Murshid Shaykh Ḥaydar Ṣafavi | |
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| 6thSheikh of theSafavid order | |
| In office 1460–1488 | |
| Preceded by | Shaykh Junayd |
| Succeeded by | Soltan-Ali |
| Personal details | |
| Born | June–July 1459 Amid,Diyar Bakr (present-dayDiyarbakır,Turkey) |
| Died | 9 July 1488 (aged 28-29) Tabasaran,Dagestan (present-dayRussia) |
| Resting place | Ardabil |
| Spouse(s) | Halima (Martha), daughter ofUzun Hasan byDespina Khatun (Theodora Megale Komnene) A daughter of Farid al-din Jafar b. Khvajeh Ali |
| Children | Soltan-Ali Ibrahim Mirza Ismail I Fakhr-Jahan Khanum Malek Khanum Sayyed Hassan |
| Parents |
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| Relatives | Khvajeh Mohammad Safavi (brother) Khvajeh Jamshid Safavi (brother) Shah Pasha Khatun (sister) |
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Shaykh Haydar orSheikh Haydar (Persian:شیخ حیدرShaikh Ḥaidar; 1459–9 July 1488) was the successor of his father (Shaykh Junayd) as leader of theSafavid order from 1460 to 1488. Haydar maintained the policies and political ambitions initiated by his father. Under Sheikh Haydar, the order became crystallized as a political movement with an increasinglyextremist heterodoxTwelverShi'i coloring and Haydar was viewed as a divine figure by his followers.[2] Shaykh Haydar was responsible for instructing his followers to adopt the scarlet headgear of 12gores commemoratingThe Twelve Imams, which led to them being designated by the Turkish termQizilbash "Red Head".[3]
Haydar soon came into conflict with theShirvanshahs, as well as theAk Koyunlu, who were allied to the former. Following several campaigns into theNorth Caucasus, mainly inCircassia andDagestan, he and his men were eventually trapped in 1488 at Tabasaran by the combined forces of the ShirvanshahFarrukh Yassar andYa'qub Beg of the Ak Koyunlu. In a pitched battled that ensued, Shaykh Haydar and his men were defeated and killed. He was succeeded by his sonSoltan-Ali as leader of the order. Soltan-Ali was on his part succeeded by Haydar's younger son, who would become the founder of theSafavid dynasty, and known by his regnal name ofIsmail I.
Haydar was born in June–July 1459 in Amid (present-dayDiyarbakır) in the province ofDiyar Bakr toShaykh Junayd and Khadija Begum bt. Qara Othman, a sister ofUzun Hasan of theAk Koyunlu.[1] His parents had married on the eve of Shaykh Junayd's invasion ofTrabzon.[1] Less than a year later, Haydar's father was killed in theBattle of Tabasaran.[1]
Apart from Haydar, the only sons of Junayd that had survived wereKhvajeh Mohammad Safavi and Khvajeh Jamshid Safavi.[1] Haydar's only surviving sister, Shah-Pasha Khatun, was married off to Mohammad Beg Talish, a pivotal figure in the foundation of the Safavid dynasty in the early 16th century.[1] In 1469-70, Haydar was installed inArdabil by his uncleUzun Hassan, who had defeatedJahan Shah ofKara Koyunlu dynasty at theBattle of Chapakchur and established his own authority over its former domains. TheSafavid order's return to Ardabil prompted an influx of Haydar’s followers from northern Syria and eastern Anatolia to Ardabil to be beside him.[4]
