Tahmasp I: Difference between revisions

| Birth = [[919]]/1513

'''Shāh Tahmāsb Awwal Ṣafawī''' (Persian: {{ia|شاه تهماسب اول صفوی}}), or '''Tahmasp I''' (b. [[919]]/1513 - d. [[984]]/1576), was the son of [[Isma'il I]] (the founder of the [[Safavid]] dynasty). He was the longest-reigning Safavid king who was in power for 54 years. [[Shiism]] was announced as the official [[religion]] in the period of Isma'il I, but it was established and spread in the period of Tahmmasp. The institution of the Shiite clergy was founded in his period, especially after the immigration of [[al-Muhaqqiq al-Thani]] to [[Iran]] when Shiite clerical families were formed by immigrant scholars and their children.

Tahmasp I was born in 919/1513. When he was just 1 year old, he was taken to [[Herat]] at the command of his father, Shah Isma'il. He was given the ownership of the territories from [[Khorasan]] to Amur River, and Div Sultan Rumlu, the ruler of [[Balkh]], was chosen as his tutor. He took over the reign when he was just 10 years old. He reigned from 930/1524-984/1576, for 54 years, which is the longest reign in the Safavid era.

In 54th year of his reign, Shah Tahmasp died in Qazvin on [[Safar 15]], 984 ([[May 24]], 1576). After a while, his corpse was buried in [[Mashhad]]. Shah Tahmasp appeared to be a pious person committed to religious obligations. Although Shiism was announced as the official religion during his father's reign, it was Tahmasp who established and propagated Shiism throughout Iran.

Thanks to the peace brought by the Amasya treaty, Shah Tahmasp never left Qazvin for 20 years. In this period, he tried to push his agenda in such peaceful circumstances. However, he was so stingy and parsimonious that in the last 14 years of his reign, he did not pay the salaries of his army. Thus, members of the army made a living by exerting pressures on people. This led, in turn, to people's dissatisfaction, culminating in riots in [[Gilan]] under the leadership of Sayyid Husayn in 979/1571 and in Tabriz in 981/1573. Both riots were quenched, but seeds of unrest grew up in later periods of the Safavid era. After Tahmasp's death, it took 12 years for the Safavid kingdom to regain its stability and power.

Since Tabriz was very close to the Ottoman borders, and was, therefore, vulnerable to Ottoman invasions, and since it was too far from Khorasan which was a target of Uzbek attacks, Shah Tahmasp moved the capital from Tabriz to Qazvin in 965/1557. Since then until 1006/1597 (when [['Abbas I]] chose [[Isfahan]] as the Safavid capital), Qazvin was the capital of the Safavid government.

In 967/1559, Bayezid entered Iran through Anatolia together with 10,000 armed soldiers and took refuge to Shah Tahmasp, because of his disputes with his father Sultan Sulayman and his brother, [[Selim]]. Shah Tahmasp respected him and ordered that he and his companions be accommodated in the palace. When the Ottoman king learned about Bayezid's refuge to Iran, he frequently sent respectful as well as threatening letters to Shah Tahmasp and asked him to expedite Bayezid. Shah's intercessions could not lead the Ottoman king to forgive his son. Eventually, the Safavid king surrendered Bayezid and his children to Ottoman agents in order to prevent Ottoman invasions and wars which were blocked by the Peace of Amasya. Subsequently, the two parties made a peace treaty in 969/1561, and battles in western Iran disappeared for a while.