The Safavid dynasty (Persian: سلسلهٔ صفويان; Azerbaijani: Səfəvilər imperiyası, صفویلر) was one of the most significant ruling dynasties of Persia(modern Iran), and is often considered the beginning of modern Persian history. They ruled one of the greatest Persian empires after the Muslim conquest of Persia and established the Twelver school of Shi'a Islam as the official religion of their empire, marking one of the most important turning points in Muslim history. The Safavids ruled from 1501 to 1722 (experiencing a brief restoration from 1729 to 1736) and at their height, they controlled all of modern Iran, Azerbaijan and Armenia, most of Iraq, Georgia, Afghanistan, and the Caucasus, as well as parts of Syria, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Turkey. Safavid Iran was one of the Islamic "gunpowder empires", along with its neighbours, the Ottoman and Mughal empires.
The Safavid dynasty had its origin in the Safaviyya Sufi order, which was established in the city of Ardabil in the Azerbaijan region. It was of mixed ancestry (Azerbaijani, Kurdish Persian and Turkmen, which included intermarriages with Georgian and Pontic Greek dignitaries). From their base in Ardabil, the Safavids established control over all of Greater Iran and reasserted the Iranian identity of the region, thus becoming the first native dynasty since the Sassanid Empire to establish a unified Iranian state.
Despite their demise in 1736, the legacy that they left behind was the revival of Persia as an economic stronghold between East and West, the establishment of an efficient state and bureaucracy based upon "checks and balances", their architectural innovations and their patronage for fine arts. The Safavids have also left their mark down to the present era by spreading Shi'a Islam in Iran, as well as major parts of the Caucasus, South Asia, Central Asia, and Anatolia.
TIMURID DYNASTY
The Timurid dynasty (Persian: تیموریان), self-designated Gurkānī (Persian: گوركانى), was a Persianate, Sunni Muslim dynasty of Turco-Mongol lineage which ruled over modern-day Iran, Afghanistan, much of Central Asia, as well as parts of contemporaryPakistan, India, Mesopotamia, Anatolia and the Caucasus. The dynasty was founded by Timur (Tamerlane) in the 14th century.
The Timurids lost control of most of Persia to the Safavid dynasty in 1501, but members of the dynasty continued to rule parts of Central Asia and parts of India, sometimes known as the Timurid Emirates. In the 16th century, Babur, a Timurid prince from Ferghana (modernUzbekistan), invaded Kabulistan (modern Afghanistan) and established a small kingdom there, and from there 20 years later he invadedHindustan to establish the Mughal Empire.
MONGOL EMPIRE
The Mongol Empire (Mongolian:
listen (help·info) Mongol-yn Ezent Güren; Cyrillic: Монголын эзэнт гүрэн, in Russian chronicles also Horde - Russian: Орда) existed during the 13th and 14th centuries, and was the largest contiguous land empire in human history. Beginning in the Central Asian steppes, it eventually stretched from Central Europe to the Sea of Japan, covering Siberia in the north and extending southward into Indochina the Indian subcontinent, the Iranian plateau, and the Middle-east.
listen (help·info) Mongol-yn Ezent Güren; Cyrillic: Монголын эзэнт гүрэн, in Russian chronicles also Horde - Russian: Орда) existed during the 13th and 14th centuries, and was the largest contiguous land empire in human history. Beginning in the Central Asian steppes, it eventually stretched from Central Europe to the Sea of Japan, covering Siberia in the north and extending southward into Indochina the Indian subcontinent, the Iranian plateau, and the Middle-east.
The Mongol Empire emerged from the unification of Mongol and Turkic tribes of historical Mongolia under the leadership of Genghis Khan. Genghis Khan was proclaimed ruler of all Mongols in 1206. The empire grew rapidly under his rule and then under the rule of his descendants, who sent invasions in every direction. The vast transcontinental empire which connected the east with the west with an enforcedPax Mongolica allowed trade, technologies, commodities and ideologies to be disseminated and exchanged across Eurasia.
The empire began to split as a result of wars over succession, as the grandchildren of Genghis Khan disputed whether the royal line should follow from Genghis's son and initial heir Ögedei, or one of his other sons such as Tolui, Chagatai, or Jochi. The Toluids prevailed after a bloody purge of Ögedeid and Chagataid factions, but disputes continued even among the descendants of Tolui. After Möngke Khan died, rivalkurultai councils would simultaneously elect different successors, the brothers Ariq Böke and Kublai, who then not only had to defy each other, but also deal with challenges from descendants of other of Genghis's sons. Kublai successfully took power, but civil war ensued, as Kublai sought, unsuccessfully, to regain control of the Chagatayid and Ögedeid families.
