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European Visitors to the Safavid Court

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Roger Stevens
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Extract

Before 1600 few Europeans visited Persia. But with the advent of the seventeenth century there was a marked change from several causes: first, the awakened interest in Eastern trade; the East India Company of London was chartered on 31 December 1600, the Dutch East India Company less than two years later; second, the common enmity against the Turk shared by Persia and Western Europe; third, a by-product of that, Shāh ᶜAbbās’ tolerant and even encouraging attitude to Christians; fourth, the freeing of Persian Gulf ports from Portuguese domination; fifth, reports filtering back to Europe of the wonders of Persia and particularly of its splendid new capital; sixth, more Europeans with the means and urge to travel.

And so we have, passing through Isfahan or settling there for long periods, a motley band of Europeans--ambassadors and adventurers, monks and mountebanks, traders and travellers, including combinations of each. Some could scarcely read or write, others wrote volumes--some went on writing about it for the rest of their lives.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 7 , Issue 3-4: Studies on Isfahan: Proceedings of the Isfahan Colloquium, Part II , Summer-Autumn 1974 , pp. 421 - 457
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1974

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References

Notes

1. Chardin, J., Voyages en Perse (Amsterdam: 1711), pp. 72-73.Google Scholar

2. Ibid.

3. M. de Thévenot, The Travels of M. de Thévenot Into the Levant (London: 1687), part II, p. 81.

4. Chardin, op. cit., p. 56.

5. Thévenot, op. cit., p. 81.

6. Herbert, T., Travels in Persia 1627-29 (London: 1928) p. 132.Google Scholar

7. Chardin, op. cit., p. 58.

8. Ibid., p. 59.

9. le Bruyn, C., Travels into Muscovy Persia and part of the East Indies (London: 1737), p. 198.Google Scholar

10. Chardin, J., Travels in Persia (London: 1927), p. 258.Google Scholar

11. Tavernier, J., Six Travels through Turkey and Persia to the Indies (London: 1687), p. 148.Google Scholar

12. Herbert, op. cit., p. 51.

13. Fryer, J., A New Account of East India and Persia (Hakluyt Society: 1915), III, p. 32.Google Scholar

14. le Bruyn, op. cit., p. 232.

15. Chardin, French ed., op. cit., p. 52.

16. Tavernier, op. cit., p. 239.

17. Fryer, op. cit., p. 96.

18. Chardin, French ed., op. cit.

19. Olearius, A., Relation du Voyage (Paris: 1666), p. 568.Google Scholar

20. Chardin, Tavernier and Thévenot, passim.

21. Thévenot, op. cit., p. 93.

22. Tavernier, op. cit., p. 242.

23. Chardin, English ed., op. cit., p. 184.

24. le Bruyn, op. cit., p. 209.

25. Fryer, op. cit., Ill, p. 36.

26. Tavernier, op. cit.,p. 234.

27. Chardin, English ed., op. cit., p. 250.

28. Ibid., p. 187.

29. Blunt, W., Pietro's Pilgrimage (London: 1953), p. 191.Google Scholar