By Patrick Clawson
Exploring continuities and adjustments, this ebook offers the historic backdrop an important to realizing how Iranian satisfaction and experience of victimization mix to make its politics contentious and most likely harmful. From the fight among the Shah and Ayatollah Khomeini to the present stress among the reformers and traditionalists, a vital factor in Iranian family politics has lengthy been its position on the earth and kin with the West.
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Extra info for Eternal Iran: Continuity and Chaos (The Middle East in Focus)
Sample text
Because of a limp, he became known as “Timur the Lame” or, in English, Tamerlane. His armies replicated Mongol psychological warfare. To ensure quick victory, they would massacre any population that resisted their call to surrender. Isfahan resisted, and Timur built a pyramid of human skulls after subduing the city. As did past kings from the days of the Achaemenids through the Mongols, Timur relied upon the established Iranian bureaucracy, although he filled top ministerial positions with family and clan.
The bitterness among the Iranian population never receded far. 4 History is replete with what-ifs, and Iran is no exception. Abbas Mirza predeceased his father. Had he not, he would have become shah. Iran’s subsequent history might have been far different. Many European travelers arrived in Iran through Tabriz and so had ample opportunity to meet the crown prince. In sharp contrast to many other Qajar figures (including the shah), these European travelers were impressed with Abbas Mirza’s intellect and desire for reform.
The rise of the Qajar dynasty coincided with the dawn of modern nationalism. 1 When Agha Muhammad Shah established the dynasty, Iran was a weak state. Its borders were ill-defined. Caravans of camels and donkeys carried coins and goods such as silk, cotton, and opium between towns since Iran had no paper currency. There were no banks. While far from stagnant, Iran had never recovered from the inflation that accompanied the influx of New World gold and silver into the Old World. 2 Iran experienced both internal and external challenges during the Qajar period.