Iranian Intermezzo

The term Iranian Intermezzo,^[1] or Persian Renaissance,^[2] represents a period in history which saw the rise of various native Iranian Muslim dynasties in the Iranian Plateau after the 7th-century Muslim conquest of Persia and the fall of the Sasanian Empire. The term is noteworthy since it was an interlude between the decline of Abbāsid rule and power by Arabs and the "Sunni Revival" with the 11th-century emergence of the Seljuq Turks. The Iranian revival consisted of Iranian support based on Iranian territory and most significantly a revived Iranian national spirit and culture in an Islamic form.^[3] Even though there were some Iranian Zoroastrian movements rejecting Islam all together as a religion (i.e. Mardavij).^[4] It also focused on revving the Persian language, the most significant one was Shahnameh written by Ferdowsi.^[5] The Iranian dynasties and entities which comprise the Iranian Intermezzo are the Tahirids, Saffarids, Sajids, Samanids, Ziyarids, Buyids, Sallarids,^[6] Rawadids, Marwanids, Shaddadids,^[7] Kakuyids, Annazids and Hasanwayhids.

According to the historian Alison Vacca (Cambridge University Press, 2017), the Iranian Intermezzo "in fact includes a number of other Iranian, mostly Kurdish, minor dynasties in the former caliphal provinces of Armenia, Albania, and Azerbaijan".^[7] The historian Clifford Edmund Bosworth states in the second edition of the Encyclopedia of Islam that Minorsky considers the Rawadids to be flourishing during the period of the Iranian intermezzo.^[8]

Muslim Iranian dynasties

Tahirids (821–873)

 

Coinage of Talha ibn Tahir, with Sasanian-type bust. Dated AH 209 (AD 824).

The Tahirid dynasty, (Persian: سلسله طاهریان) was an Iranian Persian dynasty that ruled over the northeastern part of Greater Iran, in the region of Khorasan (made up of parts of present-day Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan). The Tahirid capital was located in Nishapur.

Saffarids (861–1003)

The Saffarid dynasty (Persian: سلسله صفاریان), was an Iranian Persian empire^[9] which ruled in Sistan (861–1003), a historical region in southeastern Iran and southwestern Afghanistan.^[10] Their capital was Zaranj.

Sajids (889–929)

The Sajid dynasty (Persian: ساجیان), was an Islamic dynasty that ruled from 889–890 until 929. Sajids ruled Azerbaijan and parts of Armenia first from Maragha and Barda and then from Ardabil.^[11] The Sajids originated from the Central Asian province of Ushrusana and were of Iranian (Sogdians)^[12][13] heritage.

Samanids (875/819–999)

The Samanid dynasty (Persian: سلسلهٔ سامانیان), also known as the Samanid Empire or simply Samanids (819–999)^[14] (Persian: سامانیان Sāmāniyān) was an Iranian empire^[15] in Central Asia and Greater Khorasan, named after its founder Saman Khuda who converted to Sunni Islam^[16] despite being from Zoroastrian theocratic nobility.^[17]

With their roots stemming from the city of Balkh (in present-day Afghanistan), the Samanids promoted the arts, giving rise to the advancement of science and literature, and thus attracted scholars such as Rudaki and Avicenna. While under Samanid control, Bukhara was a rival to Baghdad in its glory. Scholars note that the Samanids revived Persian more than the Buyids and the Saffarids, while continuing to patronize Arabic to a significant degree. Nevertheless, in a famous edict, Samanid authorities declared that "here, in this region, the language is Persian, and the kings of this realm are Persian kings."^[18]

Ziyarids (930–1090)

The Ziyarid dynasty (Persian: زیاریان) was an Iranian dynasty of Gilaki origin that ruled Tabaristan from 930 to 1090. At its greatest extent, it ruled much of present-day western and northern Iran.

Buyids (934–1062)

 

Southwest Asia, c. 970 A.D

Buyid dynasty, also known as the Buyid Empire^[19] or the Buyids (Persian: آل بویه Āl-e Buye, Caspian: Bowyiyün), also known as Buwaihids or Buyyids, were a Shī‘ah Persian^{[20][21][22][23]} dynasty that originated from Daylaman. They founded a confederation that controlled most of modern-day Iran and Iraq in the 10th and 11th centuries. Indeed, as Dailamite Iranians the Būyids consciously revived symbols and practices of Persia's Sassānid dynasty. In fact, beginning with 'Adud al-Daula they used the ancient Sassānid title Shāhanshāh (Persian: شاهنشاه), literally meaning king of kings.

Sallarids (942–979)

The Sallarid dynasty (also referred to as the Musafirids or Langarids) was an Islamic Persian dynasty principally known for its rule of Iranian Azerbaijan, Shirvan, and a part of Armenia from 942 until 979.

