No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
Introduction: New Perspectives on the Ottoman-Safavid War of 1578–1590
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 December 2025
Abstract
The war of 1578–1590 marked a turning point in Ottoman-Safavid relations. It followed thirty-three years of peace and ushered in over half a century of nearly continuous crisis and bloodshed. Militarily, the conflict was centered primarily in the Caucasus, where the Ottomans achieved significant territorial gains, formalized in the Treaty of Constantinople (1590). This war is among the better documented of the Ottoman-Safavid conflicts thanks to a wealth of contemporary sources, particularly from the Ottoman side. However, the lack of contemporary Safavid sources, as well as the neglect of local and global perspectives, has led to a biased and partial understanding, which the present special section seeks to address. Two of this section’s articles focus on the Caucasus campaign of 1578–1579, emphasizing Ottoman interactions with local populations and the daily experiences of ordinary soldiers (Alsancakli and Stevens). Two other articles examine Safavid relations with Russia and the Italian states in the context of a potential anti-Ottoman alliance (Rybar and Trentacoste). All four contributions are based on the presentation and publication or translation of previously unknown or overlooked primary sources.
Information
- Type
- Article
- Information
- Copyright
- © The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Association for Iranian Studies.
References
Aktaş, Necati, and Halaçoğlu, Yusuf. “Başbakanlık Osmanlı Arşivi.” TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi 5 (1992): 122–126.Google Scholar
Allouche, Adel. The Origins and Development of the Ottoman-Ṣafavid Conflict. Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1983.Google Scholar
Alsancakli, Sacha. “Le Šarafnāma de Šaraf Xān Bidlīsī (ca. 1005/1596–1597) : composition, transmission et réception d’une chronique des dynasties kurdes entre les Safavides et les Ottomans.” PhD diss., Université Sorbonne Nouvelle, 2018.Google Scholar
Arşiv Belgelerine Göre Osmanlı’da İstihbarat. Istanbul: T.C. Başbakanlık Devlet Arşivleri Genel Müdürlüğü, Osmanlı Arşivi Daire Başkanlığı, 2017.Google Scholar
Âsafî Dal Mehmed Çelebi. Şecâʾatnâme. Özdemiroğlu Osman Paşa’nın Şark Seferleri (1578–1585). Edited by Özcan, Abdülkadir. Istanbul: Çamlıca, 2006.Google Scholar
Ateş, Sabri. The Ottoman-Iranian Borderlands. Making a Boundary, 1843–1914. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ateş, Sabri. “Treaty of Zohab, 1639: Foundational Myth or Foundational Document?” Iranian Studies 52, no. 3–4 (2019): 397–423.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aubin, Jean. Émirs mongols et vizirs persans dans les remous de l’acculturation. Paris: Association pour l’avancement des études iraniennes, 2015.Google Scholar
Aymes, Marc, and Markiewicz, Christopher. “Setting Off for the Archives.” In The Cambridge Companion to Ottoman History, edited by Wick, Alexis, 13–26. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2025.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Başbakanlık Osmanlı Arşivi Rehberi. Istanbul: T.C. Başbakanlık Devlet Arşivleri Genel Müdürlüğü, Osmanlı Arşivi Daire Başkanlığı, 2010.Google Scholar
Belgelerle Arşivcilik Tarihimiz, I (Osmanlı Dönemi). Ankara: T.C. Başbakanlık Devlet Arşivleri Genel Müdürlüğü, Osmanlı Arşivi Daire Başkanlığı, 1999.Google Scholar
Binark, İsmet, ed. Osmanlı Devletle Azerbaycan Türk Hanlıkları Arasındaki Münâsebetlere Dâir Arşiv Belgeleri (Karabağ-Şuşa, Nahçıvan, Bakü, Gence, Şirvan, Şeki, Revan, Kuba, Hoy), I (1578–1914). Ankara: T.C. Başbakanlık Devlet Arşivleri Genel Müdürlüğü, Osmanlı Arşivi Daire Başkanlığı, 1992.Google Scholar