Functioning as the "spiritual leader" of the order "tariqa", Haydar would engage into various alliances with the leaders of theTalish,Shirvan and southernDagestan regions.[1] Subsequently, he initiated three military campaigns against various rural areas and villages in theNorthern Caucasus.[5][1] According to Prof.Roger Savory, meant to drill his men, these raids targeted the "infidels" ofCircassia andDagestan.[5] These were however probably the ChristianAlans (nowadays better known asOssetians) who roamed to the north of theDarial Pass as well as theKabardian subgroup ofCircassians.[5] In order to reach the area, Haydar had to cross areas ruled by theShirvanshah (specifically the Shirvanshah rulers ofSalyan and Mahmudabad), who were hostile as they were allied to the Ak Koyunlu ruler ofAzerbaijan, SultanYa'qub.[1] Therefore, Haydar ordered for the production of boats inKhalkhal andAstara, in order to avoid having to go by land.[1] By using boats, Haydar and his men would be able to circumvent the Shirvanshah's, reachingDerbent and coastal Dagestan through theCaspian Sea.[1] In particular, the towns of Agrica and Mian-Qeslaq seem to have been the main target at the time.[1] In around 1473-3, Haydar and his men performed their first seaborne attack on Dagestan, during which they plundered the predominantly Circassian-inhabited town of Qaytaq as well as the Hamiri plain.[1] Haydar's first mainland campaign in Dagestan happened five years later, in 1478.[1] However, the third and final of his campaigns in Dagestan, which took place in 1488, proved to be his last.[1]
The Shirvanshah had allowed Haydar's first two campaigns, but this time, on his way to the North Caucasus, he sacked the city ofShamakhi.[5] InTabasaran, outside the Bayqird Castle, Haydar and his men were cornered; in the ensuing pitched battle, on 9 July 1488, they were killed by the combined forces of the Shirvanshah rulerFarrukh Yassar and the Ak Koyunlu Sultan Ya'qub ibn Uzun Hassan.[1][6][5] The Ak Koyunlu then ordered for the beheading of Haydar; they buried his severed head later on inTabriz.[1] Haydar died not far from the location where his own father Junayd had died in 1460. Haydar's son, known regnally asIsmail I, would later move his father's remains (which were thus located in both Tabriz as well as Tabasaran), and bury them inside the Safavid shrine located atArdabil.[1] Haydar's tomb in Ardabil became a place of pilgrimage.
Shaykh Haydar was married on two occasions. His first wife, whom he married in 1471–1472, namedHalima (otherwise known as Alamshah Begum, or Martha) was a daughter ofUzun Hasan by his wifeDespina Khatun (Theodora Megale Komnene), daughter ofJohn IV of Trebizond.[7][8][5] In 1473, he married a daughter of Shaykh Farid al-din Jafar b. Khvajeh Ali, the paternal uncle of his father.[1] Shaykh Haydar furthermore had severalCircassian andGeorgian concubines.[1] With regard to his offspring, ten sons and four daughters are known to have survived his death in 1488.[1]
By Alamshah,Soltan-Ali, Ibrahim Mirza (d. 1500[9]) andIsmail I were born.[1][10] Soltan-Ali and Ismail would succeed Shaykh Haydar, while Ibrahim, according to various contemporary accounts, was either passed up in the succession despite being three years older than Ismail, or he shared leadership of the Safavid Order for a number of years until his death in 1500.[11] From his marriage to Jafar's daughter, Sayyed Hasan was born (died ca. 1525).[1] He would serve as an official at the Safavid shrine located in Ardabil during the reign of his half-brother and future king Ismail I.[1] Haydar's eldest daughter, Fakhr-Jahan Khanum, was given in marriage to Bayram Beg Qaramanlu (d. 1514) a powerful tribal leader.[1] The younger sister of Fakhr-Jahan Khanum, Malek Khanum, married Abdallah KhanShamlu, a high-rankingQizilbash chief, who hailed fromArdabil.[1] The other two daughters of Haydar were given in marriage to respectivelyHusayn Beg Shamlu, who would later serve as the firstvakil (viceregent) of the Safavid Empire, and to Shah-Ali Beg (d. after 1540), the ruler ofHazo andSason inAnatolia.[1]
Shaykh Haydar | ||
| Preceded by | Leader of theSafavid order 1460–1488 | Succeeded by |