(Redirected from Nadir Shah):''This article is about the Persian shah. For the 20th century king of Afghanistan, see
Mohammed Nadir Shah.''
'Nāder Shāh Afshār' (; also known as ''Nāder Qoli Beg'' - ' نادر قلی بیگ' or ''Tahmāsp Qoli Khān'' - 'تهماسپ قلی خان') (
August 6,
1698[1] –
June 19,
1747) ruled as
Shah of Iran (1736–47) and was the founder of the
Afsharid dynasty. Because of his
military genius, some historians have described him as the ''
Napoleon of Persia''
[2] or the ''Second
Alexander''.
[3] Nader Shah was a member the
Turkmen Afshar tribe of northern
Persia,
[4] which had supplied military power to the
Safavid state since the time of
Shah Ismail I.
[5] He created a great Iranian Empire that briefly encompassed what is now
Iran,
Afghanistan, northern
India, and parts of
Central Asia.
[6] He won battles against the
Afghans,
Ottomans and
Mughals. Nader idolised previous conquerors from Central Asia,
Genghis Khan and
Timur, trying to imitate their military prowess and - especially later in his reign - their cruelty. Nader Shah's victories briefly made him the
Middle East's most powerful sovereign, but his empire quickly disintegrated after he was assassinated in 1747. Nader Shah was the last great
Asian military
conqueror. Nader is considered to be Iran's most gifted military commander
[7] and is credited for restoring Iranian power as an eminence between the
Ottomans and the
Mughals.
[8]
Early life
A Portrait of Nader Shah by Jonas Hanway
Nader Shah was born in Dastgerd
[9] into the Qereqlu clan of the
Afshars, a semi-nomadic
Turkmen tribe in
Khorasan.
[10] His father, a poor
peasant, died while Nader was still a child. According to legends, Nader and his mother were carried off as
slaves by marauding
Uzbek or Turkmen
tribesmen, but Nader managed to escape. He joined a band of
brigands while still a boy and eventually advanced to become their leader. Under the patronage of Afshar
chieftains, he rose through the ranks to become a powerful military leader. Nader married the two daughters of Baba Ali Beg, a local chief.
[6]
The fall of the Safavid dynasty
Nader grew up during the final years of the
Safavid dynasty which had ruled Persia since 1502. At its peak, under such figures as
Abbas the Great, Safavid Persia had been a powerful empire, but by the early 18th century the state was in serious decline and the reigning shah,
Soltan Hossein, was a weak ruler. When Soltan Hussein attempted to quell a rebellion by
Ghilzai Afghans in
Kandahar, the governor he sent was killed. Under their leader Mahmud, the rebellious Afghans eventually moved on Iran itself. In 1722, they defeated a vastly superior force at the Battle of Golnabad and then besieged the capital,
Isfahan. After the shah failed to escape to rally a relief force elsewhere, the city was starved into submission and Soltan Hussein abdicated, handing power to Mahmud. In Khorasan, Nader at first submitted to the local Afghan governor of
Mashhad, Malek Mahmud, but then rebelled and built up his own small army. Soltan Hossein’s son had declared himself
Shah Tahmasp II, but found little support and fled to the
Qajar tribe, who offered to back him. Meanwhile, Persia's imperial rivals, the
Ottomans and the
Russians took advantage of the chaos in the country to seize territory for themselves.
[12]
Defeat of the Afghans
Tomb of Nader Shah, a tourist attraction in
Mashhad
Tahmasp and the Qajar leader Fath Ali Khan (the ancestor of
Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar) contacted Nader and asked him to join their cause and drive the Afghans out of Khorasan. He agreed and now became a figure of national importance. When Nader discovered that Fath Ali Khan was in treacherous correspondence with Malek Mahmud and revealed this to the shah, Tahmasp executed him and made Nader the chief of his army instead. Nader subsequently took on the title Tahmasp Qoli (Servant of Tahmasp). In late 1726, Nader captured Mashhad.
