Tahmasp I

Qajar painted and printed cotton pictorial kalamkar panel depicting Tahmasp I in battle, surrounded by various other warriors, signed Sheikh Ali, Iran, second half 19th century.

Suleiman the Magnificent, sultan of the Ottoman Empire, may have considered a strong Safavid empire a threat. During the first decade of Tahmasp's reign, however, he was preoccupied with fighting the Habsburgs and unsuccessfully attempted to Seize Vienna.[42] In 1532, while the Ottomans were fighting in Hungary, Suleiman sent Olama Beg Takkalu with 50,000 troops under Fil Pasha to Iran.[21] Olama Beg was one of many Takkalu members who, after Chuha's death, took refuge in the Ottoman Empire.[43] The Ottomans seized Tabriz and Kurdistan, and tried to obtain support from Gilan province.[44] Tahmasp drove the Ottomans out, but news of another Uzbek invasion prevented him from defeating them.[21] Suleiman sent his grand vizier, Ibrahim Pasha, to occupy Tabriz in July 1534 and joined him two months later.[42] Suleiman peacefully conquered Baghdad and Shia cities such as Najaf.[44] Whilst the Ottomans were on the march, Tahmasp was in Balkh campaigning against the Uzbeks.[21]

The first Ottoman invasion may have been the greatest crisis of Tahmasp's reign[45] since the Shamlu tribe unsuccessfully tried to poison him; they revolted against Tahmasp, who had recently asserted his authority by removing Hossein Khan.[46] The rebels contacted Suleiman and asked him for support in enthroning Sam Mirza, who promised to follow a pro-Ottoman policy.[21] Suleiman recognized him as ruler of Iran, which panicked Tahmasp's court.[45] Tahmasp reconquered the seized territory when Suleiman went to Mesopotamia, and Suleiman led another campaign against him. Tahmasp attacked his rearguard, and Suleiman was forced to retreat to Istanbul at the end of 1535 after losing all his gains except Baghdad.[46]

Alqas Mirza and Suleiman the Magnificent. Illustration from the Süleymanname.

Relations with the Ottomans remained hostile until the revolt of Alqas Mirza, Tahmasp's younger brother, who led the Safavid army during the 1534-35 Ottoman invasion and was governor of Shirvan.[47] He led an unsuccessful revolt against Tahmasp, who conquered Derbant in the spring of 1547 and appointed his son Ismail as governor.[48] Alqas fled to Crimea with his remaining forces and took refuge with Suleiman. He promised to restore Sunni Islam in Iran and encouraged the Sultan to lead another campaign against Tahmasp.[49][50] The new invasion sought the quick capture of Tabriz in July 1548; it soon became clear, however, that Alqas Mirza's claims of support from all the Qizilbash leaders were untrue. The long campaign focused on looting as they plundered Hamadan, Qom, and Kashan before they were stopped at Isfahan.[21] Tahmasp did not fight the exhausting Ottoman army but laid waste the entire region from Tabriz to the frontier; the Ottomans could not permanently occupy the captured lands, since they soon ran out of supplies.[36]

Eventually, Alqas Mirza was captured on the battlefield and imprisoned in a fortress, where he died. Suleiman ended his campaign, and by the fall of 1549 the remaining Ottoman forces retreated.[51] He launched his last campaign against the Safavids in May 1554, when Ismail (Tahmasp's son) invaded eastern Anatolia and defeated Erzerum governor Iskandar Pasha. Suleiman marched from Diyarbakr towards Armenian Karabakh and reconquered the lost lands.[lower-alpha 2][52] Tahmasp divided his army into four corps and sent each in a different direction, indicating a significantly-larger Safavid army. With Tahmasp's Safavids holding the advantage, Suleiman had to retreat.[53] The Ottomans negotiated the Peace of Amasya, in which Tahmasp recognized Ottoman sovereignty in Mesopotamia and much of Kurdistan; deferring to Sunni Islam, he banned the holding of Omar Koshan (a festival commemorating the assassination of the second caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab) and expressing hatred towards the Rashidun caliphs who are held dear by the Sunni Muslims. The Ottomans allowed Iranian pilgrims to travel freely to Mecca, Medina, Karbala, and Najaf.[44][54] Through this treaty, Iran had time to increase its forces and resources as its western provinces had the opportunity to recuperate from the war.[54] This peace also demarcated the Ottoman-Safavid frontier in the north-west without the cession of large areas of territory on the Safavid side.[36] These terms, in circumstances favourable to the Safavids, were evidence of the frustration felt by Suleiman the Magnificent at his inability to inflict a greater defeat on the Safavids.[36]

