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IRAN
AND THE WORLD IN THE SAFAVID AGE
Abstracts
Imber,
Dr. Colin, Manchester University, Department of Middle Eastern
Studies, Manchester, The Battle of Sufiyan: A Symptom of Ottoman Military
Decline?
In
November 1605, Shah Abbas won a major field battle at Sufiyan near
Tabriz against an Ottoman army under the experienced command of
Jigalazade Sinan Pasha. In
the previous two years Safavid forces had recaptured Tabriz, and
taken the Ottoman fortresses of Nakhichevan and Erivan.
In these cases it is possible to ascribe Ottoman failure to
preoccupation with the war in Hungary and with the campaign in
Anatolia against the Jelali rebels.
In 1605, however, Shah Abbas encountered and defeated a
fully equipped army. The
war in Hungary from 1593 had revealed major inadequacies in
Ottoman battlefield tactics in the face of modernized Habsburg
armies, and the failures against the Jelalis in Anatolia had also
appeared to reveal an inability to adapt to a new type of enemy.
The defeat at Sufiyan might suggest that the Safavids too
had achieved military superiority over the Ottomans.
The question, however, is whether the outcome of the battle
was the result of the superior quality of Safavid forces, or
simply the superiority of Shah Abbas as a military commander.
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