[13]
Nader chose not to march directly on Isfahan. First, in May 1729, he defeated the
Abdali Afghans near
Herat (many of them subsequently joined his army). The new Ghilzai Afghan shah, Ashraf, decided to move against Nader but in September 1729, Nader defeated him at the
Battle of Damghan and again, decisively, in November at Murchakhor. Ashraf fled and Nader finally entered Isfahan, handing it over to Tahmasp in December. The citizens' rejoicing was cut short when Nader plundered them to pay his army. Tahmasp made Nader governor over many eastern provinces, including his native Khorasan and married him to his sister. Nader pursued and defeated Ashraf, who was murdered by his own followers.
[14] In 1738 Nader Shah besieged and destroyed
Kandahar. This was the ultimate defeat of any remaining Afghan forces. Nader Shah built a new city near
Kandahar; he named this new city Naderabad.
[6]
Ottoman campaign
In the spring of 1730, Nader attacked the
Ottomans and regained most of the territory lost during the recent chaos. At the same time, the Abdali Afghans rebelled and besieged Mashhad, forcing Nader to suspend his campaign and save his brother, Ebrahim. It took Nader fourteen months to defeat the Abdali Afghans.
Relations between Nader and the shah had declined as the latter grew jealous of his general's military successes. While Nader was absent in the east, Tahmasp tried to assert himself by launching a foolhardy campaign to recapture
Yerevan. He ended up losing all Nader’s recent gains to the Ottomans, and signed a treaty ceding
Georgia and
Armenia in exchange for
Tabriz. Nader saw that the moment had come to ease Tahmasp from power. He denounced the treaty, seeking popular support for a war against the Ottomans. In Isfahan, Nader got Tahmasp drunk then showed him to the courtiers asking if a man in such a state was fit to rule. In 1732 he forced Tahmasp to abdicate in favour of the shah’s baby son, Abbas III, to whom Nader became regent.
Nader decided he could win back the territory in Armenia and Georgia by seizing Ottoman
Baghdad then offering it in exchange for the lost provinces. Unfortunately, his plan went badly wrong when his army was routed by the Ottoman general
Topal Osman Pasha near the city in 1733. Nader decided he needed to regain the initiative as soon as possible to save his position; revolts were already breaking out in Persia. He faced Topal again with a larger force and defeated and killed him. He then besieged Baghdad as well as
Ganja in the northern provinces, earning a Russian alliance against the Ottomans. Nader scored a great victory over a superior Ottoman force at Baghavard; by the summer of 1735, the Persian Armenia and Georgia were his again. In March 1735, he signed a treaty with the
Russians in Ganja by which the latter agreed to withdraw all of their troops from Persian territory.
[16]
Nader becomes shah
In January 1736, Nader held a ''
qoroltai'' (a grand meeting in the tradition of
Genghis Khan and
Timur) on the Moghan Plain in
Azerbaijan. The leading figures in Persian political and religious life attended. It was suggested Nader be crowned as the new shah. Everyone agreed, many - if not most - enthusiastically, the rest fearing Nader’s anger if they showed support for the deposed Safavids. Nader was crowned Shah of Persia on March 8, 1736, a date his
astrologers had chosen as being especially propitious.
Religious reforms
Nader also proposed religious reforms. The Safavids had introduced
Shi'a Islam as the state religion of Persia. Nader claimed this had intensified the conflict with the Ottoman Empire which was
Sunni. He wanted Persia to adopt a form of religion that would be more acceptable to Sunnis and suggested Persia should adopt the
Ja'fari form of Shi'ism. He banned certain Shi'a practices and had the chief mullah in Persia strangled. Nader's aim in doing this was to further weaken the Safavids since Shi'a Islam had always been a major element in support for the dynasty. It is also highly probable that Nader had plans to make himself the master of the entire Islamic world and so needed to establish a form of religion that would be accepted by the majority of his future subjects.
