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Qizilbash Afterwards: The Afshars in Urmiya from the Seventeenth to the Nineteenth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Nobuaki Kondo
Nobuaki Kondo*
Affiliation:
Department of History, Tokyo Metropolitan University
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Extract

The aim of this paper is to investigate historical change that occurred in a Turkic tribal group, the Afshars in Urmiya, western Azerbaijan, from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century. The Afshars were important in Iranian history as part of the Qizilbash tribal confederation that contributed to the rise of the Safavids, and as the founders of the Afsharid dynasty. Their branch in Urmiya also played notable roles in the civil wars of the eighteenth century.

Numerous attempts have been made by scholars to show the political and military role of the Qizilbash in the early Safavid period. However, few studies have dealt with their later history. Recently, Kathryn Babayan argued that as a result of the centralization policy of Shah ᶜAbbas (r. 1587-1629), the Qizilbash lost their power and their political and spiritual cohesion, but after that we know little about their actual situation. More than twenty years ago, Ann Lambton pointed out that the collapse of the Safavids caused a resurgence of tribes like the Afshars and Qajars, in the eighteenth century, but the process of and reasons for this “resurgence” have never been examined.

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Articles
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Iranian Studies , Volume 32 , Issue 4 , Fall 1999 , pp. 537 - 556
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1999

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References

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2. See Babayan, K., “The Waning of the Qizilbash” (Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, 1993Google Scholar).

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7. I used the text edited by Mahmud Ramiyan and Parviz Shahriyar Afshar (Reza˒iyye?, 1346 Sh.). ᶜAli Dihqan refers to a manuscript of Tārīkh-i Afshār, but the text he cites differs from the published version. See Dihqan, Sarzamīn, 358 and TAF, 4-6, 512. Nikitine also refers to a manuscript history of the Urmiya Afshars, said to have been written by Parviz Khan Shihab al-Dawlah (grandson of Yusuf Khan's brother) in 1917, but what he cites of the work coincides almost exactly with the published text except for the date of the Afshar migration to Urmiya. I assume therefore that Nikitine's manuscript is closely related to Mirza Rashid's work. Unfortunately, I have been unable to locate and thus compare the manuscripts themselves.

8. On the terminology of tribal groups, see Tapper, R., “Confederation, tribal,” Encyclopædia Iranica, vol. 6, 125–28Google Scholar.

9. Among the posts they lost were: the governorships of Kirman (1592/3), Shushtar (1594), and Kuhgiluyah (1596/7). (Iskandar Beg Munshi, Tārīkh-i ᶜĀlam-ārā-yi ᶜAbbāsī, [henceforth TAA], ed. Iraj Afshar [Tehran, 1334 Sh.], 457-58, 500, 524 and Mulla Jalal al-Din Munajjim, Tārīkh-i ᶜAbbāsī, [henceforth TAB], ed. Sayfullah Vahid Niya (Tehran, 1366 Sh.], 127-29.) The last Afshar qūrchī-bāshī was dismissed in 1591/2 (M. Haneda, Le Chāh, 195).

10. TAF, 46-48.

11. TAA, 1006-7, 1018-19,1035.

12. TAB, 414, 417. Although this place name is written as ṢDMRH, ṢDMRD OR ṢDMZD in both the Tehran edition and the manuscript of the British Library (add. 27241), apparently it refers to Saymarah near Hamadan, Nihavand, and Khurramabad.

13. TAA, 1018. According to A. Kasravi, Qasim Sultan migrated to Urmiya after the fall of the city. Although Kasravi does not indicate his sources, Köprülü, Oberling, and Takash all agree with him. See Tabrizi, Sayyid Ahmad Aqa (Kasravi), “Īl-i Afshār,” Āyandah 2 (1306 Sh.): 601Google Scholar; F. Köprülü, İslam Ansiklopedisi, “AVŞAR;” ᶜAla al-Din Takash, “Qāsim Khān dar ra˒s-i īl-i Afshār,” Armaghān 27: 4/5 (2537): 262Google Scholar.

