The Hotak dynasty was an Afghan monarchy founded by Ghilji Pashtuns that briefly ruled portions of Iran and Afghanistan during the 1720s. It was established in April 1709 by Mirwais Hotak, who led a successful rebellion against the declining Persian Safavid empire in the region of Loy Kandahar in what is now southern Afghanistan.
Abbas III was a son of Shah Tahmasp II and Shahpari Begum of the Safavid dynasty and reigned from 1732 to 1736. After the deposition of his father by Nader Khan the infant Abbas was appointed nominal ruler of Iran on 7 September 1732. Nader Khan, who was the real ruler of the country, assumed the positions of deputy of state and viceroy. Abbas III was deposed in March 1736, when Nader Khan had himself crowned as Nader Shah. This marked the official end of the Safavid dynasty. Abbas was sent to join his father in prison in Sabzevar, Khorasan.
Ali-qoli Khan, commonly known by his regnal title Adel Shah was the second shah of Afsharid Iran, ruling from 1747 to 1748. He was the nephew and successor of Nader Shah, the founder of the Afsharid dynasty.
The Battle of Gulnabad was fought between the military forces from Hotaki Dynasty and the army of the Safavid Empire. It further cemented the eventual fall of the Safavid dynasty, which had been declining for decades.
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 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.
The Battle of Yeghevārd, also known as the Battle of Baghavard or Morad Tapeh, was the final major engagement of the Perso-Ottoman War of 1730–1735 where the principal Ottoman army in the Caucasus theatre under Koprulu Pasha's command was utterly destroyed by only the advance guard of Nader's army before the main Persian army could enter into the fray. The complete rout of Koprulu Pasha's forces led to a number of besieged Ottoman strongholds in the theatre surrendering as any hope of relief proved ephemeral in light of the crushing defeat at Yeghevārd. One of Nader's most impressive battlefield victories, in which he decimated a force four or five times the size of his own, it helped establish his reputation as a military genius and stands alongside many of his other great triumphs such as at Karnal, Mihmandoost or Kirkuk.
The campaign of 1731 was a failed attempt by Tahmasp II of the Safavid dynasty to launch an offensive into Ottoman held Caucasus which ended in a disastrous defeat with all of Nader's gains during the previous year being lost. The result of this particular military catastrophe was still overturned with Nader's return from the east but would have much more significant impact on the Safavid dynasty itself as Tahmasp II sealed his own fate by initiating this ill fated expedition.
The Battle of Kirkuk, also known as the Battle of Agh-Darband, was the last battle in Nader Shah's Mesopotamian campaign where he avenged his earlier defeat at the hands of the Ottoman general Topal Osman Pasha, in which Nader achieved suitable revenge after defeating and killing him at the battle of Kirkuk. The battle was another in the chain of seemingly unpredictable triumphs and tragedies for both sides as the war swung wildly from the favour of one side to the other. Although the battle ended in a crushing victory for the Persians, they had to be withdrawn from the area due to a growing rebellion in the south of Persia led by Mohammad Khan Baluch. This rebellion in effect robbed Nader of the strategic benefits of his great victory which would have included the capture of Baghdad, if he had the chance to resume his campaign.
The Battle of Samarra was the key engagement between the two great generals Nader Shah and Topal Osman Pasha, which led to the siege of Baghdad being lifted, keeping Ottoman Iraq under Istanbul's control. The armed contest between the two colossi was very hard fought with a total of roughly 50,000 men becoming casualties by the end of the fighting that left the Persians decimated and the Ottoman victors badly shaken. Other than its importance in deciding the fate of Baghdad, the battle is also significant as Nader's only battlefield defeat although he would avenge this defeat at the hands of Topal Pasha at the Battle of Agh-Darband where Topal was killed.
The Caucasus Campaign of 1734–1735 was the last great campaign of the Ottoman–Persian War (1730–35) which ended in a Persian victory allowing Nader to recast Persian hegemony over almost the entire Caucasus, region, reconquering it for the Safavid state.
