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Late Islamic Period: History
The late Islamic period was an age of
empires, when the Islamic world was governed by three
powerful dynasties: the Safavids in Iran; the Mughals in India; and the greatest of the late Islamic dynasties, the Ottomans,
who ruled Anatolia, the Arab lands, and much of eastern Europe. Although
the Ottomans already controlled all of Anatolia and parts of eastern
Europe prior to 1453 and their conquest of Constantinople (thereafter
Istanbul), which they made their capital, the sixteenth century was the
Ottoman golden age.
In
1517 the Mamluk empire fell to the Ottomans, and by the
middle of the sixteenth century Ottoman control extended
from central Europe to the Indian Ocean. The Ottoman
Empire reached the peak of its military and political
potency under Sulayman the Magnificent (r. 1520–66),
whose armies advanced as far west as Vienna. To
Sulayman’s reign also belong some of the greatest
achievements of Ottoman architecture, particularly the
enormous and incomparable mosques and religious
foundations that he had built in Istanbul.
Ottoman power began to weaken in
the century following Sulayman’s death. For the
first time the Ottoman army experienced large-scale
military defeat at the hands of the Europeans, whose
military and economic power continued to overwhelm them
in the eighteenth century. The empire was finally
dismantled following Ottoman defeat in World War I, with
only Anatolia remaining under Turkish rule.
In the early sixteenth
century Iran was united under the rule of the Safavid
dynasty, whose members traced their descent to Shaykh Safi, a Sufi who founded a dervish
order at Ardabil, in northwestern Iran. In 1501 the young
and charismatic Ismacil Safavi seized control
of northwestern Iran from the Aq Quyunlu and was
proclaimed the first Safavid shah, in Tabriz, the new
capital. Ismacil established Shicite Islam
as the official religion of the Safavid state, which at
the time consisted only of the province of Azerbayjan.
Within a decade, however, all of Iran was under Safavid
control.
The greatest of the
Safavid rulers was Shah cAbbas (r.
1587–1629), who inherited a kingdom beset by
political, financial, and military troubles. As part of
his political and fiscal reforms, cAbbas
transferred his capital to Isfahan, in central Iran,
where he built a new city adjoining the old one. cAbbas
also advocated trade with Europe, to which Iran exported
silk, along with carpets, textiles, and ceramics. Under cAbbas,
Iran reached new heights of power, prosperity, and
opulence, and although his successors failed to match his
achievements, they continued his traditions for another
century, until the fall of the Safavid dynasty in 1732.
Image in top banner:
Tile Panel, Turkey, Iznik, Ottoman, last quarter of the 16th century; fritware, underglaze painted; 29 1/2 x 52 3/4 in. (74.93 x 133.99 cm); The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection, gift of Joan Palevsky, M.73.5.6
Browse the Islamic
art collection at LACMA
Travel with LACMA to the Middle East
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Late Islamic Period: Art 