Tahmasp was interested in the Caucasus, especially Georgia, for two reasons: to reduce the influence of the Ostajlu tribe (who kept their lands in southern Georgia and Armenia after the 1526 civil war) and a desire for booty, similar to that of his father. Since the Georgians were mainly Christian, he used the pretext of jihad to justify the invasion.[55] Between 1540 and 1553, Tahmasp led four campaigns against the divided state's many kings.[56] The Safavid army looted Tbilisi, including its churches and the wives and children of the nobility, in the first campaign.[57] He also had the governor of Tbilisi, Golbad, converted to Islam. The King of Kartli, Luarsab I, managed to escape and went to hiding during Tahmasp's raiding.[58] During his second invasion, ostensibly to ensure the stability of Georgian territory, he looted the farms and subjugated Levan of Kakheti.[59] One year before the Peace of Amasya in 1554, Tahmasp led his last military campaign into the Caucasus. Throughout his campaigns, he took many prisoners, and this time he brought 30,000 Georgians to Iran. One of those prisoners was Luarsab’s mother Nestan Darejan, who committed suicide as she was captured.[20] The descendants of these prisoners formed a "third force" in the Safavid administration and bureaucracy with the Turkomans and Persians and became a main rival to the other two during the later years of the Safavid Empire.[57] Although this "third force" came to power during the reign of Abbas the Great, it began infiltrating Tahmasp's army during the second quarter of his reign as gholams and qurchis and became more influential at the apex of the Safavid empire.[60]

In 1555, following the Peace of Amasya, eastern Georgia remained in Iranian hands and western Georgia was ruled by the Turks.[61] Never again did Tahmasp appear on the Caucasus frontier after the treaty. Instead, the Governor of Georgia, Shahverdi Sultan, represented Safavid power north of the Aras River.[20] Tahmasp sought to establish his dominance by imposing several Iranian political and social institutions and placing converts to Islam on the thrones of Kartli and Kakheti; one was Davud Khan, brother of Simon I of Kartli.[57] Son of Levan of Kakheti, Prince Jesse also appeared in Qazvin during the 1560s and converted to Islam. In return, Tahmasp granted him favours and gifts. The prince was given the old royal palace for his residence in Qazvin, and became the governor of Shaki and adjacent territories.[20] The conversation of these Georgian Princes did not dissuade the Georgian forces who tried to reconquer Tbilisi under Simon I and his father, Luarsab I of Kartli, in the Battle of Garisi; the battle ended in a stalemate, with Luarsab and the Safavid commander Shahverdi Sultan both slain in battle.[62]

Tahamsp and Humayun at a Nowruz festival (Chehel Sotoun, Isfahan)

