Welcoming the Future Safavid Sovereign: The Significance of Rustam Mirza’s Exodus to the Mughal Empire (1593)

Abstract

The objective of this article is to find out to what extent a Safavid prince could threaten the stability of the Safavid imperial crown. To this end, the article analyses the case of Rustam Mirza (1565–1642) who belonged to a secondary branch of the imperial dynasty and who ruled autonomously over a Central Asian territory. Due to regional and imperial conflicts, the Safavid prince had to go into exile in the Mughal Empire from where he continued to impact the internal stability and the borders of the Safavid Empire. The article analyses various aspects of Rustam Mirza’s journey abroad and we will see what interest the Mughals might have had in welcoming him; what Rustam Mirza represented for the imperial Safavid centre; who was involved in the negotiations; how this welcoming process was interpreted; what benefits the prince received; and what influence his stay abroad had on the domestic and foreign policy of the sending and receiving states.

Keywords:

• Safavids
• Mughals
• Qandahar
• Shah Abbas
• Rustam Mirza
• Akbar

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Following the criteria established by Liesbeth Geevers, I will refer to Rustam Mirza’s lineage as Bahrami: Liesbeth Geevers, ‘Safavid Cousins on the Verge of Extinction. Dynastic Centralization in Central Asia and the Bahrami Collateral Line (1517–1593)’, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 58-3 (2015), pp. 293-326. See also Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, trans. R. Savory (Boulder, 1979), vol. I, p. 154.

2 Shah Hoseyn Sistani, Ehya al-Moluk (Tehran, 1966), pp. 237, 269-71; Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, pp. 657-64. See also, Geevers, ‘Safavid Cousins on the Verge of Extinction’; Rudi Matthee, ‘Relations Between the Centre and the Periphery in Safavid Iran: The Western Borderlands v. the Eastern Frontier Zone’, The Historian 77 (2015), pp. 431-63.

3 In 1581, a Qizilbash faction of Khorasan took up arms against the Safavid shah, dividing the province. From 1587 to 1598 the Uzbek khans would join the conflict.

4 Khwajah Nizamuddin Ahmad, The Tabaqat-i-Akbari, trans. B. De (Calcutta, 1936), vol. II, p. 654.

5 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, trans. H. Blochmann (Calcutta, 1927), vol. I, p. 327.

6 Muhammad-Hadi, The Jahangirnama. Memoirs of Jahangir, Emperor of India, trans. W.M. Thackston (Oxford, 1999), p. 139.

7 For example: Hamid Algar, ‘Naqshbandis and Safavids: A Contribution to the Religious History of Iran and Her Neighbors’, in Michel M. Mazzaoui (ed.), Safavid Iran and Her Neighbors (Salt Lake City, 2014), pp. 7-48; and James Reid, Studies in Safavid Mind, Society and Culture (Costa Mesa, 2000).

8 For instance: Ina Baghdiantz McCabe, The Shah’s Silk for Europe’s Silver. The Eurasian Trade of the Julfa Armenians in Safavid Iran and India (1530–1750) (Atlanta, 1999); or Willem Floor, The Economy of Safavid Persia (Wiesbaden, 2000).

9 For example: Sanjay Subrahmanyan, ‘An Infernal Triangle: The Contest between Mughals, Safavids and Portuguese, 1590–1605’, in Willem Floor and Edmund Herzig (eds), Iran and the World in Safavid Age (London, 2012), pp. 103-30; and Fariba Zarinebaf, ‘Rebels and Renegades on Ottoman-Iranian Borderlands. Porous Frontiers and Hybrid Identities’, in Abbas Amanat and Farzin Vejdani (eds), Iran Facing Others: Identity Boundaries in a Historical Perspective (London, 2012), pp. 81-99.

10 Walter Posch, Osmanisch-safavidische Beziehungen 1545–1550: Der Fall Alkâs Mîrzâ. (Vienna, 2013).

11 Posch, Osmanisch-safavidische Beziehungen, p. 20

12 Moisés Almosnino, Crónica de los Otomanos (Barcelona, 1998), p. 117. The Sultan probably expected nothing more than to establish a protectorate like the one over Crimea: Rudi Matthee, ‘Safavid Iran and the “Turkish Question” or How to Avoid a War on Multiple Fronts’, Iranian Studies, 52 (2019), pp. 513-42, p. 528.