14. In the list of tribes given by Journatian, the largest colony of Afshars was in Urmiya, 25,000 people or 28.5% of the entire Afshar population of 88,000. Other large colonies were in Khuzistan and Khamsah, each with 10,000 people. See Dupré, A., Voyage en Perse fait dans les années 1807,1808 et 1809 (Paris, 1819), 2: 457Google Scholar.

15. [Mirza Samiᶜa], Taẕkirat al-Mulūk, ed. Dabir-i Siyaqi, Muhammad (Tehran, 1368 Sh.)Google Scholar, 72.

16. Ibid. (7,390 tumans and 3,747 dinars). See also Mirza ᶜAli Naqi Nasiri, Alqāb va Mavājib-i dawrah-yi salāṭīn-i Ṣafaviyyah, ed. Rahimlu, Yusuf (Mashhad, 1371 Sh.), 105Google Scholar, who says 7,690 tumans and 6,746 dinars.

17. J. R. Perry calls this type of migration “cossackization.” See idem, “Forced Migration in Iran during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,” Iranian Studies 8 (1975): 205Google Scholar.

18. Shamlu, Vali Quli, Qiṣaṣ al-khāqānī, ed. Nasiri, Hasan Sadat-i (Tehran, 1371 Sh.), 1: 351, 353Google Scholar; Qazvini, Muhammad Tahir Vahid, ᶜAbbās-nāmah, ed. Dihqan, Ibrahim (Arak, 1329 Sh.), 114, 128,329, 330Google Scholar.

19. TAF, 8, 49. Even today it remains as the name of a village near Urmiya. See Yazdi, Muhammad Husayn Papuli, Farhang-i ābād-hā va makān-hā-yi mazhabī-yi kishvar (Mashhad, 1367 Sh.), 151Google Scholar.

20. Çelebi, Evliya, Seyāḥatnāme (İstanbul, 1314 A.H.), 4: 294–95Google Scholar. V. Minorsky did not find the governor's name in Seyāḥatnāme. See idem “Urmiya.” Encyclopedia of Islam, 1st ed., vol. 10, 1032–36Google Scholar.

21. Evliya Çelebi, 4: 299-300.

22. Ibid., 4: 301.

23. Qarakhani, Hasan, “Buqᶜah-yi Ayyūb-i Anṣārī dar Takāb… Farāmīn-i shāhān-i Safavī dar bārah-yi mawqūfāt-i ān,” Bar-rasīhā-yi tārīkhī 9, no. 1 (1353 Sh.): 73–122Google Scholar.

24. Ibid., 78

25. Ibid., 87-88.

26. Ibid., 95.

27. Ibid., 98. According to the document, the Afshar governor had the right to collect tax from only one of the five vaqf villages and no right to occupy any of them.

28. Çelebizade, İsmail Asim Kücük, Tarih-i Raşid (Istanbul, 1282 A.H.), 6: 328Google Scholar; Zarinbaf-Shahr, F., Tabriz under Ottoman Rule (1725-30) (Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, 1991)Google Scholar, 26. However, according to TAF, 70-72. Muhammad Qasim Khan Qasimlu Afshar resisted the Ottoman army, and was killed.

29. According to Afsharid sources, the Khurasan Afshars migrated from Azerbaijan during the reign of Shah Ismail I (r. 1501-24) or Shah ᶜAbbas I (r. 1587-1629). See Marvi, Muhammad Kazim, ᶜĀlam-ārā-yi Nādirī, (henceforth AAN) ed. Riyahi, Muhammad Amin (Tehran, 1369 Sh.), 4–5Google Scholar and Astarabadi, Mirza Mahdi Khan, Jahāngushā-yi Nādirī, (JN) ed. ᶜAbdullah Anvar (Tehran, 1341 Sh.), 26–27Google Scholar.

30. AAN, 135-36.

31. TAF, 86-87. According to TAF, Fath ᶜAli Khan charkhchī-bāshī was also an Urmiya Afshar and was later appointed governor of Urmiya, but according to Muhammad Kazim, the charkhchī-bāshī was from Khurasan and Nadir's brother-in-law (AAN, 1039), so the governor of Urmiya seems to have been another Fath ᶜAli Khan, perhaps of the Arashlu subgroup.

