A Death in Tabriz

In 1494, in another world, a seven-year old boy named Ismail was pulled out of a house by soldiers in Tabriz, a city which, in our world, his actions would place in the west of Iran. In our world, the soldiers didn't find him. After being transfered from safehouse to safehouse by his followers in Tabriz, he escaped the city and came of age among Turkic tribesmen in the wilds of Azerbaijan. He took his rightful place as leader of the Safavids, a Sufi order lead by a hereditary line of masters, which over time had built up a rich treasury and its own private military, made up of fanatically devoted Azeri tribesman who considered the Safavid leaders to be the manifestations of God on Earth. The power of the Safavids led them to be alternately courted as allies and persecuted as dangerous enemies by the Aq Qoyunlu, the Turkic tribe that ruled Iran. Ismail defeated the Aq Qoyunlu in our world. He became known to history as Shah Ismail I of Persia, and he wrenched that country, long a stronghold of Sunnism, into the Shia branch of Islam, importing Ayatollahs from Lebanon and eastern Arabia to spread the faith to the people of Iran. His descendants ruled Iran until the 18th century.

Before that, however, he was a little boy, whose father and brother, the heads of the Safavid order, had been killed by the Aq Qoyunlu. And in another world, they got to him too. With its line of ruling masters extinct, the Safavid order imploded, its fearsome military turning in on itself and destroying itself in a struggle for power, and leaving the Aq Qoyunlu to continue ruling Iran, for a little longer. Shah Ismael and the Safavids were utterly lost to history. And for the peoples of the Middle East and Europe, that loss would make a very big difference indeed.

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Just to clarify, for those unfamiliar with Iranian history who may not have gotten the introduction: the POD is Shah Ismail I, the founder of the Safavid dynasty, getting killed by the by the Aq Qoyunlu as a young boy (as opposed to OTL, where he escaped the Aq Qoyunlu manhunt for the Safavid ruling family, the only member of them to do so). He thus doesn't go on destroy the Aq Qoyunlu in 1508-the first immediate effect being that Iran remains a Sunni country.
 
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...The Aq Qoyunlu (literally "White Sheep" in their native Azeri Turkic language) comfortably fit into a pattern in Iranian and Turkish history established since the Seljuk invasions of the 11th century. They were a confederation of nomadic tribes speaking the Azeri Turkic dialect, largely held together by the strength of their rulers. While the Aq Qoyunlu are mentioned in historical records from the 14th century, they did not become a major power until 1402, when Timur the Lame (Tamerlane) granted them land in eastern Turkey. The Aq Qoyunlu spent much of the early 15th century in a series of wars against a rival Azeri tribal confederation, the Qara Qoyunlu (Black Sheep), who controlled parts of southeastern Turkey and most of Iraq, including Baghdad. The Aq Qoyunlu finally destroyed the Qara Qoyunlu in 1467, and subsequently took control of most of western and central Iran. The Aq Qoyunlu leader, Uzun Hassan, then tried to challenge the growing power of the Ottomans to his west by allying with Venice. This was less successful, and he lost the Battle of Tercan against the Ottomans in 1473. During the latter half of the 15th century, the Aq Qoyunlu were consumed with a series of succession wars, which continued into the 16th century and greatly weakened the dynasty...


-From A Short History of the Persian World by Malcolm Lewis
(Almost all of that is OTL-I gave it as background so people might understand the TL a little better)
 