One of the most celebrated events of Tahmasp's reign was the visit of Humayun, the eldest son of Babur and emperor of the Mughal empire who faced rebellions by his brothers.[63] Humayun fled to Herat, travelled through Mashhad, Nishapur, Sabzevar, and Qazvin, and met Tahmasp at Soltaniyeh in 1544.[64] Tahmasp honoured Homayun as a guest and gave him an illustrated version of Saadi's Gulistan dating back to the reign of Abu Sa'id Mirza, Humayun's great-grandfather;[65][66] however, he refused to give him political assistance unless he converted to Shia Islam. Humayun reluctantly agreed, but reverted to Sunni Islam when he returned to India and did not force the Iranian Shias, who came with him to India, to convert.[63] Tahmasp also demanded a quid pro quo in which the city of Kandahar would be given to his infant son, Morad Mirza.[64][67] Humayun spent Nowruz in the Shah's court and left in 1545 with an army provided by Tahmasp to regain his lost lands; his first conquest was Kandahar, which he ceded to the young Safavid prince.[68] Morad Mirza soon died, however, and the city became a bone of contention between the two empires; the Safavids said that it had been given to them in perpetuity, and the Mughals said that the apanage expired with the death of the prince.[64] Tahmasp began the first Safavid expedition to Kandahar in 1558, after the death of Humayun, and reconquered the city.[45]

Another notable visitor to Tahmasp's court was Şehzade Bayezid, the fugitive Ottoman prince who rebelled against his father Suleiman the Magnificent, and went to the shah with an army of 10,000 to persuade him to begin a war against the Ottomans.[69] Although he honoured Bayezid, Tahmasp did not want to disturb the newly-signed Peace of Amasya.[70][71] Suspecting that Bayezid was planning a coup, he had him arrested and returned to the Ottomans; Bayezid and his children were immediately executed.[69]

An aged Tahmasp, painted c. 1575, Qazvin

Although Tahmasp rarely left Qazvin from the Peace of Amasya in 1555 to his death in 1576, he was still active during this period. A 1564 rebellion in Herat was suppressed by Masum Bek and the Khorasan governors, but the region remained troubled and was raided by the Uzbeks two years later.[72] Tahmasp became seriously ill in 1574 and neared death twice in two months.[69] Since he had not chosen a crown prince, the question of succession was raised by members of the royal family and Qizilbash leaders. His favourite son, Haydar Mirza, was supported by the Ustajlu tribe and the powerful court of Georgians; the imprisoned prince Ismail Mirza was supported by Pari Khan Khanum, Tahmasp's influential daughter.[73] The pro-Haydar faction tried to eliminate Ismail by winning the favour of the castellan of Qahqaheh Castle (where Ismail was imprisoned), but Pari Khan learned about the plot and informed Tahmasp; the shah, who was still fond of his son, ordered him to be guarded by Afshar musketeers.[74]

Tahmasp, recovered from his illness, returned his attention to affairs of state. Remaining court tensions, however, triggered another civil war when the shah died on 14 May 1576 from poisoning.[75] The poisoning was blamed on Abu Naser Gilani, a physician who attended Tahmasp when he was ill. According to Tarikh-e Alam-ara-ye Abbasi, "He unwisely sought recognition of his superior status vis-à-vis the other physicians; as a result, when Tahmasp died, Abu Nasr was accused of treachery in the treatment he had prescribed, and he was put to death within the palace by members of the qurchi".[36] Tahmasp I had the longest reign of any member of the Safavid dynasty: nine days short of fifty-two years.[36] He died without a designated heir and the two factions in his court clashed for the throne. Heydar Mirza was quickly eliminated, and Ismail Mirza became king and was crowned Ismail II. Less than two months after his enthronement, Ismail ordered a mass purge of all male members of the royal family. Only Mohammad Khodabanda, already nearly blind, and his three toddler sons survived this purge.[48]