Binark, İsmet, ed. Osmanlı Devletle Azerbaycan Türk Hanlıkları Arasındaki Münâsebetlere Dâir Arşiv Belgeleri (Karabağ-Şuşa, Nahçıvan, Bakü, Gence, Şirvan, Şeki, Revan, Kuba, Hoy), II (1575–1918). Ankara: T.C. Başbakanlık Devlet Arşivleri Genel Müdürlüğü, Osmanlı Arşivi Daire Başkanlığı, 1993.Google Scholar
Çetinkaya Tahtacı, Sultan. “Bir Edebi Tür Olarak Gazavatnameler ve Dönemsel İçerik Analizi.” Avrasya İncelemeleri Dergisi-Journal of Eurasian Inquiries 13, no. 1 (2024): 1–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Çetinkaya Tahtacı, Sultan. Les récits des ghaza chez les Ottomans du XVe siècle. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2024.Google Scholar
Don Juan de Persia. Relaciones de Don Juan de Persia. Valladolid: Juan de Bostillo, 1604.Google Scholar
Don Juan of Persia. A Shiʿah Catholic, 1560–1604. Translated by Guy Le Strange. New York and London: Harper and Brothers, 1926.Google Scholar
Durand-Guédy, David. Iranian Elites and Turkish Rulers: A History of Iṣfahān in the Saljūq Period. London: Routledge, 2010.Google Scholar
Monshi, Eskandar Beg. History of Shah ʿAbbas the Great. 2 vols. Translated by Roger M. Savory. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1978.Google Scholar
Faroqhi, Suraiya. Approaching Ottoman History. An Introduction to the Sources. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fekete, Lajos. Einführung in die persische Paläographie. 101 persische Dokumente. Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1977.Google Scholar
Fleischer, Cornell H. Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire. The Historian Mustafa Âli (1541–1600). Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986.Google Scholar
Floor, Willem, and Javadi, Hasan. “The Role of Azerbaijani Turkish in Safavid Iran.” Iranian Studies 46, no. 4 (2013): 569–581.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gelibolulu Mustafa ʿÂlî. Nusret-nâme. Edited by Eravcı, H. Mustafa. Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu, 2014.Google Scholar
Genç, Vural. “From Tabriz to Istanbul: Goods and Treasures of Shāh Ismāʿīl Looted after the Battle of Chāldirān.” Studia Iranica 44, no. 2 (2015): 227–276.Google Scholar
Göyünç, Nejat. “Osmanlı Devletinde Taşra Teşkilâtı (Tanzimat’a Kadar).” In Osmanlı, 6, Teşkilât, edited by Eren, Güler, 77–88. Ankara: Yeni Türkiye Yayınları, 1999.Google Scholar
Güngörürler, Selim. The Ottoman Empire and Safavid Iran, 1639–1682. Diplomacy and Borderlands in the Early Modern Middle East. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2024.Google Scholar
Hacı Mustafa Eravcı. Âsafî Dal Mehmed Çelebi ve Şecâʿatnâme. Istanbul: MVT Yayıncılık, 2009.Google Scholar
Hanaoka, Mimi. Authority and Identity in Medieval Islamic Historiography. Persian Histories from the Peripheries. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haneda, Masashi. Le Châh et les Qizilbāš. Le système militaire safavide. Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1987.Google Scholar
İnalcık, Halil. “Ottoman Methods of Conquest.” Studia Islamica 2 (1954): 103–129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
İnalcık, Halil. The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age, 1300–1600. 2nd ed. Translated by Norman Itkowitz and Colin Imber. New Rochelle, NY: Aristide D. Caratzas, Publisher, 1989 [1st ed., 1973].Google Scholar
Iskandar Beg Turkmān. Tārīkh-i ʿĀlam-ārā-yi ʿAbbāsī. 2 vols. Edited by Afshār, Īraj. Tehran: Chāpkhāna-yi Mūsavī, 1334–1335sh/1956.Google Scholar
Kanûn-nâme-i Sultânî li ʿAzîz Efendi. Aziz Efendi’s Book of Sultanic Laws and Regulations: An Agenda for Reform by a Seventeenth-Century Ottoman Statesman. Edited and translated by Rhoads Murphey. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, Office of the University Publisher, 1985.Google Scholar