13 The pretender, before his defeat (1549), had been politically isolated, while in Iran, Shah Tahmasp hastened to secure the loyalty of the Qizilbash on the frontier: Walter Posch, ‘On a Pachyderm’s Voyage from Tabriz to Aleppo: A Light Moment in Persianate “Elephant Diplomacy”’, Journal of Persianate Studies 8 (2015), pp. 230-33; Posch, Osmanisch-safavidische Beziehungen, p. 351

14 Geevers, ‘Safavid Cousins on the Verge of Extinction’; Sinem Casale, ‘A Peace for a Prince: The Reception of a Safavid Child Hostage at the Ottoman Court’, Journal of Early Modern History 20 (2016), pp. 39-62.

15 Mustafa Efendi Selaniki, Tarikh-e Selaniki. 971–1008/1563–1600, trans. Hasan b. Ali (Tehran, 2011), p. 433.

16 Iskandar Beg Munshi, Almara-ye Abbasi, vol. I, p. 482.

17 Juan De Persia, Relaciones de Don Juan de Persia (Madrid, 1946), p. 85.

18 Selaniki, Tarikh-e Selaniki, pp. 337-9; Ismail Hami Danişmend, Îsahlı Osmanlı Tarihi Kronolojisi. Vol. 3 (1574–1703) (Istanbul, 1972), p. 114.

19 Casale, ‘A Peace for a Prince’, p. 56; Selaniki, Tarikh-e Selaniki, p. 340.

20 Iskandar Beg Munshi, Almara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 707. A seyyed is a descendant from the Prophet.

21 Rudi Matthee, Loyalty, Betrayal and Retribution: Biktash Khan, Ya‘qub Khan and Shah Abbas I’s Strategy in Establishing Control over Kirman,Yazd and Fars’, in Robert Hillenbrand, A.C.S. Peacock and Firuza Abdullaeva (eds), Ferdowsi, the Mongols and the History of Iran: Art, Literature and Culture from Early Islam to Qajar Persia (London, 2014), pp. 184-200, p. 187.

22 Shah Tahmasp was very careful to show his authorship of the murders within the family (Posch, ‘On a Pachyderm’s Voyage’, p. 228).

23 Stephen F. Dale provides an interesting comparative analysis of the evolution of the monarchy between the Safavids and the Mughals: The Muslim Empires of the Ottomans, Safavids, and Mughals (Cambridge, 2014), pp. 87-105.

24 Sholeh Quinn, Shah Abbas. The King Who Refashioned Iran (London, 2015), p.19; Sanjay Subrahmanyan, ‘Iranians Abroad: Intra-Asian Elite Migration and Early Modern State Formation’, The Journal of Asian Studies 52-2 (1992), pp. 340-63, p. 354.

25 Muhammad Khodabandeh Mirza and his laleh Qazaq Khan Takkalu rose up against the Shah (1564) (Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. I, p. 190); and Budagh Khan Chegani confronted Shah Abbas using his responsibility as laleh of Sultan Hasan Mirza (1589) (Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 579).

26 Colin P. Mitchell, ‘Am I my brother’s keeper? Negotiating Corporate Sovereignty and Divine Absolutism in Sixteenth-Century Turco-Iranian politics’, in Colin P. Mitchell (ed.), New Perspectives of Safavid Iran (London, 2011), p. 52.

27 Among other things, Shah Tahmasp’s original plan was for his son Murad Mirza and his laleh to keep Qandahar: Jawhar Aftabachi, Private Memoirs of the Moghul Emperor Humayun, trans. C. Stewart (London, 1832), pp. 79-80.

28 He was the first of three sons born to Bahram Mirza and the Shirvani aristocrat Zeinab Sultan. After the death of Bahram Mirza (1549), his sons came under the protection of Shah Tahmasp. Sultan Hussein Mirza fought against the Ottomans and took over the peripheral Sistan government (Sistani, Ehya al-Moluk, pp. 163-4).

29 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, pp. 448-9; Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. I, p. 154.

30 Sultan Hussein Mirza’s extension of power was evidenced by proclamations encouraging the city’s exiles to return (the success of which would be determined by the fact that he was an adult Safavid prince with a lasting mandate). Riazul Islam, A Calendar of Documents on Indo-Persian Relations (1500–1750) (Lahore, 1979), vol. I; and for the high-profile trial of a religious sheikh for public scandal, see Haravi Nimat Allah, History of the Afghans, trans. B. Dorn (London, 1836), vol. I, p. 19.