Flag of Tahmasp I

The Chehel Sotoun pavilion in Qazvin

Tahmasp's reign after the civil wars between the Qizilbash leaders became a "personal rule" that sought to control the Turkoman influence by empowering the Persian bureaucracy. The key change was the 1535 appointment of Qazi Jahan Qazvini, who extended diplomacy beyond Iran by establishing contact with the Portuguese, the Venetians, the Mughals, and the Shiite Deccan sultanates.[76] English explorer Anthony Jenkinson, who was received at the Safavid court in 1562, also sought to promote trade.[36] The Habsburgs were eager to ally with the Safavids against the Ottomans. In 1529, Ferdinand I sent an envoy to Iran with the objective of a two-front attack on the Ottoman Empire the following year. The mission was unsuccessful, however, since the envoy took over a year to return.[77] The first extant Safavid letters to a European power were sent in 1540 to Doge of Venice Pietro Lando. As a response, the Doge and the Great Council of Venice commissioned Michel Membré to visit the Safavid court. In 1540, he visited Tahmasp's encampment at Marand, near Tabriz. Membré's mission lasted for three years, during which, he wrote the Relazione di Persia, one of the few European sources which describe Tahmasp's court.[78] In his letter to Lando, Tahmasp promised to "cleanse the earth of [Ottoman] wickedness" with the help of the Holy League. The alliance, however, never bore fruit.[79]

One of the most important events of Tahmasp's reign was his relocation of the Safavid capital, which began what is known as the Qazvin period.[80] Although the exact date is uncertain, Tahmasp began preparations to have the royal capital moved from Tabriz to Qazvin during a 1540s period of ethnic re-settlement.[21] The move from Tabriz to Qazvin discontinued the Turco-Mongol tradition of shifting between summer and winter pastures with the herds, ending Ismail I's nomadic lifestyle.[81] The idea of a Turkoman state with a center in Tabriz was abandoned for an empire centered on the Iranian plateau.[82] Moving into a city that linked the realm to Khorasan through an ancient route, allowed a greater degree of centralization as distant provinces such as Shirvan, Georgia, and Gilan were brought into the Safavid fold.[83] Qazvin's non-Qizilbash population allowed Tahmasp to bring new staff to his court who were unrelated to the Turkoman tribes.[lower-alpha 3][21] The city, associated with orthodoxy and stable governance, developed under Tahmasp's patronage; the era's foremost building is Chehel Sotoun.[84]

The Safavid military evolved during Tahmasp's reign, particularly gunners (tupchiyan) and musketeers (tufangchiyan).[85] Gollar-aghasis, military slaves developed by Tahmasp from Caucasus prisoners, commanded the tupchiyan and tufangchiyan.[86] To lessen Qizilbash power, he discontinued the titles of amir al-umara and vakil.[36] The qurchi-bashi, formerly subordinate to the amir al-umara, became the chief Safavid military officer.[87]

After the Peace of Amasya in 1555, Tahmasp became an avaricious person who did not care how and where his troops obtained their pay, even if it was through criminal means. By 1575, Iran’s troops had not been paid for four years. They are said to have accepted this because, as one chronicler put it, ‘they loved shah so much’.[88]

A Quran probably belonging to Tahmasp I, dated July–August 1552, created in Shiraz or Qazvin

Tahmasp described himself as a "pious Shia mystic king".[89] His religious views and the extent to which they influenced Safavid religious policy is the most interesting aspect of his reign among historians both contemporary and modern. As the Italian historian Biancamaria Scarcia Amoretti has noted, “the modern originality of Persian Shi'ism has its roots [with Shah Tahmasp].”[21] Until 1533, the Qizilbash leaders (worshipping Ismail I as the promised Mahdi) urged the young Tahmasp to continue in his father's footsteps; that year, he had a spiritual rebirth, performed an act of repentance and outlawed irreligious behavior.[90] Tahmasp rejected his father's claim of being a mahdi, becoming a mystical lover of Ali and a king bound to sharia,[91] but still enjoyed villagers travelling to his palace in Qazvin to touch his clothing.[21] Tahmasp held firmly to the extremist Shi’i belief in the imminent coming of the Mahdi. He refused to allow his favourite sister, Shahzada Sultanim, to marry, because he was keeping her as a bride for the Mahdi.[92] He claimed connections with Ali and Sufi saints, such as his ancestor Safi al-Din, through dreams in which he foresaw the future.[93] Tahmasp wanted the poets of his court to write about Ali, rather than him.[94] He sent copies of the Quran as gifts to the Ottoman Empire; overall, during his reign, eighteen copies of the Quran were sent to Istanbul and all were encrusted with jewels and gold.[95]

