The Imperial Age with the Resurgence of Han Style

Chapter 15 Prince Abbas’s Ambition
Mahmoud, the leader of the Afghan Girzai tribe who invaded the hinterland of Persia, unsurprisingly hit a wall under the city of Yazd. He besieged the city for more than ten days and failed to capture the city. On February 2, Withdraw and leave.

However, the stubborn Afghans still had no intention of leaving the hinterland of Persia and returning to Kandahar. Instead, they made an astonishing move. The entire army turned and drove directly to the imperial capital - Isfahan.

Suddenly, the entire Isfahan fell into "panic" again.You know, Yazd is less than [-] kilometers away from Isfahan. If the cavalry attacks with all its strength, it can be reached in five or six days.

However, until this time, the debate in the palace about how to deal with the Afghan invasion was still not over.Half a month ago, Emperor Shah Sultan Hussein, who was unable to make a decision, simply moved out of Isfahan and hid in the Farahabad Palace a few kilometers southwest of the city, continuing to live his life. Ridiculous days of drunkenness and dreams.

After receiving the news of the Afghan attack, the Shah, smelling of rouge and a bit drunk, hurried back to the Ali Qapu Palace in Isfahan and convened his ministers to discuss countermeasures.

Just when the attention of everyone in the empire turned to the incoming Afghans, Prince Abbas Mirza, who had been under house arrest by the Shah, quietly boarded an ordinary carriage and met the black guards of Qi and Persia. Under the cover of the trading company, he secretly sneaked out of the city of Isfahan and entered Qi's trading station.

As early as more than half a month ago, Prince Abbas's princess and several children had been transported out of the city by the black guards one after another, and were placed in this huge trading station, waiting to join him.

Compared with the weak and fickle nature of his brother, Shah Sultan Hussein of the Empire, Prince Abbas has a tough, courageous and decisive character.When he was very young, he followed the example of the greatest king of the empire, Abbas the Great, and determined to rebuild the glory of the empire, reproduce the glory of the Safavid dynasty, and hoped to become Abbas III who would be praised by future generations.

However, his father, Suleiman I, did not designate a clear heir when he was dying, so that his aunt Mariam Begum united with the powerful eunuchs in the court to support his brother. Succession to the throne of the Shah, in their view, a prince with a gentle nature, a weak heart, and a weak heart could succeed to the throne, which would allow them to better continue to control the court.

For more than 20 years, the emperor's Shah Sultan Hussein's fickleness and weakness in the face of stubborn religious trends uncontrollably accelerated the decline of the dynasty.Moreover, the Shah was an alcoholic, fond of beauty, indulged in pleasure, and like their father Suleiman I, had no interest in state affairs. All government affairs were taken care of by their eldest aunt Mariam Begum. , harem eunuchs and several great ministers took over.

Under the Shah's rule, the people frequently launched riots due to their poverty, resisting the ruthless oppression of corrupt officials and local lords everywhere.I still remember that 16 years ago (1706), when the Shah spent tens of thousands of dollars on a pilgrimage to the holy city of Mashgabat (a Shia holy city), tens of thousands of people in Isfahan could not bear the food shortage caused by officials colluding with grain merchants to hoard them. They brazenly launched a riot and besieged the Ali Qapu Palace, demanding a positive response from Prince Abbas.

Although the riot was forcibly suppressed by Kai Khoslu, the commander of the Janissaries sent back by the Shah, the incident had a profound impact on the entire empire.It is hard to imagine that such a huge civilian riot could occur in the imperial capital.In the view of Prince Abbas, any Shah who does anything would not allow such a serious food crisis to be artificially caused.

The people in the capital besieged the Ali Qapu Palace by throwing stones and holding wooden sticks, which meant that not only Shah Sultan Hussein's personal reputation, but also the prestige of the empire had dropped to the brink of danger.

The Safavid court was already corrupt, and domestic religious conflicts continued to intensify.The Lezkin people in the northwest began to invade southward in retaliation for the Safavid dynasty's continuous persecution of Sunnis.The rebellious Kurdish tribes in the west invaded Hamadan and once approached the outskirts of Isfahan.The Omanis across the sea to the south have become a new threat, gradually encroaching on the empire's islands and coastal territories in the Gulf.The Balochs from the southeast sacked Bam and Kerman, and the governor of Kandahar was completely powerless to stop them.At this time, the Safavid dynasty was simply unable to cope with such a situation, and the entire country was on the verge of collapse.