Kashani-Sabet, Firoozeh. Frontier Fictions. Shaping the Iranian Nation, 1804–1946. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999.Google Scholar
Kreutel, Richard F. Die Autobiographie des Dolmetschers ʿOsmān Aġa aus Temeschwar. Cambridge: Gibb Memorial Trust, 1980.Google Scholar
Kunt, İ. Metin. Sancaktan Eyalete. 1550–1650 Arasında Osmanlı Ümerası ve İl İdaresi. Istanbul: Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Matbaası, 1978.Google Scholar
Kunt, İ. Metin. The Sultan’s Servants. The Transformation of Ottoman Provincial Government, 1550–1650. New York: Columbia University Press, 1983.Google Scholar
Kütükoğlu, Mübahat S. Osmanlı Belgelerinin Dili (Diplomatik). Revised 2nd ed. Istanbul: Kubbealtı Akademisi Kültür ve Sanat Vakfı, 1998 [1st ed., 1994].Google Scholar
Lattimore, Owen. Studies in Frontier History. Collected Papers, 1928–1958. London: Oxford University Press, 1962.Google Scholar
Levend, Agâh Sırrı. Ġazavāt-nāmeler ve Mihaloğlu Ali Bey’in Ġazavāt-nāmesi. Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1956.Google Scholar
Lewis, Bernard. “Başvekalet Arşivi.” The Encyclopaedia of Islam, New Edition 1 (1986): 1089–1091.Google Scholar
Lockhart, Laurence. The Fall of the Ṣafavī Dynasty and the Afghan Occupation of Persia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1958.Google Scholar
Majmūʿa-yi tārīkh-i Īran. Tārīkh-i Qizilbāshān, az rū-yi nuskha-yi munḥaṣir bi fard-i Kitābkhāna-yi Millī-yi Malik, taʾlīf shuda bayn sālhā-yi 1007–1013. Edited by Mīr Hāshim Muḥaddis̱. Tehran: Intishārāt-i Bihnām, 1361sh/1982.Google Scholar
Mardukh, Abdollâh. “Aux sources de l’historiographie kurde.” Studia Iranica 21, no. 1 (1992): 103–117.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Matthee, Rudi. Persia in Crisis. Safavid Decline and the Fall of Isfahan. London: I.B. Tauris, 2012.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Matthee, Rudi. “The Ottoman-Safavid War of 986–998/1578–90: Motives and Causes.” International Journal of Turkish Studies 20, no. 1–2 (2014): 1–20.Google Scholar
Melville, Charles. “The Caspian Provinces: A World Apart. Three Local Histories of Mazandaran.” Iranian Studies 33, no. 1–2 (2000): 45–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Melville, Charles. “Persian Local Histories: Views from the Wings.” Iranian Studies 33, no. 1–2 (2000): 7–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Murphey, Rhoads. “Continuity and Discontinuity in Ottoman Administrative Theory and Practice during the Late Seventeenth Century.” Poetics Today 14, no. 2 (1993): 419–443.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Navāʾī, ʿAbd al-Ḥusayn. Shāh Ṭahmāsb-i Ṣafavī. Majmūʿa-yi asnād va mukātibāt-i tārīkhī hamrāh bā yāddāshthā-yi tafṣīlī. Tehran: Bunyād-i farhang-i Īrān, 1349sh/1971.Google Scholar
Navāʾī, ʿAbd al-Ḥusayn. Shāh ʿAbbās. Majmūʿa-yi asnād va mukātibāt-i tārīkhī hamrāh bā yāddāshthā-yi tafṣīlī. 2 vols. Tehran: Bunyād-i farhang-i Īrān, 2535–2537shāh/1976–1978.Google Scholar
Öğün, Tuncay. “Osmanlı Devletinde Müsâdere Uygulamaları.” In Osmanlı, 6, Teşkilât, edited by Eren, Güler, 371–383. Ankara: Yeni Türkiye Yayınları, 1999.Google Scholar
Osman of Timişoara. Prisoner of the Infidels. The Memoir of an Ottoman Muslim in Seventeenth-Century Europe. Translated by Giancarlo Casale. Oakland: University of California Press, 2021.Google Scholar
Pistoso, Maurizio, and Pudioli, Maria Cristina. “Le guerre del Golfo [Materiali per una storia letteraria della Persia safavide].” Studi Orientali e linguistici 4 (1988): 61–95.Google Scholar
Qāżī Aḥmad b. Sharaf al-Dīn al-Ḥusayn al-Ḥusaynī al-Qumī. Khulāṣat al-Tavārīkh. 2 vols. Edited by Ishrāqī, Iḥsān. Tehran: Intishārāt-i Dānishgāh-i Tihrān, 1363sh/1984.Google Scholar
