Ṭahmásp, the eldest of Isma'íl's sons, was only ten years of age when he succeeded his father. He reigned over Accession of Sháh Ṭahmásp (May 23, 1524). Persia for fifty-two years and a half, and died on May 14, 1576. In the contemporary chronicles he is usually denoted as Sháh-i-Dín-panáh (“the King who is the Refuge of Religion”). The date of his accession is commemorated in the following verse:

<text in Arabic script omitted> * “O Ṭahmásp, King of the World, who, by the Divine Assistance,
didst take thy place on the throne of gold after the Victorious
King!
Thou didst take the place of thy father; thou didst subdue the world:
‘Thou didst take the place of thy father’ (já-yi-pidar giriftí) *
was the date of thine accession.”

Of the numerous records of his long reign two, on which in what follows I shall chiefly draw, are worthy of special Two chief Per­sian authorities on this reign. note; his own autobiography * from his accession on Monday, Rajab 19, 930 (May 23, 1524), to his shameful surrender of the Turkish Prince Báyazíd, who had sought refuge at his court, in 969/1561-2; and the excellent Aḥsanu't-Tawáríkh of Ḥasan Beg Rúmlú, concluded in 985/1577-8 only a year after Ṭahmásp's death. The autobiography, possibly suggested by Bábur's incom­parable Memoirs, is far inferior to that most instructive and amusing work, and is not greatly superior to the over­estimated Diaries of the late Náṣiru'd-Dín Sháh; but it throws some valuable light on the mentality of Ṭahmásp, and on those inner conditions which it is so difficult to deduce from the arid pages of the official chronicles, con­taining for the most part a mere record of interminable wars and massacres, and leaving us quite in the dark as to the social and intellectual state of the people. That Character of Ṭahmásp. Ṭahmásp was a bigot is indicated both by Sir John Malcolm * and Erskine, * though the former historian takes the more favourable view of his character, describing him as “of a kind and generous dis­position,” and adding that he “appears to have possessed prudence and spirit, and, if he was not distinguished by great qualities, he was free from any remarkable vices.” Anthony Jenkinson, who carried a letter of recommendation from Queen Elizabeth, * had a not very gratifying audience with him at Qazwín in November, 1562. * The Venetian Ambassador Vincentio d'Alessandri, who was accredited to His personal appearance. his Court in 1571, describes him, * “in the sixty-fourth year of his age, and the fifty-first of his reign,” as “of middling stature, well formed in person and features, although dark, of thick lips and a grizzly beard,” and says that he was “more of a melancholy disposition than anything else, which is also known by many signs, but principally by his not having come out of his palace for the space of eleven years, nor having once gone to the chase nor any other kind of amusement, to the great dissatisfaction of his people.” He further describes him as boastful, but unwarlike and “a man of very little courage”; as caring little for law and justice, but much for women and money; as mean and avaricious, “buying and selling with the cunning of a small merchant.” “Notwith­standing the things mentioned above,” he concludes, “which make one think he ought to be hated, the reverence and love of the people for the King are incredible, as they worship him not as a king but as a god, on account of his descent from the line of 'Alí, the great object of their vene­ration,” and he cites the most extraordinary instances of this devotion and even deification, which is not confined to the common people but extends to members of the Royal Family and courtiers, and to the inhabitants of the remotest parts of his realms. One magnanimous act of the king's Ṭahmásp much influenced by dreams. reign, which led to a great alleviation of the burden of taxation imposed on his people, the Venetian Ambassador ascribes to the influence of a dream, “in which the Angels took him by the throat and asked him whether it was becoming to a king, surnamed the Just and descended from 'Alí, to get such immense profits by the ruin of so many poor people; and then ordered him to free the people from them.” This story is likely enough, for Ṭahmásp in his Memoirs records numerous dreams to which he evidently attached great importance. Thus in a dream 'Alí promises him victory over the Uzbeks about A.D. 1528, * and a year or two later at Herát advises him as to another campaign, * whereon he remarks, “the belief of this weak servant Ṭahmásp aṣ-Ṣafawí al-Músawí al-Ḥusayní * is that whoever sees His Holiness the Com­mander of the Faithful (i.e. 'Alí), on whom be the blessings of God, in a dream, that which he says will come to pass.” Again in his twentieth year two consecutive dreams, in the second of which he sought and obtained from the Imám 'Alí Riḍá confirmation of the first, led him to repent of wine-drinking and other excesses, and to close all the taverns and houses of ill-repute in his domains, on which occasion he composed the following quatrain: * <text in Arabic script omitted>