32. JN, 134-35; TAF, 78. See also the farmān of Nadir Shah dated 1151/1738 in ᶜAli Karimiyan, “Bāzkhwānī-i chand farmān-i Nādir Shāh Afshār,” Ganjīnah-yi Asnād 25/26 (1376 Sh.): 13,19Google Scholar.

33. AAN, 251.

34. TAF, 92.

35. JN, 425-26; AAN, 1125.

36. Mahdi Khan forcibly expelled Fath ᶜAli Khan Arashlu, governor of Urmiya, and was appointed governor-general of Tabriz by Ibrahim Khan, later Ibrahim Shah (See TAF, 93-102, ᶜAbd al-Razzaq Beg Dunbuli Maftun, Tajribat al-Ahrar va Tasliyat al-Abrār, ed. Hasan Qazi Tabataba˒i [Tabriz, 1349-50 Sh.], 1: 489Google Scholar; Abu al-Hasan b. Muhammad Amin Gulistaneh, Mujmal al-Tavārīkh, ed. Razavi, Mudarris [Tehran, 2536], 31)Google Scholar. After the fall of Azad Khan Afghan, Fath ᶜAli Khan was invited by the people of Tabriz to become the ruler. He also made a military expedition to the Qara Bagh region (Abu al-Hasan Ghaffari Kashani, Gulshan-i Murād, ed. Ghulam Riza Tabataba˒i Majd [Tehran, 1369 Sh.], 121, 143Google Scholar; TAF, 138-45, Javanshir, Mirza Jamal, Tārīkh-i Qārā Bāgh, [Baku, 1959], 18–19)Google Scholar. It is said that after the death of Karim Khan Zand, Imam Quli Khan, the governor of Urmiya, extended his power to all of Azerbaijan and received taxes from Maraghah, Khuy, Sanandaj, Savujbulaq (present Mahabad), and Tabriz (TAF, 202).

37. Fath ᶜAli Khan Arashlu was the most influential general of the army of Azad Khan. Azad Khan married a daughter of Muhammad Qasim Khan Qasimlu, and appointed her brother, Muhammad Musa Khan, deputy governor of Urmiya.

38. ᶜAbd al-Razzaq Beg, Tajribat, 1: 84–85Google Scholar; TAF, 220-21.

39. TAF, 95, 115.

40. Takash and Oberling say the Qasimlu subgroup descended from Qasim Sultan, but they provide no evidence (Takash, “Qāsim Khān,” 262; Oberling, “Afshar”). All sources agree that Qasim Sultan and his son Kalb ᶜAli Khan were of the Imanlu subgroup; and at least in TAF the Qasimlu subgroup existed at the time of the migration.'

41. Sümer, Safevî Devletinin Kumluşu, 192–94Google Scholar.

42. Mirza, Jahangir, Tārīkh-i Naw, ed. Eqbal, Abbas (Tehran, 1328 Sh.), 169Google Scholar.

43. TAF, 159.

44. TAF, 197.

45. Mudarrisi Tabatabaᶜi, “Asnād va aḥkām az khānadān-i Afshār-i Urūmī,” Barrasīhā-yi tārīkhī 7 no. 2 (1351 Sh.): 152–70.’Google Scholar

46. TAF, 168, 378.

47. TAF, 171, 378, 493, 462.

48. TAF, 267, 300.

49. TAF, 342.

50. TAF, 364-65.

51. TAF, 392-93. In a raqam of ᶜAbbas Mirza, which was issued at the time of the appointment of Malik Qasim Mirza, the prince and the Afshars were compared to a pearl and a pearl oyster respectively. See Qa˒im Maqam Farahani, Munsha˒āt-i Qāyim Maqām Farāhānī, ed. Sayyid Badr al-Din Yaghma˒i (Tehran, 1373 Sh.), 123Google Scholar.