Quinn, Sholeh A. Historical Writing During The Reign of Shah ʿAbbas. Ideology, Imitation and Legitimacy in Safavid Chronicles. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2000.Google Scholar
Savory, Roger M. “The Principal Offices of the Ṣafawid State during the Reign of Ismaʿīl I (907–30/1501–24).” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 23, no. 1 (1960): 91–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Savory, Roger M. “The Principal Offices of the Ṣafawid State during the Reign of Ṭahmāsp I (930–84/1524–76).” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 24, no. 1 (1961): 65–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Savory, Roger M. Iran under the Safavids. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980.Google Scholar
Scheref, prince de Bidlis. Scheref-Nameh ou Histoire des Kourdes. 2 vols. Edited by Véliaminof-Zernof, Vladimir. Saint Petersburg: Académie Impériale des Sciences, 1860–1862.Google Scholar
Sümer, Faruk. Safevî Devletinin Kuruluşu ve Gelişmesinde Anadolu Türklerinin Rolü (Şah İsmail ile Halefleri ve Anadolu Türkleri). Ankara: Güven Matbaası, 1976.Google Scholar
Tadhkirat al-Mulūk. A Manual of Safavid Administration (circa 1137/1725). Persian Text in Facsimile (B.M. Or. 9496). Translated by Vladimir Minorsky. London: Luzac & Co., 1943.Google Scholar
Takamatsu, Yoichi. “Formation and Custody of the Ottoman Archives during the Pre-Tanzimat Period.” The Memoirs of the Toyo Bunko 64 (2006): 125–148.Google Scholar
Tietze, Andreas. Muṣṭafā ʿĀlī’s Counsel for Sultans of 1581. 2 vols. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1981–1982.Google Scholar
Tomar, Cengiz, and Öğün, Tuncay. “Müsâdere.” TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi 32 (2006): 67–68.Google Scholar
Trausch, Tilmann. Formen höfischer Historiographie im 16. Jahrhundert. Geschichtsschreibung unter den frühen Safaviden: 1501–1576. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2015.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Uluçay, Salih. “El Aman Hanı ve Köse Hüsrev Paşa Üzerine Bir Değerlendirme.” Bitlis Eren Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü Dergisi 1, no. 1 (2012): 70–83.Google Scholar
Uzunçarşılı, İsmail Hakkı. Osmanlı Devletinin İlmiye Teşkilâtı. Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1965.Google Scholar
Uzunçarşılı, İsmail Hakkı. Osmanlı Devletinin Merkez ve Bahriye Teşkilâtı. Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1948.Google Scholar
Uzunçarşılı, İsmail Hakkı. Osmanlı Devletinin Saray Teşkilâtı. Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1945.Google Scholar
Uzunçarşılı, İsmail Hakkı. Osmanlı Devleti Teşkilâtından Kapukulu Ocakları. 2 vols. Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1943–1944.Google Scholar
Ünal, Uğur, ed. Arşiv Belgelerine Göre Osmanlı’da İstihbarat. Istanbul: T.C. Başbakanlık Devlet Arşivleri Genel Müdürlüğü, Osmanlı Arşivi Daire Başkanlığı, 2017.Google Scholar
Viaggi di Pietro Della Valle, il pellegrino, Con minuto ragguaglio di tutte le cose notabili osservate in essi, Descritti da lui medesimo in 54 Lettere familiari, Da diversi luoghi della intrapresa pellegrinatione, mandate in Napoli All’erudito, e fra’ piu cari, di molti anni suo Amico, Mario Schipano, Divisi in trè Parti, Cioè la Turchia, la Persia, et l’India, co’l ritorno in Patria. 3 vols. 2nd ed. Venice: Pressa Paolo Baglioni, 1663–1664 [1st ed., 1650–1658].Google Scholar
Yamaguchi, Akihiko. “Shāh Ṭahmāsp’s Kurdish Policy.” Studia Iranica 41, no. 1 (2012): 101–132.Google Scholar
Yamaguchi, Akihiko. “The Safavid Legacy as Viewed from the Periphery: The Formation of Iran and the Political Integration of a Kurdish Emirate.” In Mapping Safavid Iran, edited by Kondo, Nobuaki, 127–154. Fuchu, Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 2015.Google Scholar