What is even more desperate is that on the eastern border of the Safavid dynasty, Afghan tribes have become increasingly difficult to control. Among them, the Abdali tribe in Herat and the Gilzai tribe in Kandahar are the most powerful. A few years ago, these two tribes rebelled against the empire.

The imperial central government's growing lack of effective supervision and control over local governments also gave rise to many other problems.Under the Shah, the safety of merchants and travelers on traditional trade routes deteriorated. Sometimes those who robbed them were the very local officials who should have protected them, and thieves and gangs emerged in endlessly.

It is said that on the way to Isfahan, Qi's caravan was attacked by a group of "bandits" with more than a thousand people, and the momentum was extremely alarming.Prince Abbas has reason to believe that this group of "bandits" must be closely related to the local governor of Fars.Without his connivance and cover, how could this "bandit" gather such a large-scale armed force within the empire.Maybe, after they robbed the caravan of a large amount of property, they would engage in a shameful and dirty division of the spoils with local officials.When it comes to Qi, Prince Abbas has very complicated feelings.This country located on the Han continent in the southeast is not only rich in products and has brought countless commodities to the empire, but it also has powerful military force and a maritime fleet that ranks first in the Indian Ocean region.

During the reign of his father Suleiman I, the empire established formal diplomatic relations with them and sent ministers to each other.Subsequently, countless Qi goods poured into the empire, including porcelain, tea, coffee, rice, sugar, spices, wood, cotton fabrics (cotton cloth), steel, copper, tin, and other types of industrial products, which greatly enriched the empire. The domestic commodity market also enabled the empire to obtain considerable profits from transit trade.The trade volume between the two sides has increased from less than 27 tomans (equivalent to about 500 taels of silver) at the beginning to more than 4000 million tomans (about [-] million taels of silver) at present, accounting for more than [-]% of the empire's trade. share.

A few months ago, the death of my aunt Mariam, who held the most power in the palace, instantly broke the balance of power in the palace.Over the past 20 years, perhaps as a political compensation for not handing over the Shah's position to him and out of guilt, Maryam has taken great care of Prince Abbas and provided him with all-round political support. Sheltered him, allowing him to live peacefully and happily until now.

But with the death of Maryam, the eunuchs in the harem, several princes of the Shah, and ministers in the palace began to prepare to liquidate and persecute him, trying to completely remove him from the royal family physically and divide all his possessions. possession of wealth.

Under this situation, he immediately found the Qi minister in Isfahan and asked for help to take him and his family away from this capital full of conspiracy and crime.

The people of Qi only hesitated for a moment, then readily agreed to his request for help, and began to carefully plan how to take him and his family out of Isfahan.

When he was in contact with the Qi people, the other party seemed to inadvertently hint to him that in the current chaotic and complicated situation of the Safavid dynasty, it was not a wise choice to take refuge in the Mughal Empire.As a prince with the same name as Emperor Abbas, he should stand up when the empire is in trouble and use his courage and tenacity to save the Safavid dynasty.

Prince Abbas immediately understood that the people of Qi were preparing to make a political investment and regard him as an exploitable chess piece, or a back-up player. Once the empire collapsed, they could push him out and use him To stabilize the situation in the empire.

Of course, he also understood that the investment of the people of Qi was not free, and they would eventually get rich returns from it.

However, Prince Abbas, who was full of endless ambition, decided to give it a try and prepare to cooperate with the people of Qi and obey their arrangements.Back then, the second emperor of the Mughal Empire, Humayun, was defeated by Sher Shah of the Sur Dynasty in the Battle of Qunu City, which temporarily suspended the rule of the Mughal Dynasty in India.Desperate, he fled west to Persia, endured the humiliation and became a guest in the imperial court, which he did for more than ten years.After Sher Shah died of old age and illness, Humayun borrowed troops from the imperial Shah Tahmasp I to recapture the Indian plains in one fell swoop, occupied Delhi and Agra, and restored the Mughal rule in India.

If when the empire falls into a huge disaster, Prince Abbas can get the support and assistance of Qi and raise his troops to attack Isfahan. He may not be able to replicate Humayun's great feat and recreate the glory of the empire.

He had a strong hunch that the Afghan Mahmoud's invasion of Isfahan might cause unimaginable harm to the empire.The chaos in the imperial court, the strife among the ministers, the passive fear of the imperial army, and the indifference of hundreds of thousands of people in the city. It is very likely that the entire Safavid dynasty will be destroyed in the face of the Afghan attack. There will be a huge crisis.

In crisis, there is also a glimmer of hope.What the people of Qi said was full of oriental wisdom.

(End of this chapter)