavid architecture are the colorful tiles that covered exterior faced and interior domes of mosques. [6] It was an Iranian dynasty of Kurdish origin, [7] but during their rule they intermarried with Turkoman, [8] Georgian, [9] Circassian, [10] [11] and Pontic Greek [12] dignitaries, nevertheless they . Prior to the rise of the Safavids, the region was broken up into a mosaic of autonomous states, all governed by local rulers. However, beneath the shah and the powerful elites, the Safavid hierarchy was unique for its time in being largely based on merit; worth and talent, not status or birth, were the keys to upward mobility. If you're behind a web filter, please make sure that the domains *.kastatic.org and *.kasandbox.org are unblocked. At the same time, however, the Safavids conversion policy brought tensions between Sunni and Shia to a level not seen since Muhammads death. In spite of all this, however, the general population of Iran remained mostly Sunni until the Safavid period. The capture of Baghdad by Ismail I in 1509, was only followed by its loss to the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent in 1534. Constant wars with the Ottomans made Shah Tahmasp I move the capital from Tabriz, into the interior city of Qazvin in 1548. Although the Safavids were eventually able to reestablish authority, they never achieved their earlier level of control. The entry of European ships to the Indian Ocean trade cut off much of Irans direct access to Africa and South Asia. Safavids in Persia | Article for mature travellers - Odyssey Travellers When the second Persian "vakil" was placed in command of a Safavid army in Transoxiana, the Qezelbash, considering it a dishonor to be obliged to serve under him, deserted him on the battlefield with the result that he was slain. Tahmasps desire to fend off the Turkish threat led him to ally himself with a rising European power, the Habsburg Empire. Shah Ismail, who saw himself as infallible and semidivine, believed his strong religious convictions had won him the Iranian throne, and he used his political and military authority to impose his religious ideology on the country (Figure 4.23). Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. At the apex of this structure was the shah. In 1514, the Ottoman Sultan Selim I invaded western Armenia, causing the ill-prepared Safavid army to retreat. In the meantime, the navy-less Safavids lost the island of Hormuz to the Portuguese in 1507. He had completely driven out the Afghans, who were still occupying Persia, by 1730. Later Safavid shahs continued to expand Isfahan, adding buildings, avenues, and bridges and commissioning structures in other cities based on the style cultivated in the capital. The art of the Safavids is simply magnificent. Many of these are now symbols of Iranian nationhood. The Safavids generally ruled over a peaceful and prosperous empire. All levels of society could mix there, from members of the royal court whose pavilion overlooked the square, to the Shiite clergy whose mosque was at the squares southern end, to foreign dignitaries, members of the military, merchants, and commoners. Textbook content produced by OpenStax is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License . Find out more about saving to your Kindle. In practice, however, there were well defined limits to this absolutism, even when the shah was a strong and capable ruler. Shi'a's sacred sites were much closerin Iraq, captured by the Safavids in 1623 (but surrendered again to the Ottomans in 1639). (credit: The Feast of Sada, Folio 22v from the Shahnama (Book of Kings) of Shah Tahmasp by Ferdowsi/Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Arthur A. Houghton Jr., 1970 /Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain), This miniature created in the Mughal Empire in 1594 shows a scene from the, https://openstax.org/books/world-history-volume-2/pages/1-introduction, https://openstax.org/books/world-history-volume-2/pages/4-3-the-safavid-empire, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, Identify the factors that contributed to the rise of the, Discuss the similarities and differences between, Describe the political structure of the Safavid Empire. The Shia believe Ali, who finally succeeded Uthman to become the leader of the Muslim community in 656, was the first legitimate imam, the title they give their spiritual leader rather than caliph. They view the line of Muhammad that descends through Ali and his wife Fatima, Muhammads daughter, as the only source of definitive religious guidance. Started in the Safavid period, mirror mosaics became an enduring Persian decorative motif that was used by the subsequent dynasties. After becoming the Safaviyeh leader in 1447, Sheikh Junayda descendant of Sheikh Safi Al-Dintransformed it into a revolutionary Shi'a movement with the goal of seizing power in Iran. 6 - THE SAFAVID ADMINISTRATIVE SYSTEM - Cambridge Core It seems that the Safavid family left its homeland and moved to Azarbaijan (modern northwestern Iran) in the twelfth century. Political and Social Structure of 3 Islamic Empires - Prezi An attempt to recapture the territory in 1618 resulted in a devastating loss for the Ottomans. The remaining 5 percent of Shia are Zaydis or Seveners, a sect established by Zayd, the great-grandson of Ali, who disagree with Twelvers over the identity of the seventh imam. Abbas I also supported direct trade with Europe, particularly England and The Netherlands, which sought Iranian carpets, silk, and textiles. By the seventeenth century, trade routes between East and West had shifted away from Iran, causing a decline in commerce and trade. Iskander Beg Monshis History of Shah Abbas the Great, written a few years after its subject's death, achieved a nuanced depth of history and character. The most distinctive and prized artworks of the Safavid era were illuminated manuscripts of well-known texts decorated with miniature paintings. The Ardabil carpet, still one of the largest Persian carpets in existence, was made during the Safavid period. Wealthy patrons commissioned artistslike those in the studio of Shah Tahmaspto paint these miniatures either to illustrate books or to be kept as a separate piece of art in an album of similar works. Various groups of Persian-speaking peoples lived in the Iranian plateau and were usually described as Tajik.. What are the common features of the Safavid and Mughal paintings? The Qizilbashi tribes were essential to the military of Iran until the rule of Shah Abbas Itheir leaders were able exercise enormous influence and participate in court intrigues (assassinating Shah Ismail II, for example). Safavid Empire Flashcards | Quizlet Has data issue: false After subsequent campaigns, the Safavids recaptured Baghdad, in 1623, but lost it again to Murad IV in 1638. PDF Safavid Dynasty 1501-1736 (official end in 1760)

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