He saw Twelverism as a new doctrine of kingship, giving the ulama authority in religious and legal matters, and appointing Shaykh Ali al-Karaki as the deputy of the Hidden Imam.[89] This brought new political and court power to the mullahs, sayyeds, and their networks, intersecting Tabriz, Qazvin, Isfahan, and the recently-incorporated centres of Rasht, Astarabad, and Amol.[96] As observed by Iskandar Beg Munshi, the contemporary historian, the sayyids as a class of landed elite enjoyed considerable power. Throughout the 1530s and 1540s, they dominated the Safavid household in Tabriz and according to Iskandar Beg, “any wish of theirs was translated into reality almost before it was uttered… although they were guilty of unlawful practices.”[97] During Tahmasp's reign, Persian scholars accepted the Safavid sayyid heritage and called him "the Husaynid".[98] Tahmasp embarked on a wide-scale urban program designed to reinvent the city of Qazvin as a centre of Shiite piety and orthodoxy, expanding the Shrine of Husayn (son of Ali al-Ridha, the eighth Imam).[99] He was also attentive to his ancestral Sufi order in Ardabil, building the Janat Sarai mosque to encourage visitors and hold Sama ceremonies.[100] Tahmasp ordered the practice of Sufi rituals and had Sufis and mullahs come to his palace and perform public acts of piety and zikr for Eid al-Fitr (and renew their allegiance to him). This encouraged Tahmasp's followers to see themselves as belonging to a community too large to be bound by tribal or other local social orders.[101] Although Tahmasp's reign saw the Shia conversion, unlike his father he did not coerce other religious groups; he had a long-established acknowledgment and patronage of Christian Armenians.[102]

A calligraphic panel dedicated to Tahmasp I, signed Muhammad Mu'min, Iran, 16th century.

Tahmasp has been called the greatest Safavid patron.[103] He was the namesake of one of the most celebrated illustrated manuscripts of the Shahnameh, which was commissioned by his father around 1522 and completed during the mid-1530s.[104] In his youth, Tahmasp was inclined towards calligraphy and art and patronised masters in both.[21] Tahmasp's most celebrated contribution to the Safavid arts was his patronage of Persian miniature manuscripts that took place during the first half of his reign.[105] He encouraged painters such as Kamāl ud-Dīn Behzād,[106] bestowing a royal painting workshop for masters, journeymen, and apprentices with exotic materials such as ground gold and lapis lazuli. Tahmasp's artists illustrated the Khamsa of Nizami,[107] and he worked on Chehel Sotoun's balcony paintings.[108] The Tarikh-e Alam-ara-ye Abbasi calls Tahmasp's reign the zenith of Safavid calligraphic and pictorial art.[21] Tahmasp lost interest in the miniature arts around 1555 and, accordingly, disbanded the royal workshop and allowed his artists to practice elsewhere.[109]

The reigns of Tahmasp and his father, Ismail I, are considered as the most productive era of the history of the Azeri Turkish language and literature. The great poet, Fuzuli, who wrote in Turkish, Persian, and Arabic, flourished during this era.[110] During the later years of his life, however, Tahmasp came to despise poets and poetry; as his devotion to the Quran increased, he no longer counted poets as pious men, for many of them were addicted to wine, an irreligious behaviour. Tahmasp refused to allow poets in his court and ceased to regard them with favour.[111] According to Tazkera-ye Tohfe-ye Sāmi by his brother, Sam Mirza, there were 700 poets during the reigns of the first two Safavid kings. After Tahmasp's religious conversion, many joined Humayun; those who remained and wrote erotic ghazals, such as Vahshi Bafqi and Mohtasham Kashani, were shunned.[21][112] The departure of poets such as Naziri Nishapuri and 'Orfi Shirazi marked the rise of Indian-style poetry, introducing Persian to Indian literature.[113][114]