| Battle of Herat (1598) | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of Safavid-Shaybanids war | |||||||||
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| Belligerents | |||||||||
 Safavid Empire |  Shaybanids | ||||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
| Abbas the Great | Din Mohammad Khan | ||||||||
| Strength | |||||||||
| 10000-15000 | 20000 | ||||||||
Battle of Herat took place on August 9, 1598, between the Shaybanid Khanate and the Safavid Empire for Khorasan and Balkh. The battle resulted in the complete defeat of the Uzbeks and Safavid Empire fully restored its power in Khorasan and got back the region.
During the reign of Shah Muhammad Khudabanda, the Safavid Empire was experiencing deep internal turmoil. During this period of turmoil, in which the Shah's weakness played an important role, the empire was attacked by its neighbors to the east and west. In 1578, Shaybanids which took an advantage of the Ottoman Empire's declaration of war on the Safavid Empire, attacked the Safavids from the east. The Ottoman-Shaybanid alliance forced the Safavid Empire to wage war on two fronts. After the defeat against the Ottoman Empire in the west, the Astrakhanid dynasty, which replaced the Shaybanid dynasty, attacked Khorasan and captured it.[ citation needed ]
In 1587, Shah Mohammad Khodabanda was succeeded by his young son Shah Abbas. He set himself the task of returning all the lost lands. Shah Abbas, who signed an unpleasant peace with the Ottoman Empire, [1] [2] started reforms including an active army and tried to centralize his state.[ citation needed ] Despite the fact that the most dangerous enemy of the Safavid Empire was on its western border, Shah Abbas was aware that it would be very difficult to fight them yet. Therefore, he decided that it would be more appropriate to eliminate the threat of the enemy in the east at the first stage. In 1597, Shah Abbas began a campaign against the Uzbeks. Many of the main cities of Khorasan were captured. Mashhad was easily subordinated to the Safavid army. However, the Uzbek commander Din Mohammad escaped alive and managed to escape to Herat. On August 9, 1598, the Safavid army approached Herat.[ citation needed ]
Shah Abbas, seeing the strengthening of Herat's fortress walls, was aware that the siege of the fortress could last for a very long time. Therefore, he was able to force the Uzbek army to leave the castle by using false retreat tactics. The Uzbek army that left the fortress was surrounded and defeated by the Safavid army. Din Mohammad, the Uzbek commander, was wounded in the battle and killed by his own fighters on the way back. [3]
With the successful conclusion of this campaign, the Safavid Empire not only regained Khorasan, but also dealt a blow to its main rival in the east, which ensured the security of its eastern borders. Thus, the Uzbek army was dealt such a heavy blow in the battle of 1598 that they could not recover their forces for a long time and enter into an open struggle with the Safavid Empire. Shah Abbas focused on the issue of war with the Ottoman Empire only after ensuring the security of the eastern borders, which he attached great importance to, and started this war in 1603. As a result of this war, great victories were won over the Ottoman army. [4] [5]
Abbas I, commonly known as Abbas the Great, was the fifth shah of Safavid Iran from 1588 to 1629. The third son of Shah Mohammad Khodabanda, he is generally considered one of the greatest rulers of Iranian history and the Safavid dynasty.
Tahmasp I was the second shah of Safavid Iran from 1524 until his death in 1576. He was the eldest son of Ismail I and his principal consort, Tajlu Khanum. Ascending the throne after the death of his father on 23 May 1524, the first years of Tahmasp's reign were marked by civil wars between the Qizilbash leaders until 1532, when he asserted his authority and began an absolute monarchy. He soon faced a long-lasting war with the Ottoman Empire, which was divided into three phases. The Ottoman sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, tried to install his own candidates on the Safavid throne. The war ended with the Peace of Amasya in 1555, with the Ottomans gaining sovereignty over Iraq, much of Kurdistan, and western Georgia. Tahmasp also had conflicts with the Uzbeks of Bukhara over Khorasan, with them repeatedly raiding Herat. In 1528, at the age of fourteen, he defeated the Uzbeks in the Battle of Jam by using artillery.
Ismail I was the founder and first shah of Safavid Iran, ruling from 1501 until his death in 1524. His reign is often considered the beginning of modern Iranian history, as well as one of the gunpowder empires. The rule of Ismail I is one of the most vital in the history of Iran. Before his accession in 1501, Iran, since its conquest by the Arabs eight-and-a-half centuries earlier, had not existed as a unified country under native Iranian rule. Although many Iranian dynasties rose to power amidst this whole period, it was only under the Buyids that a vast part of Iran properly returned to Iranian rule (945–1055).
Mohammad Shah was the third Qajar shah of Iran from 1834 to 1848, inheriting the throne from his grandfather, Fath-Ali Shah. From a young age, Mohammad Mirza was under the tutelage of Haji Mirza Aqasi, a local dervish from Tabriz whose teachings influenced the young prince to become a Sufi-king later in his life. After his father Abbas Mirza died in 1833, Mohammad Mirza became the crown prince of Iran and was assigned with the governorship of Azarbaijan. After the death of Fath-Ali Shah in 1838, some of his sons including Hossein Ali Mirza and Ali Mirza Zel as-Soltan rose up as claimants to the throne. With the support of English and Russian forces, Mohammad Shah suppressed the rebellious princes and asserted his authority.
