Bijan Beg (son of Rustam Khan)
Bijan Beg (Bezhan, Bizhan; fl. 17th-century) was an Iranian Safavid official of Georgian origin, who served as the governor (beglarbeg) of Azerbaijan during the reign of king Suleiman I (r. 1666–1694).
Biography
A scion of the Saakadze family, Bijan was the son of the former sipahsalar (commander-in-chief), Rustam Khan (c. 1588 – 1 March 1643), and an uncle of the later sipahslar and divanbegi (chancellor, chief justice), also named Rustam Khan.[1][2] He was a namesake to his grandfather.[2] His brother Safiqoli (d. 1679) held influential positions in the Safavid ranks as well.[3] Though Bijan's family had always been, according to the Italian traveller Gemelli Careri, amongst the king's favorites, he himself had "fallen into disgrace" during the tenure of the vizier Shaykh Ali Khan Zangana (1669–1689).[1] Shaykh Ali Khan had made him "suspect" with king Suleiman I, by claiming that he was a "madman" and a "drunkard".[1] Careri adds that it was only through the mediation of his powerful nephew, that the king could finally be convinced of his sanity.[1]
References
- 1 2 3 4 Matthee 2012, p. 68.
- 1 2 Maeda 2003, p. 272.
- ↑ Maeda 2003, pp. 257-258, 272.
Sources
- Maeda, Hirotake (2003). "On the Ethno-Social Background of Four Gholām Families from Georgia in Safavid Iran". Studia Iranica (32): 1–278.
- Matthee, Rudi (2012). Persia in Crisis: Safavid Decline and the Fall of Isfahan. I.B.Tauris. ISBN 978-1845117450.