Nader Shah, Iran’s saviour or slayer?

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Nader Shah, Iran’s saviour or slayer?
by Arash Monzavi-Kia
12-Dec-2008
 

Continued from: Mongol plague and Shia take-over.

The final blow to the Safavids dynasty came from the disgruntled Sunni people of Afghanistan. In 1720, a rebellious Afghan army toppled the weak Safavid king (Shah Sultan Hussein) and pillaged Isfahan. Their uprising was a direct result of Sunni suppression in the Kandahar province, and their success was due to the steady weakening of the army and Ghezelbash, and the deteriorating court spirit under the mind-numbing influence of Shia mullahs.

To fight the Afghan conquest, the Safavids united around a young successor to the murdered king, and designated Nader Khan as the army chief. Nader was a minor Afshar (a Ghezelbash tribe) warlord, but a military genius and extremely courageous. Nader’s army defeated the Afghans in 1729, and he subsequently removed the incapable Safavid heir, and crowned himself as Nader Shah, in 1736.

Nader’s reign started like a fairytale and ended like a nightmare. At the beginning, Nader was regularly consulting the Ghezelbash chiefs and the learned nobility; tried to reconcile the Shia-Sunni animosity; managed to obtain a respectable peace treaty with both the Uzbeks and the Ottomans; and lowered the tax burden on the general populace.

Unfortunately, the huge army that Nader had gathered during the war years encouraged him to march in the militaristic path of the likes of Genghis and Tamerlane. Besides, with each bloody campaign of pillage and terror, Nader descended deeper and deeper into the abyss of paranoia and rage. Nader’s most infamous military aggression was the invasion of India, to plunder their riches.

India had never had any war with Iran, and since antiquity was linked to us, through cultural, linguistic and religious ties. Nader’s brutal invasion of that country and the merciless looting, raping and pillaging of Delhi, not only is a shameful example of cruelty, but also weakened the Indian Muslim state to be subsequently colonized by the British Empire.

Nader’s greed for treasures did not abate after the plundering of most Indian jewels, such as the Peacock throne and the diamonds of Kohinoor and Daryinoor. He concealed much of those loots in the remote Khorasan Mountains (Kalat Naderi), and then increased the taxes to pay for the maintenance of his huge army (Urdu), which by this time had even developed its own hybrid language.

Nader’s final years are filled with suspicion and conspiracy, as he embarked on killing and blinding all the potential rivals, including his own sons. Finally, a group of his trusted generals, lead by a nephew, attacked his grand tent at night and killed him in 1747. In 20 short years, Nader had saved Iran from servitude and mayhem, raised it to the level of a respectable regional power and then plunged it again in blood and anarchy!

Immediately after Nader’s assassination, his army broke up along several ethnic and tribal lines, each trying to find and fetch as much of the cursed Kalat loot as possible. The Afghans went east to establish the independent Afghanistan state, lead by the Dorani’s, who continued to raid India for the next fifty years. The Qajars (another Ghezelbash tribe) converged in Mazandaran and began fighting against Nader’s murderous nephew in Khorasan and the Zands (Bakhtiari tribe) based in Isfahan and Shiraz.

Finally, after many more years of fighting filled with torture and madness, a more benevolent Khan of Zands (Karim Khan), could re-ascertain a measure of Iranian sovereignty and peace. Unfortunately, those fifty years of murder and mayhem not only ruined most of the Safavids cultural and social achievements, but also instilled a sick psyche of brutality and madness in the Iranian subconscious. Karim Khan maintained a relatively generous and caring government from his new capital in Shiraz, but could not establish a lasting and durable system to outlive his passing in 1779.

After Karim Khan, the various khans of Zands fought for his succession for ten bloody years; till another fine example of Persian nobility (Lotfali Khan) could prevail over his cruel cousins. Unfortunately, by that time the Qajars had regained military power in the North and united around their castrated but brutally determined Khan (Agha Mohammad).

Agha Mohammad conducted a merciless campaign of terror against Lotfali, who had to take refuge in Kerman. When Kerman fell, Agha Mohammad tortured and massacred the captured Zands, blinded all the men of Kerman and enslaved the women and children.