“For a while we pursued the crushed emerald; *
For a while we were defiled by the liquid ruby; *
Defilement it was, under whatever colour:
We washed in the Water of Repentance, and were
at peace.”

This “repentance” or conversion of Sháh Ṭahmásp is recorded in the Aḥsanu't-Tawáríkh under the year 939/ 1532-3.

About the same time the army of the Ottoman Sulṭán Sulaymán, profiting as usual by Persia's preoccupation with Premature snow causes disaster to Turkish army. one of the constantly recurring Uzbek invasions of her north-eastern province, marched into Ádharbáyján, where it was overtaken by a premature but violent snow-storm (it was in the month of October), in which numbers of the Turkish troops perished. This disaster to the arms of his hereditary foe Sháh Ṭah-másp * ascribes to “the help of God and the aid of the Immaculate Imáms.” It has been commemorated in the following forcible quatrain, given in the Aḥsanu't-Tawáríkh and the Ta'ríkh-i-'Álam-árá-yi-'Abbásí:

<text in Arabic script omitted>

“I went to Sulṭániyya, that rare pasture-ground:
I saw two thousand dead without grave or shroud.
‘Who,’ said I, ‘killed all these Ottomans?’
The morning breeze arose from the midst saying ‘I!’”

Other dreams are meticulously recorded by Sháh Ṭah-másp in his Memoirs: at Ardabíl he sees and converses Other visions. with the vision of his ancestor Shaykh Ṣafiyyu 'd-Dín; * on another occasion he receives en­couragement from the spirit of Shaykh Shihábu'd-Dín; * other allegorical dreams are recorded under the years 957/ 1550 and 961/1554.*

In his domestic relations Sháh Ṭahmásp was unhappy, though not perhaps more so than most contemporary Asiatic Unhappy domestic relations. sovereigns, notably the Ottoman Sulṭáns. He had three younger brothers, Sám (notable as a poet and biographer of poets), * Bahrám and Alqáṣ, of whom the first and third rebelled against him. Sám Mírzá was cast into prison in 969/1561-2 and was ultimately put to death there in 984/1576-7 by Ṭahmásp's successor. The case of Alqáṣ was much worse, for he was a traitor as well as a rebel, and not only took refuge with Sulṭán Sulaymán at Constantinople, but incited him to attack Persia and took an active part in the ensuing war against his own country. At Hamadán, in 955/1548, he plundered the house of his sister-in-law, the wife of Bahrám Mírzá, and later advanced as far as Yazdikhwást, where he made a massacre of the inhabitants, but in the following year he was defeated and fell into the hands of his brother Bahrám, who handed him over to Ṭahmásp. The King imprisoned him in the Castle of Alamút, according to his own Memoirs, * or, according to the Aḥsanu't-Tawaríkh, in the Castle of Qahqaha, where he perished a week later. “In short,” says Ṭahmásp in recording the event, “after some days I saw that he did not feel safe from me, but was con­stantly preoccupied, so I despatched him to a fortress with Ibráhím Khán and Ḥasan Beg the centurion, who took him to the Castle of Alamút and there imprisoned him. After six days, those who had custody of him being off their guard, two or three persons there, in order to avenge their father whom Alqáṣ had killed, cast him down from the castle. After his death the land had peace.” It can scarcely be doubted that Ṭahmásp approved, if he did not actually arrange, this deed of violence. Bahrám Mírzá died the same year at the age of 33.