Muhammad Shaybani Khan was an Uzbek leader who consolidated various Uzbek tribes and laid the foundations for their ascendance in Transoxiana and the establishment of the Khanate of Bukhara. He was a Shaybanid or descendant of Shiban, the fifth son of Jochi, Genghis Khan's eldest son. He was the son of Shah-Budag, thus a grandson of the Uzbek conqueror Abu'l-Khayr Khan.
Mohammad Khodabanda, was the fourth Safavid shah of Iran from 1578 until his overthrow in 1587 by his son Abbas I. Khodabanda had succeeded his brother, Ismail II. Khodabanda was the son of Shah Tahmasp I by a Turcoman mother, Sultanum Begum Mawsillu, and grandson of Ismail I, founder of the Safavid dynasty.
The Ottoman–Safavid War of 1623–1639 was the last of a series of conflicts fought between the Ottoman Empire and Safavid Iran, then the two major powers of Western Asia, over control of Mesopotamia. After initial Persian success in recapturing Baghdad and most of modern Iraq, having lost it for 90 years, the war became a stalemate as the Persians were unable to press further into the Ottoman Empire, and the Ottomans themselves were distracted by wars in Europe and weakened by internal turmoil. Eventually, the Ottomans were able to recover Baghdad, taking heavy losses in the final siege, and the signing of the Treaty of Zuhab ended the war in an Ottoman victory. Roughly speaking, the treaty restored the borders of 1555, with the Safavids keeping Daghestan, Shirvan, eastern Georgia, and Eastern Armenia, while western Georgia and Western Armenia decisively came under Ottoman rule. The eastern part of Samtskhe (Meskheti) was irrevocably lost to the Ottomans as well as Mesopotamia. Although parts of Mesopotamia were briefly retaken by the Iranians later on in history, notably during the reigns of Nader Shah (1736–1747) and Karim Khan Zand (1751–1779), it remained thenceforth in Ottoman hands until the aftermath of World War I.
The Ottoman–Safavid War of 1603–1612 consisted of two wars between Safavid Iran under Shah Abbas I and the Ottoman Empire under Sultans Mehmed III, Ahmed I, and Mustafa I. The first war began in 1603 and ended with a Safavid victory in 1612, when they regained and reestablished their suzerainty over the Caucasus and Western Iran, which had been lost at the Treaty of Constantinople in 1590.
The Ottoman–Safavid War (1578–1590) was one of the many wars between the neighboring arch rivals of Safavid Empire and the Ottoman Empire.
Nader Shah Afshar was the founder of the Afsharid dynasty of Iran and one of the most powerful rulers in Iranian history, ruling as shah of Iran (Persia) from 1736 to 1747, when he was assassinated during a rebellion. He fought numerous campaigns throughout the Middle East, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and South Asia, such as the battles of Herat, Mihmandust, Murche-Khort, Kirkuk, Yeghevārd, Khyber Pass, Karnal, and Kars. Because of his military genius, some historians have described him as the Napoleon of Persia, the Sword of Persia, or the Second Alexander. Nader belonged to the Turkoman Afshars, one of the seven Qizilbash tribes that helped the Safavid dynasty establish their power in Iran.
The Treaty of Constantinople, also known as the Peace of Istanbul or the Treaty of Ferhad Pasha, was a treaty between the Ottoman Empire and the Safavid Empire ending the Ottoman–Safavid War of 1578–1590. It was signed on 21 March 1590 in Constantinople. The war started when the Ottomans, then ruled by Murad III, invaded the Safavid possessions in Georgia, during a period of Safavid weakness. With the empire beleaguered on numerous fronts and its domestic control plagued by civil wars and court intrigues, the new Safavid king Abbas I, who had been placed on the throne in 1588, opted for unconditional peace, which led to the treaty. The treaty put an end to 12 years of hostilities between the two arch rivals. While both the war and the treaty were a success for the Ottomans, and severely disadvantageous for the Safavids, the new status quo proved to be short lived, as in the next bout of hostilities, several years later, all Safavid losses were recovered.
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Safavid-Uzbek wars
The campaigns of Nader Shah, or the Naderian Wars, were a series of conflicts fought in the early to mid-eighteenth century throughout Central Eurasia primarily by the Iranian conqueror Nader Shah. His campaigns originated from the overthrow of the Iranian Safavid dynasty by the Hotaki Afghans. In the ensuing collapse and fragmentation of the empire after the capture of the Iranian capital of Isfahan by the Afghans, a claimant to the Safavid throne, Tahmasp II, accepted Nader into his service. After having subdued north-west Iran as well as neutralising the Abdali Afghans to the east as well as turning Tahmasp II into a vassal, Nader marched against the Hotaki Afghans in occupation of the rest of the country. In a series of incredible victories the Afghans were decimated and Tahmasp II returned to the throne as a restored Safavid monarch.
Safavid Iran or Safavid Persia, also referred to as the Safavid Empire, was one of the largest and long-standing Iranian empires after the 7th-century Muslim conquest of Persia, which was ruled from 1501 to 1736 by the Safavid dynasty. It is often considered the beginning of modern Iranian history, as well as one of the gunpowder empires. The Safavid Shāh Ismā'īl I established the Twelver denomination of Shīʿa Islam as the official religion of the empire, marking one of the most important turning points in the history of Islam.
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