The chapter argues for the importance of being familiar two literary traditions that made their way into Persianate histories. The first tradition is Mirrors for Princes. The chapter demonstrates that it is possible to view certain portions of Persian histories as “responses” to “mirrors for princes.” Several Persian histories contain a conventional element that describes the qualities of a particular king.This section demonstrates how narratives on the “qualities” of the Safavid king ‘Abbas and the Mughal king Akbar reflect the same ideal qualities that a king is supposed to possess, as indicated in the mirrors for princes literatures.The second tradition explored is the tazkirah, or biographical dictionary.Like the mirrors for princes literatures, the tazkirah is a genre in its own right that flourished during the Timurid era. Some Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal histories contain their own “mini-tazkirah” sections.The chapters trace the historiographical influences on the mini-tazkirahs, and show just how influential Mirkhvand and Khvandamir were for chroniclers writing under the Ottomans, Safavids, and Mughals. The chapter also explains how the chroniclers’ political agendas were reflected in how they used tazkirah to highlight the royal courts where many of them wrote.

Chapter 4 examines one of the most prevalent genres of early modern Persian historical writing:the universal history, which was the most common type of history composed in the early stages of the Ottoman, Safavid, and Mughal dynasties.The chapter focuses on accounts of Kayumars, considered the first human in the ancient Persian tradition. This chapter demonstrates how, while recording the unique aspects of whatever dynasty they were writing under at the end of their universal histories, the chroniclers were predominately narrating a shared past that predated the establishment of Islam. It also establishes that there is no single narrative version that is common to every history, as the chroniclers drew on a range of sources for their information. The choices they made in terms of their sources depended on factors such as regional loyalty and access or family ties.The chapter also demonstrates that many chroniclers looked to the Rawzat al-safa as a model source, and chroniclers writing under Akbar’s reign did not de-mythologize accounts of Kayumars like their Safavid counterparts. In many instances, chroniclers engaged in intertextual dialog as they updated, responded to, and modified their models.

Chapter 3 shows how, in addition to drawing on earlier models, the chroniclers also looked to each other’s works as they composed their narratives.We see movement across dynasties in various ways, whether intellectually, as the chroniclers looked beyond dynastic borders to read and cite texts being produced in other parts of the Islamicate world, or physically, as chroniclers moved between Safavid, Mughal, and Ottoman territories, writing under different dynasties for different patrons.The chapter has as its centerpiece a case study focusing on one historian, Khvandamir. Drawing on a late Timurid history, Khvandamir wrote one of the earliest Safavid histories, his Habib al-siyar, and then moved to India, where he wrote one of the earliest Mughal narratives, the Qanun-i Humayuni.The analysis shows precisely how Khvandamir appropriated a portion of his Safavid era text dealing with the significance of the number twelve relative to the Shi‘i Imams, carefully transformed it into a “cosmological” text, and incorporated it into his Mughal history written for the emperor Humayun (1505-1556).The chapter ends with an overview of the fortunes of Mir Yahya Qazvini’s descendants, who left Safavid Iran for Mughal India.

This chapter first shows how the Timurid historiographical tradition survived into the early modern period. It then explores some of the formal conventional elements in a number of Persian histories. The chapter makes two overall points.First, the survival of conventional elements depends, to a very great extent, on whether or not a chronicler is modeling his history on an earlier work that contains a similar conventional element.Certain information appears in the sources due to established convention and because of the historiographical choices that the chronicler made. Second, such conventional elements appear in Persian chronicles across the Islamic empires.The specific historiographical elements that the chapter analyzes are benefits of history, bibliographies, genealogies, and dream narratives. The chapter demonstrates how the chroniclers, whether writing for the Ottomans, Safavids, or Mughals, tapped into a common earlier tradition, which they then modified and reshaped according to the political and dynastic expediencies of the time.

Chapter 1 provides an introduction to the book and provides the reader with background information regarding the main themes in the volume.It opens with an overview of Persian historiography across the Ottoman, Safavid, and Mughal empires, providing a brief overview of each empire.The chapter then examines recent studies on connected histories and the Persianate world. This is followed by a summary of the “state of the field,” noting recent scholarship on Persian historiography under the Ottomans, Safavids, and Mughals, and studies on Persian historiography during the early and middle periods of Islamicate history. Next, the chapter presents an overview of each of the subsequent chapters in the book. It concludes with notes on terminology and transliteration.

This chapter provides an overall conclusion for the book. It summarizes the arguments in each chapter and concludes with some general comments regarding the nature of Persian historiography.In particular, it notes that early modern Persian chroniclers were engaging in an active dialog with the past, and in doing so they utilized sophisticated narrative techniques.They were able to make political statements despite any pressures they were facing by their patron.The chapter also stresses the importance of looking beyond dynastic boundaries in order to understand the relationship between the chroniclers and their historiographical legacy.The chapter ends with a section suggesting possible future studies.

Today is Thursday and for Elham, this day is different from all the Thursdays she previously experienced. Just like Sundays, Mondays, or the other days of the week, which ends tomorrow. Tomorrow is Friday. If she can get through that, she is not so anxious for the upcoming Saturday. She has experienced Saturday in her new situation.

The daily work at the company has begun again. The employees do not take Thursday's work so seriously, and she shares the same view on this matter as the others. Among all the days of the week she likes Thursday the most. Ever since her school days she has always liked this day. Thursday has Friday following it, and Friday, during those years of study and instruction, was a day of fun and play, and in recent years it is the only day that she spends in its entirety with Fariborz. The fresh scent of Friday can be smelled Thursday morning, reaching its culmination close to noon.

On Thursdays, the daily work of the company stops at one o’clock in the afternoon, but by noon, in fact, everyone is ready to go home. This is an undeclared, unofficial agreement, which everyone observes with no particular justification.

For Elham, the Thursday work hours – unlike Saturday, which is long and heavy – pass easily. By the time she performs a couple of different tasks and has her tea and cookies, noon has arrived. Also, there is no need to eat at the work table at the company. Everyone comes to work unburdened on this day, without their lunch pails or food containers.

Safavid origins

The Safavid dynasty traces its origins to a fourteenth-century Sufi order established in the northern Iranian city of Ardabīl, located in the province of Azerbaijan (see Map 5). Iran at this time was witnessing one of its not so uncommon periods of political fragmentation and decentralisation, and control of Ardabīl was in the hands of either the post-Ilkhanid Mongol Jalayirids or Turcoman Aq Qoyunlus. As a result of the Mongols placing increasing importance on Tabrīz, and transferring the capital to Sulṭāniyya, both in northern Iran, Azerbaijan was increasingly becoming an important Islamic centre. In Ardabīl, the eponymous founder of the Safaviyya ṭarīqa, Shaykh Ṣafī al-Dīn Iṣḥaq Ardabīlī (650–735/1252–1334) and his followers lived what approximated to a ‘typical’ Sufi existence. Even during his lifetime, Shaykh Ṣafī was highly respected and well known in Ardabīl. Adepts of the Safaviyya order, according to Ibn Bazzāz’s massive hagiographical source, the Ṣafvat al-ṣafā, written during the lifetime of Shaykh Ṣafī’s son and successor, Shaykh Ṣadr al-Dīn Mūsā, engaged in prayer, fasting, dhikr sessions and other activities. Ibn Bazzāz narrates the many miraculous events of Shaykh Ṣafī’s life, all designed to portray him as a devout and pious Sufi. The Safaviyya was just one of many Sufi orders that flourished in post-Mongol Iran and Anatolia.