See also

• Shi'a Century
• Nizari Ismaili state and the Nizari–Seljuk conflicts

References

1. Such an obviously coined designation was introduced by Vladimir Minorsky, "The Iranian Intermezzo", in Studies in Caucasian history (London, 1953) and has been taken up by Bernard Lewis, among others, in his The Middle East: A brief history of the last 2,000 years (New York, 1995).
2. Harter, Conrad Justin (2016). Narrative and Iranian Identity in the New Persian Renaissance and the Later Perso-Islamicate World (Thesis). UC Irvine.
3. The Middle East: 2,000 Years of History from the Rise of Christianity to the Present Day (pgs. 81–82) – Bernard Lewis
4. Robinson, Chase F. (4 November 2010). The New Cambridge History of Islam: Volume 1, The Formation of the Islamic World, Sixth to Eleventh Centuries. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-316-18430-1.
5. "Ferdowsi and the Ethics of Persian Literature". UNC-Chapel Hill Libraries. Retrieved 19 September 2023.
6. Vacca, Alison (2017). Non-Muslim Provinces under Early Islam: Islamic Rule and Iranian Legitimacy in Armenia and Caucasian Albania. Cambridge University Press. pp. 5–7. ISBN 978-1107188518.
7. Vacca, Alison (2017). Non-Muslim Provinces under Early Islam: Islamic Rule and Iranian Legitimacy in Armenia and Caucasian Albania. Cambridge University Press. p. 7. ISBN 978-1107188518. The Iranian intermezzo in fact includes a number of other Iranian ethnic groups, mostly Kurdish, minor dynasties in the former caliphal provinces of Armenia, Albania, and Azerbaijan before the arrival of the Seljuks, such as the Kurdicized Arab Rawwādids in Azerbaijan and the Kurdish Marwānid family in eastern Anatolia from the tenth to the eleventh centuries. Finally, the most famous Kurdish dynasty, the Shaddādids, came to power in Dabīl/Duin in the tenth century, ruling until the twelfth. The Shaddādids named their children after Sasanian shāhanshāhs and even claimed descent from the Sasanian line. It is the other branch of the Shaddādid family, which controlled Ani, that Minorsky offers as the "prehistory" of Salāḥ al-Dīn.
8. Bosworth, C.E. (1995). "Rawwādids". In Bosworth, C. E.; van Donzel, E.; Heinrichs, W. P. & Lecomte, G. (eds.). Encyclopaedia of Islam. Volume VIII: Ned–Sam (2nd ed.). Leiden: E. J. Brill. ISBN 978-90-04-09834-3.
9. The Cambridge History of Iran, By Richard Nelson Frye, William Bayne Fisher, John Andrew Boyle, Published by Cambridge University Press, 1975, ISBN 0-521-20093-8, ISBN 978-0-521-20093-6; p. 121.
10. Nancy Hatch Dupree – An Historical Guide To Afghanistan – Sites in Perspective (Chapter 3)... Link 27 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
11. Iranicaonline.org AZERBAIJAN iv. Islamic History to 1941
12. Clifford Edmund Bosworth, The New Islamic Dynasties: A Chronological and Genealogical Manual, Columbia University, 1996. pg 147: "The Sajids were a line of caliphal governors in north-western persia, the family of a commander in the 'Abbasid service of Soghdian descent which became culturally Arabised."
13. V. Minorsky, Studies in Caucasian history, Cambridge University Press, 1957. p. 111
14. Encyclopædia Britannica, Online Edition, 2007, Samanid Dynasty, LINK
15. Aisha Khan, A Historical Atlas of Uzbekistan, Rosen Publishing Group, 2003, ISBN 0-8239-3868-9, ISBN 978-0-8239-3868-1, p. 23; Richard Nelson Frye, William Bayne Fisher, John Andrew Boyle, eds., The Cambridge History of Iran, Cambridge University Press, 1975, ISBN 0-521-20093-8, ISBN 978-0-521-20093-6, p. 164; The New Encyclopædia Britannica, 1987, ISBN 0-85229-443-3, p. 891; Sheila Blair, The Monumental Inscriptions from Early Islamic Iran and Transoxiana, Brill, 1992, ISBN 90-04-09367-2, p. 27.
16. Elton L.Daniel, The History of Iran, p. 74
17. C.E. Bosworth, ed and tr, The Ornament of Histories: A History of the Eastern Islamic Lands AD 650–1041, I.B. Tauris, 2011, p. 53.
18. Richard Foltz, Iran in World History, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 56–58.
19. • Busse, Heribert (1975), "Iran Under the Buyids", in Frye, R. N., The Cambridge History of Iran, Volume 4: From the Arab Invasion to the Saljuqs., Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, page 270: "Aleppo remained a buffer between the Buyid empire and Byzantium".
    • Joseph Reese Strayer (1985), "Dictionary of the Middle Ages", Published by Scribner, 1985.
20. Nagel, Tilman. "BUYIDS". Encyclopedia Iranica. Retrieved 8 February 2012.
21. MADELUNG, WILFERD. "DEYLAMITES". Encyclopædia Iranica. Retrieved 8 February 2012.
22. Clifford Edmund Bosworth, The New Islamic Dynasties: A Chronological and Genealogical Manual, Columbia University, 1996. pp. 154–155.
23. "Buyid Dynasty." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2008. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 25 Jan. 2008 <http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9018373>