Mohammad Taqi Mirza (also written Mohammad Taghi Mirza) was born 5 October 1791 in Tehran as Fath-Ali Shah's 7th son by the latter's temporary (sighe) wife Zeynab Khanom, daughter of Ali Mardan Khan Bakhtiari, supreme chief of the Chahar Lang division of the Bakhtiari tribe. Thus, he was one of the shah's twelve senior sons attending the official receptions at court depicted in several portraits. His only full sister was Princess Maryam Khanom (Fath-Ali Shah's 5th daughter).
In 1818 he commanded the attack on the Castle of Shirvan and his father, the shah, entitled him Hessam os-Saltaneh (lit. "Saber of the Monarchy"). After his eldest brother Mohammad Ali Mirza, the governor-general of Kermanshah, died from cholera in 1823 Mohammad Taqi Mirza was made 1826-1829 governor of that province. 1831-1834 he was made governor of Boroujerd. At his father's death in 1834 he was with some brothers imprisoned in the Ardabil citadel by the prime minister to avoid any attempts against the succession of the princes' nephew Mohammad Shah Qajar. He was released in 1848 by the next Qajar ruler Naser al-Din Shah. Mohammad Taqi Mirza was also a poet under the pen name "Shokat".[1][2][3]
Fath-Ali Shah enthroned on the Peacock Throne with his twelve senior sons. At the shah's left hand side, upper row, third person is Mohammad Taqi Mirza.
Family
Marriages
Mohammad Taqi Mirza married five wives:
His first wife was the daughter of Hajji Mirza Ebrahim Khan "Mirza Shafi", sometimes prime minister to Fath-Ali Shah.
His chief and most prominent wife according to tribal customs of the Qajar house (galin khanom) was a daughter of Hossein Qoli Khan Donboli, the Khan of Khoy Khanate.
^Fereydoun Barjesteh van Waalwijk van Doorn, "The Fath Ali Shah Project", in: Qajar Studies, Vol IV, 2004, p. 181.
Sources
Azod al-Dawleh, Soltan Ahmad Mirza (2014). Tarikh-e Azodi: Life at the Court of the Early Qajar Shahs, transl. by M. Eskandari-Qajar. Washington DC: Mage Publishers.
Barjesteh van Waalwijk van Doorn, Fereydoun (2004). Qajar Studies - Journal of the International Qajar Studies Association, Vol IV: "The Fath Ali Shah Project", pp. 165-213. Rotterdam: Barjesteh van Waalwijk van Doorn.
Eskandari-Qajar, Manouchehr M. (2008). Qajar Studies - Journal of the International Qajar Studies Association, Vol VIII: "The Message of the Negarestan Mural of Fath Ali Shah and His Sons: Snapshot of Court Protocol or Determination of Dynastic Succession", pp 17-41. Rotterdam: Barjesteh van Waalwijk van Doorn.
Sheikh-O-Raees Qajar, Abol-Hassan Mirza (1894). منتخب النفیس [The Valuable Selection] (in Persian). Matba Naseri. Retrieved 2025-01-23.
