The Safavid dynasty (/ˈsæfəvɪd,ˈsɑː-/; Persian: دودمان صفوی, romanized: Dudmâne Safavi,[1]pronounced[d̪uːd̪ˈmɒːnesæfæˈviː]) was one of Iran's most significant ruling dynasties reigning from 1501 to 1736.[2] Their rule is often considered the beginning of modern Iranian history,[3] as well as one of the gunpowder empires.[4] The Safavid Shāh Ismā'īl I established the Twelver denomination of Shīʿa Islam as the official religion of the Persian Empire, marking one of the most important turning points in the history of Islam.[5] The Safavid dynasty had its origin in the Safavid order of Sufism, which was established in the city of Ardabil in the Iranian Azerbaijan region.[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, for practical purposes, they were Turkic-speaking and Turkified.[13] From their base in Ardabil, the Safavids established control over parts of Greater Iran and reasserted the Iranian identity of the region,[14] thus becoming the first native dynasty since the Sasanian Empire to establish a national state officially known as Iran.[15]
The Safavids ruled from 1501 to 1722 (experiencing a brief restoration from 1729 to 1736 and 1750 to 1773) and, at their height, controlled all of what is now Iran, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Armenia, eastern Georgia, parts of the North Caucasus including Russia, Iraq, Kuwait, and Afghanistan, as well as parts of Turkey, Syria, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
Despite their demise in 1736, the legacy that they left behind was the revival of Iran as an economic stronghold between East and West, the establishment of an efficient state and bureaucracy based upon "checks and balances", their architectural innovations, and patronage for fine arts.[3] The Safavids have also left their mark down to the present era by establishing Twelver Shīʿīsm as the state religion of Iran, as well as spreading Shīʿa Islam in major parts of the Middle East, Central Asia, Caucasus, Anatolia, the Persian Gulf, and Mesopotamia.[3][5]
^*Afšār, ta·līf-i Iskandar Baig Turkmān. Zīr-i naẓar bā tanẓīm-i fihristhā wa muqaddama-i Īraǧ (2003). Tārīkh-i ʻʻālamārā-yi ʻʻAbbāsī (in Persian) (Čāp-i 3. ed.). Tihrān: Mu·assasa-i Intišārāt-i Amīr Kabīr. pp. 17, 18, 19, 79. ISBN 978-964-00-0818-8.
p. 17: dudmān-i safavīa
p. 18: khāndān-i safavīa
p. 19: sīlsīla-i safavīa
p. 79: sīlsīla-i alīa-i safavīa
^"SAFAVID DYNASTY". Encyclopædia Iranica.
^ abcMatthee, Rudi (13 June 2017) [28 July 2008]. "SAFAVID DYNASTY". Encyclopædia Iranica. New York: Columbia University. doi:10.1163/2330-4804_EIRO_COM_509. ISSN 2330-4804. Archived from the original on 25 May 2022. Retrieved 23 June 2022.
^Streusand, Douglas E., Islamic Gunpowder Empires: Ottomans, Safavids, and Mughals (Boulder, Col : Westview Press, 2011) ("Streusand"), p. 135.
^ abSavory, Roger (2012) [1995]. "Ṣafawids". In Bosworth, C. E.; van Donzel, E. J.; Heinrichs, W. P.; Lewis, B.; Pellat, Ch.; Schacht, J. (eds.). Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. Vol. 8. Leiden and Boston: Brill Publishers. doi:10.1163/1573-3912_islam_COM_0964. ISBN 978-90-04-16121-4.
^Baltacıoğlu-Brammer, Ayşe (2021). "The emergence of the Safavids as a mystical order and their subsequent rise to power in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries". In Matthee, Rudi (ed.). The Safavid World. Routledge Worlds (1st ed.). New York and London: Routledge. pp. 15–36. doi:10.4324/9781003170822. ISBN 978-1-003-17082-2. S2CID 236371308.
^
Matthee, Rudi. (2005). The Pursuit of Pleasure: Drugs and Stimulants in Iranian History, 1500-1900. Princeton University Press. p. 18; "The Safavids, as Iranians of Kurdish ancestry and of nontribal background (...)".
Savory, Roger. (2008). "EBN BAZZĀZ". Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. VIII, Fasc. 1. p. 8. "This official version contains textual changes designed to obscure the Kurdish origins of the Safavid family and to vindicate their claim to descent from the Imams."
Amoretti, Biancamaria Scarcia; Matthee, Rudi. (2009). "Ṣafavid Dynasty". In Esposito, John L. (ed.) The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World. Oxford University Press. "Of Kurdish ancestry, the Ṣafavids started as a Sunnī mystical order (...)"
^
Roemer, H. R. (1986). "The Safavid Period" in Jackson, Peter; Lockhart, Laurence. The Cambridge History of Iran, Vol. 6: The Timurid and Safavid Periods. Cambridge University Press. pp. 214, 229
Blow, David (2009). Shah Abbas: The Ruthless King Who Became an Iranian Legend. I.B.Tauris. p. 3
Savory, Roger M.; Karamustafa, Ahmet T. (1998) "ESMĀʿĪL I ṢAFAWĪ". Encyclopaedia Iranica Vol. VIII, Fasc. 6, pp. 628-636
^Aptin Khanbaghi (2006) The Fire, the Star and the Cross: Minority Religions in Medieval and Early. London & New York. IB Tauris. ISBN 1-84511-056-0, pp. 130–1
^Yarshater 2001, p. 493.
