Two Kings Cannot Share The World: The Dispute Over Khorasan Between Shah Abbas and Rustam Mirza
Abstract
In this article, we will analyze the Khorasan region at the end of the 16th century, one of the most critical political arenas in the history of the Safavid Empire (1500-1736), where control of the area was contested simultaneously by: 1) the lieutenants of a Shiite Safavid empire against those of a Sunni Uzbek empire; 2) the Safavid sovereign Shah Abbas against the imperial ambitions of his relative Rustam Mirza; 3) the competition for control of Khorasan between two Qizilbash political factions, one based in Herat and the other in Mashhad; and 4) the internal rivalry within the Turkaman Qizilbash group for leadership. To this end, we will focus on the following points: 1) the nature of the conflict between Qizilbash in Khorasan during the last decades of the 16th century; 2) the legitimizing principles of Safavid princes to claim the throne and organize Qizilbash governments; 3) the development of a conflict that has generally been poorly explained in southern Khorasan between 1587 and 1593.
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References
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