TURKOMANS BETWEEN TWO EMPIRES: THE ... - Bilkent University

Solakzāde states that Ismail made his soldiers wear red-caps after his ascendance
to the throne in Tabriz. And thence his soldiers became famous for the epithet
‘qizilbash’. 1753 Solakzāde does not use this word in the former chapters of his history.
We see similar explanations in other sources as well. A sixteenth-century anonymous
history, for example, cites almost the same story. After capturing Tabriz, Ismail soon
became one of the most majestic rulers of the era. He ordered all his men - his retinues,
his bureaucrats, warriors, adherents of his father and grandfather – and all his subjects
whether they were Muslim or Christian to wear red-caps (kırmızı çuhadan taçlar).
Eventually, his followers and subjects were called ‘kızılbaş’. Ismail’s goal in doing so
was to differentiate his men from the Ottomans. 1754 We know that the word “kızılbaş”
was not initiated by Ismail, but by his father Shaykh Haydar. Then how should we
interpret this false account repeated in relatively independent Ottoman sources? The
answer must somehow be related to the ‘political’ connotation of the word ‘kızılbaş’ in
the Ottoman context. Before appearing as a temporal power, Safavids and their disciples
were simply ‘sufis’ in the eyes of the Ottoman officials. When they turned into a
political rival, the term ‘sufi’ was replaced by ‘kızılbaş’.
It is understood from Ottoman sources that the epithet of ‘qizilbash’ achieved
wide acceptance among Ottomans only after Ismail’s achievement of significant
temporal power. Because of that, this term not only conveyed mystical connotations
such as being spiritual devotees of the Safavid order for which the term ‘sufi’ had been
1753 See SLZ1, pp. 428-9.
1754 See ANMH, p. 39. This anonymous historical document was written in the sixteenth century,
approximately one century before Solakzāde. On the other hand, a careful examination reveals that it
evidently has a different stand from other ottoman chronicles. Thus, though still bearing discernible
familial resemblances with Solakzāde and with other Ottoman chronicles, there are reasons to deem its
account considerably independent than that of the established clichés in the Ottoman historiography of the
sixteenth-century.
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