First Transformation

Chapter 1 is a detailed guide to the multifaceted historical backdrop of the Safavids, charting their first transformation, from a Sufi order to a potent Shiʿi empire in Iran. In this exploration, Anatolia holds particular importance, illuminating the region’s significant impact on the Safavid journey and unveiling the movement’s origins within Ottoman territories. This chapter also contends that a rigid understanding of sects and sectarianism does not adequately capture the nuanced emergence of the early Safavid movement and its spread into neighboring regions. Instead, it posits that the Safavid order (and later the state) was the product of a syncretic and turbulent religious, cultural, and political landscape in Southwest Asia during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. This perspective is particularly pertinent when connecting Safavid history to recent scholarship that highlights the coexistence and long-term transformations of religious identities in regions such as Anatolia and the Iberian Peninsula, rather than reducing the narrative to one of perpetual tension and abrupt ruptures.