31 Khwajah Nizamu’din Ahmad, ‘Tabakat-i Akbari’, in The History of India as Told by its Own Historians. The Muhammadan Period, ed. H.M. Elliot (London, 1873), vol. V, p. 315.

32 His daughter, Oghan Pasha Khanoom would remain in the imperial capital and years later, through marriage to the royal successor, would provide him with a certain power base in Khorasan: Qazi Ahmad Qomi, Afzale Tavarikh (Tehran, 1984), pp. 632, 711).

33 Amita Paliwal, ‘Sind in the Mughal Empire (1591–1740). A Study of its Administration, Society, Economy and Culture’ (unpublished PhD dissertation, Aligarh Muslim University, 2010), p. 39.

34 Riazul Islam, Indo-Persian Relations. A Study of the Political and Diplomatic Relations between the Mughal Empire and Iran (Tehran, 1970), p. 57.

35 Qomi, Afzale Tavarikh, pp. 665-6. He was also urged to do so by the Qandahar oligarchy itself, who did not want the two princes to be sent to Qazvin. VVAA, A Chronicle of the Carmelites in Persia and the Papal Mission of the XVII and XVIII Centuries (London, 1939), vol. I, p. 44.

36 Rudi Matthee makes an extraordinary reflection on this topic: ‘Relations Between the Center and the Periphery in Safavid Iran’.

37 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. III, pp. 399-400.

38 Mirza Naqi Nasiri, Titles and Emoluments in Safavid Iran. A Third Manual of Safavid Administration, trans. W. Floor (Washington, 2008), pp. 82-3.

39 Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 652; Hamza Beg Dhulkadir was Sultan Hussein Mirza’s right-hand man since 1559. Mirza Naqi Nasiri, Titles and Emoluments in Safavid Iran, p. 169.

40 Audrey Burton, The Bukharans. A Dynastic, Diplomatic and Commercial History. 1550–1702 (Richmond, 1997), p. 30.

41 Ibid., pp. 229-34.

42 Nawwab Samsam-ud Daula Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara: Being Biographies of the Muhammadan and Hindu Officers of the Timurid Sovereigns of India from 1500 to about 1780 AD, trans. H. Beveridge (New Delhi, 1979), vol. II, p. 351. It is interesting to note that during Rustam Mirza’s brief rule in Qandahar, he may have given his version of events to the imperial court in Qazvin, something we can deduce from Minadoi’s report on Qandahar in which he notes that the city consists of three sultans, and that the leader of these is Rustam Mirza with a force of 25,000 horses. Giovanni Tommaso Minadoi, The History of the Warres between the Turkes and the Persians. trans. A. Hartwell (Tehran, 1976), pp. 52, 70.

43 The ruler of Herat, fearing an attack by Murshedqoli Khan, sought help from the princes of Qandahar (unsuccessfully) and then from the Uzbek leader Abdullah Khan. Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. I, p. 502.

44 Selaniki, Tarikh-e Selaniki, pp. 336-7; Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 576.

45 Ibid, p. 557. As we have seen, this dual system of power, established in 1579 with the Khodabandeh-Hamza Mirza tandem, bears many similarities to the Uzbek political system characterized by the figures of the ‘old khan’ and the ‘young khan’: see Audrey Burton, ‘Who Were the First Ashtarkhanid Rulers of Bukhara?’, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 51-3 (1988), pp. 482-8.

46 Qomi, Afzale Tavarikh, p. 887; Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 657; Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. II, p. 632.

47 Qomi, Afzale Tavarikh, p. 887; Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 657; Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. III, p. 632.

48 Sistani, Ehya al-Moluk, p. 269.

49 Qomi, Afzale Tavarikh, p. 887.

50 Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 664.

51 Sistani, Ehya al-Moluk, pp. 273, 280, 308-10.

52 Shortly afterwards Abd al-Momen Khan, leader of the Uzbeks in Khorasan and with his own internal problems in the south of the province, wrote to Shah Abbas encouraging him to call a truce in 1593 and thus allow their respective rivals to wear each other down. Audrey Burton, ‘The War of Words between Abd al-Mumin and Shah Abbas’, Central Asiatic Journal 39-1 (1995), pp. 51-77, pp. 65-6.

53 Qomi, Afzale Tavarikh, p. 915; Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, pp. 659-60; Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. III, pp. 632-3.

54 Khwajah Nizamuddin, The Tabaqat-i-Akbari, vol. II, p. 654.

55 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, p. 416; Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. III, p. 633.