Agha Mohammad Khan then continued along the lines of Nader’s tradition of fighting and looting, and invaded the caucuses in 1795. He successfully defeated the Christian king of Georgia; looted the city of Tbilisi; made a minaret from the severed heads of thousands of their men; and enslaved their wives and daughters. This created such a steer in the Christian Russia that the Tsar accepted the full future protection of Georgia, leading to a generation of Persian-Russian wars.

In 1797, while again campaigning in the caucuses, Agha Mohammad Shah was assassinated by two of his servants. The servants were apparently under suspicion of having eaten a melon from the Shah’s kitchen, and were jailed to be executed pending the royal’s final decision.

Reference: The History of Iran, by Prof. Elton Daniel.

 

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Arash Monzavi-Kia

Nader's journey from good to bad

by Arash Monzavi-Kia on

Nader has not been alone in his life journey from good to bad; it has happened to so many Iranian kings. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely! Our historical inability to establish a power sharing model has been the most obvious reason for our leaders' corruption.

The corrupting effect of absolute-power has consistently turned our kings and leaders to murderous maniacs, or at least out-of-touch lunatics. Power is a curse on the leader who would not or could not share it! 

Arash M-K


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Judgement

by iri (not verified) on

To be an impartial judge in what Nader Shah did for Iran, it suffices to imagin if he had never been in the picture ... regardless of what one might think of his brutalities, Nader saved Iran from falling aparts under aggressions from Turkey, Russia, barbaric Afghans and a weak, pleasure-seeking, incompetent Safavid princes ... May God reward him in the Heaven and eternal light shine upon his soul.


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He was a slayer

by Anonymous123 (not verified) on

He was a butcher like all other turkish rulers. They were all a disgrace to whole humanity.


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re: nader shah

by Shaun of Iran (not verified) on

my pleasure....you're welcome


Arash Monzavi-Kia

Thanks Shaun

by Arash Monzavi-Kia on

Yes, from a distance he looked like an honest-to-god hero to me too. Thanks for sharing the 'hat trick' story.

Arash M-K


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Nader Shah's historic footprint

by Shaun of Iran (not verified) on

Rarely have we had anyone in our history who managed to turn around a devastated,ruined and corrupt country in to a respected, strong power in matter of 6-7 years. Simply astounding! He surely is my historical hero....never mind what he did later in life!


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re: nader Shah

by Shaun of Iran (not verified) on

Sure. Don't know if anyone knows already but the story of how Nader Shah managed to get the koohinoor and daryaenoor is interesting. Apparently he had asked for the treasury's jewels to be handed to him.(He was really after kohinoor). So through one of his informants, he was told that the Mughal emperor has hidden them in his huge turban! So at a state dinner hosted in the Maughal emperor's honour (they were on good terms, given the circumstances), Nader Shah suggested as gesture of good will to exchange turbans!! The emperor could not refuse and the rest is history!


Arash Monzavi-Kia

Dear Shaun

by Arash Monzavi-Kia on

Thanks for your comment. Can you share any other information or historical anecdotes that may have come from your ancestor? 

Arash M-K


Arash Monzavi-Kia

Dear Orang

by Arash Monzavi-Kia on

It is not easy jamming deeper discussions in a blog, so may I suggest that you take a look at the reference book (The History of Iran), or others you may find in the citation list of Farsinameh? 

Arash M-K


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re Nader Shah

by Shaun of Iran (not verified) on

Thanks for the informative article.
Nader Shah did not plunder and pillage Delhi at first, in fact he was quite cool headed at the time given his temper. It was only after while he was riding next to Jama Masjid opposite the famous Red Fort that someone shot and killed his right hand man who was a general if I'm not mistaken. He asked the authorities to hand over the culprit but nothing came out of it. It was then that he ordered the massacre. It lasted about 2 days and it was only after the Maughal Emperor who petitioned him, that it was stopped. Infact a lot of what he did in India was quite contrary to the his normal practices. I know this because I lived there, have talked to people(even thought a lot of Indians still hate him)and after all my great great grand father was his standard bearer.


Orang Gholikhani

History is not only Kings

by Orang Gholikhani on

Thanks for sharing. 

I think we need a study of our history including all human, social and economic factors.

There is no Savour or Slayor, there are men and people how react considering their environement and their private story.

Our historiens have been too simplist till now ! We need a deep and objectif analyst without a black or white approach.