52. Najaf Quli Khan presided at the dīvānkhānah every day as the deputy of Jahangir Mirza (TAF, 417). He also served as the deputy of Malik Qasim Mirza during his second term as governor (TAF, 429). His son Jahangir Khan was the deputy of Malik Mansur Mirza (TAF, 495). During Akbar Mirza's governorship important posts like pīshkār and farrāsh-bāshī were also held by Afshars. (TAF, 451)

53. Mirza, Jahangir, Tārīkh-i Naw, 142Google Scholar. Prices for other places are as follows: Maraghah 10,000, Marand 15,000, Savujbulaq 15,000 (tumans). This is one of the earliest examples of the sale of offices in the Qajar period.

54. Ibid. 155, 169; TAF, 414-6.

55. Malik Qasim Mirza was dismissed as the result of a petition from the Afshar chiefs to the governor-general of Azerbaijan (TAF, 430-31). Yusuf Khan's appeal forced Muhammad Sharif Klian to leave office (TAF, 450-1). Sultan Ahmad Mirza's dismissal was caused by insurrections of lūṭīs who were stirred up by the Afshars and ᶜulamā (TAF, 513-20).

56. TAF, 259, 273, 278.

57. TAF, 324, 350, 352; ᶜAbd al-Razzaq Maftun Dunbuli, Ma˒āṣir-i Sulṭāniyya, ed. Afshar, Ghulam Husayn Sadri (Tehran, 1351 Sh.), 161, 260, 275, 348, 370–71Google Scholar. For further details of his mission to France, see Jahangir Qa˒im-maqami, Yak Ṣad va Panjāh Sanad-i Tārīkhī, (Tehran, 1347 Sh.), 111–24Google Scholar.

58. TAF, 259, 281,302.

59. Hidayat, Riza Quli Khan, Rawzat al-Ṣafā-yi Nāṣirī, (Tehran, 1339 Sh.), vol. 10: 538, 783–88Google Scholar; Muhammad Husayn Khan Iᶜtimad al-Saltanah, Mir˒āt al-Buldān, ed. ᶜAbd al-Husayn Navaᶜi and Muhaddis, Mir Hashim (Tehran. 1367-8 Sh.), 1225, 1293, 1532Google Scholar; Muhammad Husayn Khan Iᶜtimad al-Saltanah, Tārīkh-i Muntaẓam-i Nāṣirī, ed. Muhammad Ismaᶜil Rizvani (Tehran, 1363-7 Sh.), 1802Google Scholar; TAF 418, 423, 436.

60. Iᶜtimad al-Saltanah, Mir˒āt al-Buldān, 1047, 1281, 1616, 1914; idem. Muntażam-i Nāṣirī, 1798; TAF, 446, 450-1,457,479, 481, 499, 504.

61. Jamshid Khan Qasimlu Majd al-Saltanah became the governor-general of Azerbaijan, and fought against the Ottoman Army as a commandant at the time of the Constitutional Revolution and during World War I. ᶜAbd al-Samad Khan Imanlu ᶜAzim al-Saltanah, who served in the Afshar regiments, was the governor of Urmiya, and tried to quell the Assyrian riots during World War I. (See Dihqan, Sarzamīn-i Zardusht, 248, 250, 417, 527; Nikitine, “Les Afšārs”, 107-108; Kaviyanpur, Ahmad, Tārīkh-i Riżā˒iyya [Tehran, 1344 Sh.], 285–87Google Scholar)

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65. Mustawfi, Mirza Muhammad, “Āmār-i Mālī va Neẓāmī-i Īrān dar 1128”, ed. Danishpazhuh, Muhammad Taqi, Farhang-i Īrān-zamīn 20(1353 Sh.): 412Google Scholar.

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67. Wagner, Travels, 234; Jackson, A.V.W., Persia, Past and Present (London, 1906), 104–5Google Scholar.

68. Fraser, Travels in Koordistan, Mesopotamia, etc, (London, 1840), 2: 57Google Scholar.

69. Sheil, Glimpses, 334-35.

70. TAF,357,395,514.

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75. For a case study of another local elite, see Kondo, N., “Muḥammad Taqī Khān and his Family in Yazd: Portraits of Iranian Local Elites during the 18th and 19th Centuries,” (in Japanese), Shigaku-Zasshi, 102(1993): 1–36Google Scholar.