56 Khwajah Nizamuddin, The Tabaqat-i-Akbari, vol. II, p. 654.

57 Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 660. Khan-i Khanan was the son of the vakil Bairam Khan, whose daughter was married to the imperial prince Daniyal. Abu’l-Fazl, The History of Akbar, trans. W.M. Thackston (Cambridge, 2015), vol. I, p. 379; Al-Badaiuni, Muntakhabu-t-Tawarikh, trans. G.S.A. Ranking (New Delhi, 1979), vol. II, p. 386. The attack he led on Thatta was to be part of a larger project that included Qandahar, Khorasan and Iran. Islam, A Calendar of Documents on Indo-Persian Relations, vol. I, pp. 111, 115.

58 A. Mogaddam, ‘Tazire masaele Qandahar var Chaleshaye siasi miane Safavian va Baburian (932–1108)’, Majabeie Tarikhe Iran va Eslam Danesghah al-Zahra 11 (Tehran, 2011), p. 90; for Kashmir issues see Thomas Wolseley Haig, ‘The Chronology and Genealogy of the Muhammadan Kings of Kashmir’ The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (1918), pp. 451-68.

59 Shounak Ghosh, ‘A Pen Sharper than the Sword: A Mughal Ideologue’s Implementation of Ideals on Diplomacy, 1577–98’, Journal of Indian History 3 (2016), pp. 78, 85; Naimur Rahman Faroqui, ‘Diplomacy and Diplomatic Procedure under the Mughals’, The Medieval History Journal 7-1 (2004), p. 73; Dahgan Nejad, Nagsh rahvurdi Qandahar dar ravavete Iran va Hend (dar durane Safavie) (Tehran, 2005), p. 50.

60 Richard Foltz, Mughal India and Central Asia (Karachi, 1999), p. 6; Masashi Haneda, ‘Emigration of Iranian Elites to India during the 16-18th centuries’, Cahiers d’Asie centrales 3/4 (1997), p. 132.

61 Annemarie Schimmel, The Empire of the Great Mughals. History, Art and Culture (London, 2004), p. 98.

62 Al-Badaiuni, Muntakhabu-t-Tawarikh, vol. II, p. 402; Khwajah Nizamuddin, The Tabaqat-i-Akbari, vol. II, pp. 467, 650.

63 We could compare his reception with that of two Timurid rulers of Badakhshan: Suleyman Mirza, a distant relative of Akbar and a Timurid ruler in his own right, was received by Akbar at the gates of the capital Fathepur Sikri (a gesture we will not see again with other rulers) when in 1575 he had to avail himself of the Indian sovereign's protection. Shahrukh Mirza, grandson of Suleyman Mirza, when he left the Badakhshan government under Uzbek pressure (1584), was escorted to the Lahore court by the imperial prince Daniyal Mirza and the religious leader Sheikh Ebrahim Chishti. Khwajah Nizamuddin, The Tabaqat-i-Akbari, vol. II, pp. 475-8; Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. III, p. 780.

64 For this gift system, which demonstrated the existing hierarchy between sender and receiver, see Rudi Matthee, Encyclopaedia Iranica, ‘Gift and Giving (IV) in the Safavid Period’, (2012) www.iranicaonline.org/articles/gift-giving-iv.

65 Balrishan Shivram, Jagirdars in the Mughal Empire During the Reign of Akbar (New Delhi, 1996), p. 12.

66 William H. Moreland, ‘Rank (mansab) in the Mogul State Service’, The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 4 (1998), p. 221. At that time, the mansab had a maximum number of 5,000 for those who were not part of the royal family.

67 One lakh is the equivalent of 100,000 rupees and the muradi tamgha was a currency in circulation throughout Central Asia, with twenty-four muradi tamgha being equivalent to one rupee. Rustam Mirza thus obtained a subsidy of 416,666 rupees, almost fifty times the yearly wage of a yuzbashi (a commander of 100). The Safavid prince would therefore potentially be able to raise an army of 5,000 cavalrymen. Schimmel, The Empire of the Great Mughals, p. 83; Al-Badaiuni, Muntakhabu-t-Tawarikh vol. II, p. 402; Khwajah Nizamuddin, The Tabaqat-i-Akbari, vol. II, pp. 467, 650.

68 Paliwal, ‘Sind in the Mughal Empire’, p. 64.

69 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, p. 329. Afzal Husain, ‘Marriages among Mughal Nobles as an Index of Status and Aristocratic Integration’, Proceedings of the Indian History Congress 33 (1971), pp. 304-12.