The Battle of Ain Jalut in 1260 marked the high-water point of Mongol conquests, and was the first time a Mongol advance had ever been beaten back in direct combat on the battlefield. Though the Mongols launched many more invasions into Levant, briefly occupying it and raiding as far as Gaza after a decisive victory at the Battle of Wadi al-Khazandar in 1299, they withdrew due to various geopolitical factors.
By the time of Kublai's death in 1294, the Mongol Empire had fractured into four separate khanates or empires, each pursuing its own separate interests and objectives: the Golden Horde khanate in the northwest, the Chagatai Khanate in the west, the Ilkhanate in the southwest, and the Yuan Dynasty based in modern-day Beijing. In 1304, the three western khanates briefly accepted the nominal suzerainty of the Yuan Dynasty, but when it was overthrown by the Han Chinese Ming Dynasty in 1368, the Mongol Empire finally dissolved.
AYYUBID DYNASTY
The Ayyubid dynasty (Kurdish: دەوڵەتی ئەییووبی Dewleta Eyûbiyan; Arabic: الأيوبيون al-ʾAyyūbiyyūn) was a Muslim dynasty of Turkish origin, founded by Saladin and centered in Egypt. The dynasty ruled much of the Middle East during the 12th and 13th centuries CE. The Ayyubid family, under the brothers Ayyub and Shirkuh, originally served as soldiers for the Zengids until they supplanted them underSaladin, Ayyub's son. In 1174, Saladin proclaimed himself Sultan following the death of Nur al-Din. The Ayyubids spent the next decade launching conquests throughout the region and by 1183, the territories under their control included Egypt, Syria, northern Mesopotamia, Hejaz,Yemen, and the North African coast up to the borders of modern-day Tunisia. Most of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and beyond Jordan River fell to Saladin after his victory at the Battle of Hattin in 1187. However, the Crusaders regained control of Palestine's coastline in the 1190s.
After the death of Saladin, his sons contested control over the sultanate, but Saladin's brother al-Adil eventually established himself as Sultan in 1200. In the 1230s, the Ayyubid rulers of Syria attempted to assert their independence from Egypt and remained divided until Egyptian Sultan as-Salih Ayyub restored Ayyubid unity by taking over most of Syria, except Aleppo, by 1247. By then, local Muslim dynasties had driven out the Ayyubids from Yemen, the Hejaz, and parts of Mesopotamia. After his death in 1249, As-Salih Ayyub was succeeded in Egypt by al-Mu'azzam Turanshah. However, he was soon overthrown by the Mamluk generals who had successfully repelled a Crusader invasion of the Nile Delta. This effectively ended Ayyubid power in Egypt and a number of attempts by the rulers of Syria, led by an-Nasir Yusuf of Aleppo, to recover it failed. In 1260, the Mongols sacked Aleppo and wrested control of what remained of the Ayyubid territories soon after. The Mamluks, who forced out the Mongols after the destruction of the Ayyubid dynasty, maintained the Ayyubid principality of Hama until deposing its last ruler in 1341.
During their relatively short tenure, the Ayyubids ushered in an era of economic prosperity in the lands they ruled and the facilities and patronage provided by the Ayyubids led to a resurgence in intellectual activity in the Islamic world. This period was also marked by an Ayyubid process of vigorously strengthening Sunni Muslim dominance in the region by constructing numerous madrasas (schools of Islamic law) in their major cities.
TURKIC KHAGANATE
The Turkic Khaganate (552-744; Old Turkic: Türk xanlïqï Chinese: ; pinyin: Tūjué hánguó), sometimes referred to by its Anatolian Turkish corruption Göktürks' khaganate (Celestial/Blue Turks), were a khaganate established by Ashina Türks in medieval Inner Asia. TheAshina Türks, under the leadership of Bumin Qaghan (d. 552) and his sons, succeeded the Rouran Khaganate as the main power in theMongolian plateau and established a stronger empire, which rapidly expanded to rule huge territories in Central Asia. This khaganate interacted extensively with various dynasties based in north China, and for significant periods exercised considerable control over the lucrativeSilk Road trade. This first dynasty collapsed in 581, and fifty years later Kutlugh (d. 692) established the
Second Türk Empire (683-734), also referred to as the Turkic Khaganate, which controlled much of the
eastern portion of the former Turkic Khaganate and produced the Orkhon inscriptions that have survived to the present.
MUGHAL EMPIRE
The Mughal Empire (Persian: شاهان مغول, Shāhān-e Moġul; Urdu: مغلیہ سلطنت, Mug̱ẖliyah Salṭanat), self-designated as Gurkani (Persian:گُورکانِیان, Gūrkāniyān), was an empire extending over large parts of the Indian subcontinent and ruled by a dynasty of Chagatai-Turkicorigin.