In the aftermath of Nader's crippling defeat and expulsion from Ottoman Baghdad, the commander who was put in charge of the 12,000 soldiers to maintain the siege of the city, Mohammad Khan Baluch, fled from Mesopotamia and returned to southern Persia, where, taking advantage of Nader's shattered prestige due to his ignominious defeat at the hands of Topal Pasha at the Battle of Samarra, Mohammad Khan raised the banner of rebellion in the south of the country. He also allied with Sheikh Ahmad Madani's Revolt.
Reza Qoli Mirza Afshar (1719–1747) was the eldest son of Nader Shah, King of Afsharid Iran. After his father's coronation in 1736, Reza Qoli, aged 17, became the Governor of the important province of Khorasan. During his tenure, he showed courage by subduing rebellious khans and campaigning up until Bukhara to put an end to the Khanate of Bukhara, his father's enemies. Before heading off to India, Nader Shah appointed Reza Qoli the regent of Iran. As regent, Reza Qoli kept the peace intact but in doing so he was cruel, demanding taxes and executing people for mere crimes. He had Tahmasp II and Abbas III, two pretenders to the throne, killed, which caused an uproar among the people. When Nader Shah returned from India, he dismissed Reza Qoli as regent, snubbing him for his actions during the regency.
The military forces of the Afsharid dynasty of Iran had their origins in the relatively obscure yet bloody inter-factional violence in Khorasan during the collapse of the Safavid state. The small band of warriors under local warlord Nader Qoli of the Turkoman Afshar tribe in north-east Iran were no more than a few hundred men. Yet at the height of Nader's power as the king of kings, Shahanshah, he commanded an army of 375,000 fighting men which, according to Axworthy, constituted the single most powerful military force of its time, led by one of the most talented and successful military leaders of history.
The Sindh expedition was one of Nader Shah's last campaigns during his war in northern India. After his victory over Muhammad Shah, the Mughal emperor, Nader had compelled him to cede all the lands to the west of the Indus River. His return to this region from Delhi was honoured by all the governors of the newly annexed territories save for Khudayar Khan, ruler of Sindh, who was conspicuously absent despite being given a summons like the rest of the governors.
Nāder's loss of prestige in the Dagestan campaign and his ongoing war with the Ottomans caused several domestic rebellions. The most serious of these began near Shiraz in January 1744 and was led by Moḥammad Taqi Khan Shirazi, the commander of Fārs province and one of Nāder’s favorites. In June 1744, Nāder sacked Shiraz, and by winter he had crushed these revolts with extreme force.
The Withdrawal through Andalal by the Persian army under Nader Shah took place after he broke off the siege of the last Lezgian fortress in order to return to Derbent for winter quarters. His withdrawal came under heavy raids by the Lezgians. However, there is no mention of any pitched battle around Andalal, or anywhere else during the withdrawal, in any of the primary or secondary material in the established historiography of Nader's Campaigns.
The province of Daghestan was a province of Safavid Iran, centred on the territory of the present-day Republic of Dagestan. Numerous high-ranking Safavid figures originally hailed from the province, or had roots there.
Afsharid Iran, also referred as the Afsharid Empire, was an Iranian empire established by the Turkoman Afshar tribe in Iran's north-eastern province of Khorasan, ruling Iran (Persia). The state was ruled by the Afsharid dynasty in the mid-eighteenth century. The dynasty was founded in 1736 by the brilliant military commander Nader Shah, who deposed the last member of the Safavid dynasty and proclaimed himself as the Shah of Iran.
Iran Kharab was a fortified camp in Dagestan founded by Iranian ruler Nader Shah in July 1742. It was located to the northwest of Derbent, a little inland from the Caspian Sea coast, and was founded in order to provide for a secure base against constant raids during his difficult campaign in Dagestan. According to the modern historian Michael Axworthy, Nader's bitter decision to name the camp "Ruin of Iran" was "hardly encouraging for his troops". Reflecting on the difficulties which Nader encountered during his campaign, Axworthy notes that the irony of the name had taken a dreadful twist, proving itself "truer than Nader could have imagined".