[17]
Invasion of India
In 1738, Nader Shah conquered
Kandahar. Nader’s thoughts now turned to
Moghul India. This once powerful Muslim state was falling apart as the nobles became increasingly disobedient and the
Hindu Marathas made inroads on its territory from the south-west. Its ruler
Mohammed Shah was powerless to reverse this disintegration. Nader used the pretext of his Afghan enemies taking refuge in India to cross the border and capture
Kabul,
Ghazni and
Lahore. He then advanced deeper into
India crossing the river
Indus before the end of year. He defeated the Moghul army at the huge
Battle of Karnal in February, 1739. After this victory, Nader captured Mohammad Shah and entered with him into
Delhi. In the rioting that followed, more than 30,000 civilians were killed by the Persian troops, forcing Mohammad Shah to beg for mercy. In response, Nader Shah agreed to withdraw, but Mohammad Shah paid the consequence – handing over the keys of his royal treasury; losing even the
Peacock Throne to the Persian emperor. The
Peacock Throne thereafter served as a symbol of Persian imperial might. Among a trove of other fabulous jewels, Nader also gained the
Koh-i-Noor and
Darya-ye Noor diamonds (
Koh-i-Noor means "Mountain of Light" in Persian,
Darya-ye Noor means "Sea of Light"). The Persian troops left Delhi at the beginning of May 1739. Nader's soldiers also took with them thousands of
elephants,
horses and
camels, loaded with the
booty they had collected. The plunder seized from India was so rich that Nader stopped
taxation in Iran for a period of three years, following his triumphant return.
[18]
After India
The Indian campaign was the zenith of Nader's career. After this he would become increasingly despotic as his health declined markedly. Nader had left his son Reza Qoli Mirza to rule Persia in his absence. Reza had behaved highhandedly and somewhat cruelly but he had kept the peace in Persia. When he heard rumours that his father had died he had made preparations for assuming the crown. These included the murder of the former shah Tahmasp and his family (including the nine-year old Abbas III). On hearing the news, Reza’s wife, who was Tahmasp’s sister, committed suicide. Nader was not impressed with his son’s waywardness and reprimanded him, but he took him on his expedition to conquer land in
Transoxiana. The Persians forced the Uzbek khanate of
Bokhara to submit and Nader wanted Reza to marry the khan’s elder daughter because she was a descendant of his hero Genghis Khan, but Reza flatly refused and Nader married the girl himself. Nader also conquered
Khwarezm.
Nader now decided to punish
Daghestan for the death of his brother Ebrahim Qoli on a campaign a few years before. In 1741, while Nader was passing through the forest of
Mazanderan, an assassin took a shot at him but Nader was only lightly wounded. He began to suspect his son was behind the attempt and confined him to
Tehran. Nader’s increasing ill health made his temper ever worse. Perhaps it was his illness that made Nader lose the initiative in his war against the
Lezgin tribes of Daghestan. Frustratingly for him, they resorted to guerrilla war and the Persians could make little headway against them. Nader accused his son of being behind the assassination attempt. Reza angrily protested his innocence, but Nader had him blinded as punishment, though he immediately regretted it. Soon afterwards, Nader started executing the nobles who had witnessed his son's blinding. In his last years, Nader became increasingly
paranoid, ordering the assassination of large numbers of suspected enemies.
Nader started to build a powerful Persian
navy. He recaptured the island of
Bahrain from the Arabs. In 1743 he conquered the city of
Muscat, south of the
Persian Gulf. In 1743 Nader started another war against the
Ottoman Empire. Despite having a huge army at his disposal, in this campaign Nader showed little of his former military brilliance. It ended in 1746 with the signing of a peace treaty, in which the Ottomans agreed to let Nader occupy
Najaf.
[19]
Death and legacy
Nader became crueller and crueller as a result of his illness and his desire to extort more and more tax money to pay for his military campaigns. More and more revolts broke out and Nader crushed them ruthlessly, building towers from his victims’ skulls in imitation of his hero Timur. In 1747, Nader set off for Khorasan where he intended to punish
Kurdish rebels. Some of his officers feared he was about to execute them and plotted against him. Nader Shah was assassinated on
19 June,
1747, at Fathabad in
Khorasan. He was surprised in his sleep by Salah Bey, captain of the guards, and stabbed with a
sword. Nader was able to kill two of the assassins.
[20][21]
After his death, he was succeeded by his nephew Ali Qoli, who renamed himself
Adil Shah ("righteous king"). Adil Shah was probably involved in the assassination plot.
