Vincentio d'Alessandri, Embassy to Persia (1571)

The short excerpts below comes from the report of Venetian ambassador Vincentio d'Alessandri who visited the court of Safavid Shah Tahmasp in 1571, just three years before the shah's death. The ambassador, who was dispatched on a mission to solicit Iranian support in Venice's war against the ottomans, left interesting insights into the Safavid royal court, noting that little or nothing could be expected the old and sickly shah who had been immured in his palace for the last few years and cared only for women and money. There was considerable political instability as Tahmasp's offspring clashed over the succession. The shah had married Turcoman, Georgian and Circassian women, whose offspring (seven of Tahmasp's surviving sons were by Georgian or Circassian mothers and two by a Turcoman) was supported by their respective factions at the court. Among the former was Haydar Mirza Safavi, the son of a Georgian mother, who was supported by the Georgian faction and was positioning himself to claim power after his father's death.

The king's service is divided into three classes; first, the women, daughters of Sultans, bought by the king, or received as presents into his harem, which is thus called from them, the Seraglio, as the abode of the women. They are all Georgian and Circassian slaves, and he is attended by them when he sleeps in the palace. When he sleeps out, he is attended by slaves in the lower duties, as in

dressing and undressing; these are of the number of forty or fifty, and keep in order the tents and the larder.

Sultan Caidar Mirisce [Haydar Mirza], the third son and Lieutenant of his father, is eighteen years old, of small stature, most fascinating and handsome in appearance, and excelling in oratory, elegance and horsemanship, and most beloved by his father, he is very fond of hearing people discourse about war, although he does not show himself much fitted for that exercise, from his too delicate and almost feminine nature; he is of good intellect, for his age is grave enough, and shows that he understands the affairs of government, and knows how the other monarchs of the world rule....