Mirza Ata-Allah Isfahani

Mirza Ata-Allah Isfahani (Persian: میرزا عطا الله اصفهانی) was a high-ranking Persian statesman in the early Safavid era, who served as the vizier of Azerbaijan, Qarabagh, and Shirvan.

Biography

A member of the Khuzani family of Isfahan, Ata-Allah is first mentioned in 1524, when he was assigned by the newly-crowned shah Tahmasp I (r. 1524–1576) to transport a royal decree (farman) and robe of honour to court of the Shirvanshah Khalilullah II,[1] who ruled Shirvan under Safavid suzerainty. Ata-Allah afterwards served as vizier of Azerbaijan, Qarabagh, and Shirvan. In 1548, he helped the fellow Isfahan-born Mirza Salman Jaberi get enlisted under the service of Tahmasp I.[2]

In 1555, Tahmasp moved the capital from Tabriz to Qazvin, but Ata-Allah nevertheless chose to stay in the former capital. In 1558, he accompanied the Ottoman rebel prince Şehzade Bayezid from Yerevan to the royal court in Qazvin.[1] According to the Safavid court historian Iskandar Beg Munshi, Ata-Allah's administrative work was so influential, that "the administrative practices they instituted are still the rule and model in those provinces."[1] When Ata-Allah died sometime in the early 1560s, the poet Abdi Beg Shirazi composed a poem in honour of him.[3] He was survived by a son, Mirza Ahmad Khuzani, who served in the chancellery, and whose son, Mirza Shah Vali Isfahani, served as the grand vizier of the country briefly in 1587.

References

  1. ^ a b c Mitchell 2009, p. 111.
  2. ^ Mitchell 2007, pp. 313–314.
  3. ^ Mitchell 2009, p. 51.

Sources

  • Mitchell, Colin P. (2009). The Practice of Politics in Safavid Iran: Power, Religion and Rhetoric. I.B.Tauris. pp. 1–304. ISBN 978-0857715883.
  • Mitchell, Colin Paul (2007). "JĀBERI". Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. XIV, Fasc. 3. pp. 313–314.
  • Mitchell, Colin P., ed. (2011). New Perspectives on Safavid Iran: Empire and Society. Milton Park, UK: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-4157-7462-8. LCCN 2010032352.
  • Meri, Josef W. (2006). Medieval Islamic Civilization: L-Z, index. Taylor & Francis. pp. 1–878. ISBN 9780415966924.