[16] Adil Shah was deposed within a year. During the struggle between Adil Shah, his brother
Ibrahim Khan and Nader's grandson
Shah Rukh almost all provincial
governors declared
independence, established their own states, and the entire Empire of Nader Shah fell into
anarchy. Finally,
Karim Khan founded the
Zand dynasty and became ruler of Iran by 1760, while
Ahmad Shah Durrani had already proclaimed independence in the east, marking the foundation of modern
Afghanistan.
During Nader Shah's brief reign a 400,000-man army was created, and the boundaries of his empire extended to the greatest extent in Iran's history since the days of the
Sassanids.
In 1768,
Christian VII of Denmark commissioned
Sir William Jones to translate a
Persian language biography of Nader Shah into
French. It was published in 1770 as ''Histoire de Nadir Chah'', and subsequently translated into
English, becoming the vehicle by which Nader Shah became known to the reading public in the West.
References
1. Nader's exact date of birth is unknown but August 6 is the "likeliest" according to Axworthy p.17 (and note) and ''The Cambridge History of Iran'' (Vol. 7 p.3); other biographers favour 1688.
2. [1] Encyclopedia Britannica
3. http://www.xs4all.nl/~kvenjb/madmonarchs/nadir/nadir_bio.htm
4. Michael Axworthy's biography of Nader, ''The Sword of Persia'' (I.B. Tauris, 2006), p.17-19: "His father was of lowly but respectable status, a herdsman of the Afshar tribe ... The Qereqlu Afshars to whom Nader's father belonged were a semi-nomadic Turcoman tribe settled in Khorasan in north-eastern Persia ... The tribes of Khorasan were for the most part ethnically distinct from the Persian-speaking population, speaking Turkic or Kurdish languages. Nader's mother tongue was a dialect of the language group spoken by the Turkic tribes of Iran and Central Asia, and he would have quickly learned Persian, the language of high culture and the cities as he grew older. But the Turkic language was always his preferred everyday speech, unless he was dealing with someone who knew only Persian."
5. Stephen Erdely and Valentin A. Riasanovski. ''The Uralic and Altaic Series'', Routledge, 1997, ISBN 0700703802, p. 102
6. NAÚDER SHAH 1736-47 Encyclopedia Iranica, by Ernest Tucker March 29, 2006
7. [2] Encyclopedia Britannica
8. Vali Nasr, "The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam Will Shape the Future" (New York 2006)
9. Axworthy p.18
10. NAÚDER SHAH 1736–47 Encyclopedia Iranica, by Ernest Tucker March 29, 2006
11. NAÚDER SHAH 1736-47 Encyclopedia Iranica, by Ernest Tucker March 29, 2006
12. Axworthy Chapter 1
13. Axworthy, Chapter 2
14. Axworthy Chapters 3-4
15. NAÚDER SHAH 1736-47 Encyclopedia Iranica, by Ernest Tucker March 29, 2006
16. Elton L. Daniel, "The History of Iran" (Greenwood Press 2000) p.94
17. Axworthy Chapter 6
18. Axworthy Chapter 7
19. Axworthy chapters 7-9
20. http://www.iranchamber.com/history/afsharids/afsharids.php
21. Axworthy chapters 9 and 10
22. Elton L. Daniel, "The History of Iran" (Greenwood Press 2000) p.94
Additional Reading
★ Lawrence Lockhart "Nadir Shah" (London, 1938)
★ Cambridge History of Iran, vol 7
★ Michael Axworthy, "Sword of Persia: Nader Shah, from Tribal Warrior to Conquering Tyrant" Hardcover 348 pages (26 July 2006) Publisher:
I.B. Tauris Language: English ISBN 1-85043-706-8
★ Ernest Tucker, "Nadir Shah's Quest for Legitimacy in Post-Safavid Iran" Hardcover 150 pages (4 October 2006) Publisher: University Press of Florida Language: English ISBN 0-8130-2964-3
See also
Nader Shah's Sword
External links
★
Nader Shah's portrait
★
History of Iran: Afsharid Dynasty (Nader Shah)
★
Biography of Nader Shah Afshar "The Persian Napoleon
★
Nader Shah Mausoleum and Museum
★
Nader Shah
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