70 Schimmel, The Empire of the Great Mughals, p. 38.

71 Thomas Wolseley Haig, ‘Akbar, Mystic and Prophet’, in The Cambridge History of India (New Delhi, 1957), vol. IV, p. 138.

72 Mir Masum, Tarikhu-s Sind, trans. H.M. Elliot, in History of India as Told by Its Own Historians (London, 1867), vol. I, p. 251; Al-Badaiuni, Muntakhabu-t-Tawarikh, vol. II, p. 392.

73 Chetan Singh, ‘Centre and Periphery in the Mughal State: The Case of Seventeenth-Century Panjab’, Modern Asian Studies 22-2 (1988), p. 302.

74 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I), p. 328.

75 Dadvar, Iranians in Mughal Politics, pp. 110, 157.

76 Afzal Husain, ‘Growth of Irani Element in Akbar’s Nobility’, Proceedings of the Indian History Congress 36 (1975), p. 172; Aziz Ahmad, ‘Safavid Poets and India’, Iran Journal of the British Institute of Persian Studies 14 (1976), p. 127.

77 Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 665.

78 Burton, The Bukharans, 77; Al Badaiuni, Muntakhabu-t-Tawarikh, vol. II, p. 402.

79 Jahangir et al., The Jahangirnama, pp. 386-88.

80 Aliqoli Sultan Asayesh-Oghlu (Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, p. 665); Muhammad Zaman Sultan Shamlu (Burton, The Bukharans, 77; Al Badaiuni, Muntakhabu-t-Tawarikh, vol. II, p. 402) and Khalil Beg Dhulkadir (Jahangir et al., The Jahangirnama, pp. 386-8).

81 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, pp. 327, 459; Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, pp. 660-61; Jamsheed Choksy and Usman Hasan, ‘An Emissary from Akbar to Abbas I: Inscriptions, Texts, and the Career of Amir Muhammad Masum al-Bhakkari’, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 1-1 (1991), p. 24.

82 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, p. 529; Balkrishan Shivram, ‘Jagirdars in the Mughal Empire During the Reign of Akbar’ (unpublished PhD. dissertation, Himachal Pradesh University, Shimla, 1996), p. 319; Choksy and Hasan, ‘An Emissary from Akbar to Abbas I’, p. 24.

83 Al-Badaiuni, Muntakhabu-t-Tawarikh, vol. II, p. 417; Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. III, pp. 633-4.

84 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, p. 327.

85 He was married to one of Suleyman Mirza’s daughters. Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, p. 326.

86 As for the notables who accompanied him to the Lahore court, we can see that they were of similar rank to those of Rustam Mirza (though not all of Khan-i Khanan’s clique). Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. II, p. 353.

87 Jorge Flores, ‘Solving Rubik’s Cube: Hormuz and the Geopolitical Challenges of West Asia, c.1592–1622’, Acta Iranica 52 (Vienna, 2011), p. 194; Dadvar, Iranians in Mughal Politics, pp. 61-2. Akbar wrote to the Uzbek Khan in 1596 to assure him that he had the Bahrami princes under his control, thus Akbar was keeping a trump card for himself to damage Uzbek interests in Khorasan. Islam, A Calendar of Documents on Indo-Persian Relations, vol. II, p. 220.

88 Burton, The Bukharans, p. 84.

89 Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. III, pp. 633-4.

90 Ibid., p. 637.

91 Dadvar, Iranians in Mughal Politics, p. 114.

92 William Foster (ed.), Early Travels in India. 1583–1619 (Oxford, 1921), pp. 139, 162.

93 Foltz, Mughal India and Central Asia, p. 128.

94 Islam, A Calendar of Documents on Indo-Persian Relations, vol. I, p. 121.

95 Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul Umara, vol. III, p. 631.

96 Ibid., p. 632.

97 Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, p. 327.

98 Jahangir et al., The Jahangirnama, p. 158.

99 Iskandar Beg Munshi, Alamara-ye Abbasi, vol. II, pp. 659-60.

100 Ibid., p. 663.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Marc Morató-Aragonés Ibáñez

Marc Morató-Aragonés Ibáñez

Dr. Marc Morató-Aragonés Ibáñez is a lecturer of history at Pompeu Fabra University as well as a former diplomacy and international relations student with the CEI International Affairs (both in Barcelona). He specialises in the political and diplomatic relations of Safavid Iran, as well as the states that formed in the sixteenth century in what is now Afghanistan and Pakistan.