From Khan to Shah: State, Society, and Forming the Ties that Made Qajar Iran
General Material Designation
[Thesis]
First Statement of Responsibility
Assef Ashraf
Subsequent Statement of Responsibility
Amanat, Abbas
.PUBLICATION, DISTRIBUTION, ETC
Name of Publisher, Distributor, etc.
Yale University
Date of Publication, Distribution, etc.
2016
PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION
Specific Material Designation and Extent of Item
389
NOTES PERTAINING TO PUBLICATION, DISTRIBUTION, ETC.
Text of Note
Place of publication: United States, Ann Arbor; ISBN=978-1-369-61910-2
DISSERTATION (THESIS) NOTE
Dissertation or thesis details and type of degree
Ph.D.
Body granting the degree
Yale University
Text preceding or following the note
2016
SUMMARY OR ABSTRACT
Text of Note
This dissertation examines the formation of the Qajar state in Iran by studying the political, social, and cultural ties that bound together the rulers and the ruled. Qajar Iran emerged after decades of political instability, economic hardships, depopulation of cities, famine, and plague in post-Safavid Iran, as well as at the dawn of the European imperial rivalry best represented by the Napoleonic Wars and the Great Game. It was one of the largest polities in the Islamic world at its time, as well as one of the few to survive beyond World War I and into the twentieth century. A question that arises, therefore, is: in the wake of the Safavid Empire's collapse in the 1720s, how and why were Qajar rulers able to consolidate power and establish a new government that could survive its founder, Āqā Muhammad Khan (r. 1785-1797)? How did a relatively small group of khans transform themselves and manage to rule over a vast territory - over 700,00 square miles, or two and a half times the size of modern France and one hundred thousand square miles larger than contemporary Iran? Nādir Shah (r. 1736-1747) and Karim Khan Zand (r. 1750-1779) had failed to establish states that outlasted their own lives. What set the Qajars apart?
TOPICAL NAME USED AS SUBJECT
Cultural anthropology; Middle Eastern history; Middle Eastern Studies
UNCONTROLLED SUBJECT TERMS
Subject Term
Social sciences;Comparative Empires;Gift Economy;Iran;Qajar;Tributary Empires