In the period of the
Safevi State, the Turkish communities in Iran were distinguished from the Farsi and the
other groups under the name of Turk. The word of Tajik was used as a counterpart for the
word of Turk like in the past in the resources. However, the Turks had used the word of
Tat that was a pure word of Turkish instead of the words of Tajik. Tajik people had
established dominion in the civil organisation of the state like in the past. However,
they did not have much influence and power in the state administration like in the period
of Seljuk State in the century XVI. The Turks (Etrak) had much influence and power in the
state administration. As some of the examples would be stated in the further sections,
they did not want the Tajik people to be occupied with any other affairs but for the
financial affairs.
In addition to the dominion of Turks in the fate of
the destiny, the Turks had possessed a powerful national culture. Besides their rich
spoken literature, they had a written (especially in verse) literature. In relation with
this literature, some of the memorandum writers such as Şam Mirza and Sadıki, etc. had
allocated special sections for the Turkish beys that wrote poems. Particularly the
Çukurova Turkish songs were sang in the Safevi palace and also the divans of Fuzuli and
Ali Şir Nevai who were the two greatest masters of the Turkish literature were also read
in the same palace. The movement of the capital city of the state to Isfahan did not
result in a recession in this respect on the contrary to the expectations. Turkish
language protected its dominion as the official language of the palace in the periods of
Shah Abbas and his successors; furthermore, there were several poets in the city that
wrote poems in Turkish language. Actually, Turkish was not only the language of the emirs,
but also the mother tongue of the dynasty.
Shah
Ismail had written poems mostly in Turkish rather than in Farsi language and he was fond
of the works of Ali Şir Nevai. These characteristics were based on the fact that Turkish
was his mother tongue. Despite the hostility and arguments between the Ottomans and Safevi
State, the continuation of the cultural relations between the Turks living in both states
is of great significance. The most important factor in respect of this issue was
doubtlessly the Shiite Turks in Anatolia. It has been understood that mostly by means of
these people, the Turks had become familiar with the Köroglu Epic and the Dede Korkut
Epics at the same time with the Iranian Turls. The Kör Oglu Epic was introduced by the
Iranian Turks to the Turkmens beyond the Caspian Sea and therefore, it gained a quality of
a national epic of them. Therefore, like Dede Korkut Epics, the Kör Oğlu Epic had become
the common national epic of all the Western Turks extending from Ceyhun River towards
Danube River, in other words, the epic of the descendants of Oguz or Turkmen people.
Similarly, the public novels such as Kerem and Asli, Aşık Garip, Arzu and Kamber and the
others (most of them had taken place in Iran) have been listened to and read amusingly in
Turkey, Iran and Turkmenistan. The issue that we try to explain through these examples was
the fact that the Safevi State was not different from the other Turkish states that had
been founded in the same country before in respect of both the dynasty that it was based
on and the state organisation and culture. Similarly, it was probably the state that had
born the Turkish characteristics on a much more extensive scale than some of the other
Turkish States of the past.
The ancient Iranian authors had stated that the
members of the Safevi order in Erdebil that had come from Anatolia were the descendants of
the slaves that Tamburlaine had brought with him from this country and he had set free out
of respect for Safevi sheikh, Hace Ali Shah. This allegation that has been repeated by
several Eastern and Western scientists of today does not have any relation with the
historical facts. Tamburlaine encountered the Kara Tatars that lived in crowded groups in
the Central Anatolia and that had already become Turkmens. He forced most of these Kara
Tatars to immigrate to Turkestan. Furthermore, he had taken a community composed of ten
thousand families from Azerbaijan. There is not any record within the resources of the
period of Tamburlaine dynasty that states that Hace Ali Shah had requested from
Tamburlaine to set free all or some of these people. Therefore, this allegation has been
only a misunderstanding and an erroneous explanation about the memory of the departure
from Rum (Urum), in other words, Anatolia that was not forgotten in Iran until the last
century.
The person that had
connected most of the Anatolian Turks to Safevi order had been Cuneyd (died in 1460).
Cuneyd was involved in a struggle with his paternal uncle, Sheikh Cafer for the sheikhdom
of Safevi sect. However, he could not be successful in this struggle, and he had to leave
Erdebil. Then, he went to Anatolia like most of the Iranians did. The maintenance of the
sheikhdom of Sheikh Cafer had been mostly possible through the exclusive support and
biased activities of Karakoyunlu Cihan Shah who was the ruler of the period.
|