In the early 16th century, northern India, being then under mainly Muslim rulers, fell to the superior mobility and firepower of the Mughals.The resulting Mughal Empire did not stamp out the local societies it came to rule, but rather balanced and pacified them through new administrative practices and diverse and inclusive ruling elites, leading to more systematic, centralised, and uniform rule.Eschewing tribal bonds and Islamic identity, especially under Akbar, the Mughals united their far-flung realms through loyalty, expressed through a Persianised culture, to an emperor who had near-divine status. The Mughal state's economic policies, deriving most revenues from agriculture and mandating that taxes be paid in the well-regulated silver currency, caused peasants and artisans to enter larger markets. The relative peace maintained by the empire during much of the 17th century was a factor in India's economic expansion, resulting in greater patronage of painting, literary forms, textiles, and architecture. Newly coherent social groups in northern and western India, such as the Marathas, the Rajputs, and the Sikhs, gained military and governing ambitions during Mughal rule, which, through collaboration or adversity, gave them both recognition and military experience. Expanding commerce during Mughal rule gave rise to new Indian commercial and political elites along the coasts of southern and eastern India. As the empire disintegrated, many among these elites were able to seek and control their own affairs.
The beginning of the empire is conventionally dated to the founder Babur's victory over Ibrahim Lodi in the first Battle of Panipat (1526). It reached its peak extent under Aurangzeb, and declined rapidly after his death (in 1707) under a series of ineffective rulers. The empire's collapse followed heavy losses inflicted by the smaller army of the Maratha Empire in the Deccan Wars, which encouraged the Nawabs of Bengal, Bhopal, Oudh, Carnatic, Rampur, the Nizam of Hyderabad and the Shah of Afghanistan to declare their independence from the Mughals. Following the Third Anglo-Maratha war in 1818, the emperor became a pensioner of the Raj, and the empire, its power now limited to Delhi, lingered on until 1857, when it was effectively dissolved after the fall of Delhi during the Indian Rebellion that same year.
The Mughal emperors were Central Asian Turko-Mongols from modern-day Uzbekistan, who claimed direct descent from both Genghis Khan(through his son Chagatai Khan) and Timur. At the height of their power in the late 17th and early 18th centuries, they controlled much of theIndian subcontinent, extending from Bengal in the east to Kabul & Sindh in the west, Kashmir in the north to the Kaveri basin in the south.Its population at that time has been estimated as between 110 and 150 million(quarter of the world's population), over a territory of more than 3.2 million square kilometres (1.2 million square miles).
The "classic period" of the empire started in 1556 with the ascension of Akbar the Great to the throne. Under the rule of Akbar and his sonJahangir, India enjoyed economic progress as well as religious harmony, and the monarchs were interested in local religious and cultural traditions. Akbar was a successful warrior; his reign also brought Persian cultural influence to its zenith in India, and the resulting Indo-Persian synthesis outlived the Mughals.[24] He also forged alliances with several Hindu Rajput kingdoms. Some Rajput kingdoms continued to pose a significant threat to Mughal dominance of northwestern India, but they were subdued by Akbar. Most Mughal emperors were Muslims. However Akbar in the latter part of his life, and Jahangir, were followers of a new religion called Deen-i-Ilahi, as recorded in historical books like Ain-e-Akbari & Dabestan-e Mazaheb.
The reign of Shah Jahan, the fifth emperor, was the golden age of Mughal architecture. He erected several large monuments, the most famous of which is the Taj Mahal at Agra, as well as the Moti Masjid, Agra, the Red Fort, the Jama Masjid, Delhi, and the Lahore Fort. The Mughal Empire reached the zenith of its territorial expanse during the reign of Aurangzeb and also started its terminal decline in his reign due toMaratha military resurgence under Shivaji Bhosale. During his lifetime, victories in the south expanded the Mughal Empire to more than 1.25 million square miles, ruling over more than 150 million subjects, nearly 1/4th of the world's population, with a combined GDP of over $90 billion.
By the mid-18th century, the Marathas had routed Moghul armies, and won over several Mughal provinces from the Deccan to Bengal, and internal dissatisfaction arose due to the weakness of the Mughal Empire's administrative and economic systems, leading to the declaration of independence by the Nawabs of Bengal, Bhopal, Oudh, Carnatic, Rampur, the Nizam of Hyderabad and Shah of Afghanistan. In 1739, the Mughals were defeated in the Battle of Karnal by the forces of Nader Shah. Mughal power was severely limited and the last emperor, Bahadur Shah II had authority over only the city of Shahjahanabad. He issued a firman supporting the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and was therefore tried by the British for treason, imprisoned, exiled to Rangoon and the last remnants of the empire were taken over by the British Raj.
OLD GREAT BULGARIA
Volga Bulgaria, or Volga–Kama Bolghar, was a historic Islamic Bulgar state that existed between the seventh and thirteenth centuries around the confluence of the Volga and Kama rivers, in what is now European Russia. The population was mostly Bulgars, who had conquered Finno-Ugrics and Turkic speakers of the region. The population had been pagan, but Islam was adopted as the state religion in the early tenth century.