^Khanbaghi 2006, p. 130.
^Anthony Bryer. "Greeks and Türkmens: The Pontic Exception", Dumbarton Oaks Papers, Vol. 29 (1975), Appendix II "Genealogy of the Muslim Marriages of the Princesses of Trebizond"
^"Safavid dynasty" at Encyclopædia Iranica, "The origins of the Safavids are clouded in obscurity. They may have been of Kurdish origin (see R. Savory, Iran Under the Safavids, 1980, p. 2; R. Matthee, "Safavid Dynasty" at iranica.com), but for all practical purposes they were Turkish-speaking and Turkified."
^"Why is there such confusion about the origins of this important dynasty, which reasserted Iranian identity and established an independent Iranian state after eight and a half centuries of rule by foreign dynasties?" RM Savory, Iran Under the Safavids (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1980), p. 3.
^Alireza Shapur Shahbazi (2005), "The History of the Idea of Iran", in Vesta Curtis ed., Birth of the Persian Empire, IB Tauris, London, p. 108: "Similarly the collapse of Sassanian Eranshahr in AD 650 did not end Iranians' national idea. The name "Iran" disappeared from official records of the Saffarids, Samanids, Buyids, Saljuqs and their successor. But one unofficially used the name Iran, Eranshahr, and similar national designations, particularly Mamalek-e Iran or "Iranian lands", which exactly translated the old Avestan term Ariyanam Daihunam. On the other hand, when the Safavids (not Reza Shah, as is popularly assumed) revived a national state officially known as Iran, bureaucratic usage in the Ottoman empire and even Iran itself could still refer to it by other descriptive and traditional appellations".
The Safaviddynasty (/ˈsæfəvɪd, ˈsɑː-/; Persian: دودمان صفوی, romanized: Dudmâne Safavi, pronounced [d̪uːd̪ˈmɒːne sæfæˈviː]) was one of Iran's most significant...
by the Safaviddynasty. It is often considered the beginning of modern Iranian history, as well as one of the gunpowder empires. The Safavid Shāh Ismā'īl...
distantly related to the Safaviddynasty and of no importance. Moreover, he appears to have tacitly changed his authority from Safavid kingship to that of...
Mirwais Hotak, who led a successful rebellion against the declining Persian Safavid empire in the region of Loy Kandahar ("Greater Kandahar") in what is now...
The Military of Safavid Iran covers the military history of Safavid Iran from 1501 to 1736. It was the first Safavid king (shah), Ismail I (1501–1524)...
centuries, but today it is best known for having given rise to the Safaviddynasty. While initially founded under the Shafi'i school of Sunni Islam, later...
Following their rise to power in Iran in the 16th century, the Safaviddynasty initiated a campaign of forced conversion against the Iranian populace...
Safavid art is the art of the Iranian Safaviddynasty from 1501 to 1722, encompassing Iran and parts of the Caucasus and Central Asia. It was a high point...
Following table consists name of Safaviddynasty monarchs in Iran. Safaviddynasty family tree List of the mothers of the Safavid Shahs Ismāʿīl I, in Encyclopædia...
their dynastic and ultimately national emblem, the Safavids of Persia, needed to have a their own dynastic and national emblem. Therefore, Safavids chose...
The Enchantress of Florence is the ninth novel by Salman Rushdie, published in 2008. According to Rushdie this is his "most researched book" which required...
negatively. Iran was reunified as an independent state in 1501 by the Safaviddynasty, which set Shia Islam as the empire's official religion, marking one...
found. The Safavid conversion of Iran to Shia Islam destroyed what was once a vibrant community of Zoroastrians. As per official policy, Safavids wanted everyone...
The Mughal dynasty (Persian: دودمان مغل; Dudmân-e Mughal) comprised the members of the imperial House of Babur (Persian: خاندانِ آلِ بابُر; Khāndān-e-Āl-e-Bābur)...
Deccan sultanates, the conflicts with the Portuguese, and the wars with the Safavids. He also suppressed several local rebellions and dealt with the devastating...
Modern History. Yale University Press. p. 41. ISBN 978-0300231465. Safaviddynasty Byzantine Emperors family tree List of mothers of the Safavid shahs...
After the fall of the Safaviddynasty in 1722, he is remembered as a forceful ruler who temporarily reversed the decline of the Safavid state and created...
اصفهان) was a six-month-long siege of Isfahan, the capital of the Safaviddynasty of Iran, by the Hotaki-led Afghan army. It lasted from March to October...
Turkoman Afshars, one of the seven Qizilbash tribes that helped the Safaviddynasty establish their power in Iran. Nader rose to power during a period...
white, of whom one hundred were black eunuchs. The monarchs of the Safaviddynasty preferred to procreate through slave concubines, which would neutralize...
the Safavids (1502–1794), they proclaimed Shi'a Islam the state religion. This led to a deterioration in their treatment of Persian Jews. Safavids Shi'ism...
ISBN 978-1-59884-337-8. Perry, John R. [in Persian] (1991). "The Zand dynasty". In Avery, Peter; Hambly, Gavin R. G. [in Persian]; Melville, Charles...