ʿAbbās I biography

 

 ʿAbbās I, byname ʿAbbās the Great, (born Jan. 27, 1571—died Jan. 19, 1629), shah of Persia from 1588 to 1629, who strengthened the Safavid dynasty by expelling Ottoman and Uzbek troops from Persian soil and by creating a standing army. He also made Eṣfahān the capital of Persia and fostered commerce and the arts, so that Persian artistic achievement reached a high point in his reign.

Life

The third son of Moḥammad Khodābanda, ʿAbbās got here to the throne in October 1588, at a essential second within the fortunes of the Safavid dynasty. The weak rule of his semiblind father had allowed usurpation by the amīrs, or chiefs, of the Turkmen tribes, who had introduced the Safavid to energy and nonetheless constituted the spine of Safavid navy power. Moreover, the intertribal factionalism of those Turkmens (referred to as Kizilbash [Red Heads] due to the distinctive purple headgear that they'd adopted to mark their adherence to the Safavids) had so weakened the state that its conventional enemies, the Ottoman Turks to the west and the Uzbeks to the east, had been capable of make massive inroads into Persian territory.

Shah ʿAbbās thus had two rapid duties: to reassert the authority of the monarchy and to expel Ottoman and Uzbek troops from Persian soil. Because he was unable to combat a warfare on two fronts concurrently, in 1589–90 he signed a peace treaty with the Ottomans, thus liberating himself for an offensive in opposition to the Uzbeks. By the treaty, massive areas in west and northwest Persia have been ceded to the Ottomans. Despite the respiration house thus gained, ʿAbbās for 10 years was unable to launch a serious offensive in opposition to the Uzbeks, and Iran suffered additional lack of territory each to the Uzbeks and to the Mughals of India.

The delay was attributable to ʿAbbās’ choice to create a standing military—an idea novel to Safavid kings, who historically levied armies in time of want from the tribal cavalry. The creation of a standing military instantly prompted a budgetary drawback, as a result of the previous tribal cavalry had been paid from the revenues of the provinces ruled by Kizilbash chiefs. ʿAbbās solved the issue within the quick time period by bringing a lot of these provinces immediately below the management of the Shah; the taxes in these new “crown” provinces have been remitted to the royal treasury. In the long term the inevitable results of this coverage, the discount within the numbers of Kizilbash troops, critically weakened the nation’s navy power.

The new standing military was composed primarily of Georgians, Armenians, and Circassians (who had been dropped at Persia as prisoners in the course of the reign of ʿAbbās’ grandfather) and their descendants. After their conversion to Islam, they have been educated for service both within the military or within the administration of the state or the royal family. Shah ʿAbbās felt that he may depend on the loyalty of those ghulāms (“slaves”) of the shah, as they have been identified, and he used them to counterbalance the affect of the Kizilbash, whom he distrusted. Ghulāms quickly rose to excessive workplace and have been appointed governors of crown provinces.

Eventually, ʿAbbās was capable of take the offensive in opposition to his exterior foes. In 1598 he inflicted a serious defeat on the Uzbeks and regained management of Khorāsān. From 1602 onward he performed a sequence of profitable campaigns in opposition to the Ottomans and recovered the territory misplaced to them.

After his nice victory over the Uzbeks, ʿAbbās transferred the capital from Kazvin to Eṣfahān. Under his steering, Eṣfahān quickly turned some of the stunning cities on the earth. He adorned town with many mosques and theological faculties and constructed quite a few caravansaries and public baths. Among essentially the most well-known are the Masjed-e Shāh (now referred to as Masjed-e Emām) and the Masjed-e Sheikh Loṭfollāh. He laid out town with spacious boulevards and a splendid sq.. The Shah’s constructing energies weren't confined to Eṣfahān; the extension and restoration of the well-known shrine at Meshed and the development, alongside the swampy littoral of the Caspian Sea, of the celebrated stone causeway, designed to present entry to his favorite winter retreats, have been amongst his most notable achievements.

To Eṣfahān got here ambassadors from European nations, retailers searching for to ascertain commerce relations, representatives of overseas monastic orders searching for permission to discovered convents at Eṣfahān and elsewhere, and gents of fortune, such because the brothers Sir Anthony and Sir Robert Sherley—the previous an adventurer, the latter a loyal servant of the Shah who distinguished himself within the wars in opposition to the Ottomans. The reign of Shah ʿAbbās was a interval of intense business and diplomatic exercise, and, within the Persian Gulf, the Portuguese, the Dutch, and the English strove to make themselves masters of commerce there and within the Indian Ocean.

ʿAbbās’ reign additionally marks a peak of Persian inventive achievement. Under his patronage, carpet weaving turned a serious business, and high quality Persian rugs started to appear within the houses of rich European burghers. Another worthwhile export was textiles, which included brocades and damasks of unparalleled richness. The manufacturing and sale of silk was made a monopoly of the crown. In the illumination of manuscripts, bookbinding, and ceramics, the work of the interval of ʿAbbās is the ultimate; in portray it's among the many most notable in Persian historical past.

Legacy

Shah ʿAbbās dominated with a passionate zeal for justice and the welfare of his topics. He frequented assembly locations of the peculiar folks in an effort to be taught of extortion and oppression on the a part of his officers; his punishment of corrupt officers was swift. He confirmed uncommon spiritual tolerance, granting privileges to many Christian teams.

The darkish aspect of his character was reserved for his personal sons and members of his family. The experiences of his youth, when he was marked for execution by his uncle, Shah Esmāʿīl II, had left him with a morbid worry of conspiracy. Originally, he adopted the apply of his predecessors in appointing the princes of the blood royal as provincial governors, however after a sequence of revolts and intrigues in favour of his sons, the royal princes have been confined to the harem, the place their solely companions have been girls and eunuchs. As his obsessive worry of assassination elevated, ʿAbbās started to place to dying or to blind any member of the royal household who prompted him anxiousness on this regard. In this manner, one son was executed (an act that prompted ʿAbbās bitter regret) and two have been blinded, and his father and brothers have been blinded and imprisoned. ʿAbbās died with out an inheritor able to succeeding him.

Though ʿAbbās possessed nice stature as a monarch—even in an age notable for its excellent rulers—his nice achievement in first saving the Safavid Empire from collapse after which elevating it to new heights of splendour is marred by his remedy of his family and the truth that his reforms contained inside them the seeds of the long run decay of each dynasty and state.