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The last years of the reign of Sultan Bayezid II of the Ottoman Empire were relatively peaceful, but it all ended in 1511. The root cause was several hundred miles to the east-Khan Yaqub Beg of the Aq Qoyunlu. The Aq Qoyunlu were pressed on two fronts-by the Ottomans to the west, and the resurgent Uzbeks, led by Shaybani Khan, to their east. Yaqub had resolved to deal with the first himself, but he needed to distract the Ottomans. To that end, he decided to wage war by proxy, recruiting a number of dissafected Azeri tribesmen-among them the last remnants of the Safavid military, which had largely disintegrated after the death of its ruling family-and encouraging them to invade the Ottoman empire. The motely army, numbering around 10,000 and led by one Hassan Halife, crossed the border in early 1514, and provided a lightening rod for all of eastern Anatolia's discontents-independent minded tribesman unwilling to submit to Constantinople, heterodox Shias, dervishes, and other holy men, and former Ottoman cavalry whose position had been displaced by the mostly Christian-born jannisaries. Beyezid tasked his favorite son, Ahmed, with putting it down, and he successfully smashed Hassan Halife's army at the Battle of Sivas, and spend the next few months securing eastern Anatolia for the Ottomans. Ahmed then decided to exploit his success by marching to Constantinople, to seize the throne from his aging father.

To defend his position, Bayezid turned to his other son Selim, who caught up with Ahmed near the city of Bursa and defeated him. Having won the jannisaries over to his side by promising a campaign into Europe, Selim returned to Constantinople and forced his father to abdicate.

To fullfill his promise, Selim led the an Ottoman army against the Hungarian fortress of Belgrade in 1515. After a little less than a month of siege, the city surrenderd, and Selim pressed inward, into the heart of Hungary.

King Vladislus II of Hungary and Bohemia had hastily raised an army, and gave battle to the Ottomans on a swampy plane known as Mohacs. The Battle of Mohacs would become one of the defining events in Hungarian history-King Vladislus died, along with over half of the Hungarian forces present and, for the next century and a half, Hungarian independence. After the battle, Selim's soldiers entered Budapest unopposed, and Selim set about making arrangements for the kingdom. While Vladislus had a son, Louis, he was only nine years old, and Hungary was still technically an elective monarchy. Aside from Selim, the most powerful man in Hungary was a Transylvanian nobleman named John Zapolya, who had arrived too late to participate at Mohacs and thus had an intact military to back him up. John Zapolya met with Selim, and offered to guarantee peace on his northern frontier if Selim would support him as King over Louis. When Hungary's remaining nobility gathered in a formal Diet to elect the next king, the electors were subtly informed as to what Selim's preference was, and to drive the point home, soldiers-both Ottoman and from Zapolya's private military-surrounded the Diet, which, after much deliberation, duly elected Zapolya as Hungary's next King. Vladislus' widow, Anna of Foix, fled with Louis to Prague, capital of Bohemia, which her late husband had also ruled. Not having an army of Jannisaries to provide its unique persuasive power, the estates of Bohemia elected Louis as King with Anna as regent. Meanwhile, the newly minted King John of Hungary and Selim formally signed a peace treaty-Hungary agreed to permanently give up Croatia, Belgrade, and Banat, and pay an annual tribute to the Sultan, and not do anything against his interests.

Selim then departed Budapest, leaving a Turkish resident and a garrison of several thousand men to remind everyone in Hungary who the province's real ruler was. While many Jannisaries had wanted to annex Hungary, and use it as a base against the Austrian Hapsburgs, events to the east had convinced Selim not to. Yaqub Beg's offensive against Shaybani Khan had come to a crashing end in 1514 at the Battle of Marv-Yaqub's forces had been routed, and he himself had barely escaped. Shortly afterwards, Yaqub had been assasinated by one of his sons, Hassan, but Hassan had been unable to secure the throne and the Aq Qoyunlu tribe had desolved into a succession war. Rumors abounded of a renewed offensive by Shaybani Khan to exploit the chaos, and Selim couldn't allow a potential adversary to aquire the Aq Qoyunlu's holdings in Azerbaijan* and Iraq, which would make excellent potential bases to attack the Ottoman Empire itself. Selim had to move first.

The Ottoman war against the Aq Qoyunlu began in 1516, when Selim's army departed Constantinople, heading for Azerbaijan. Hassan, the strongest of the many contenders for the Khanship of the Aq Qoyunlu, met Selim in battle at Chaldiran. The conclusion, however, was almost foregone-Selim's forces outnumbered Hassan's by almost four to one, and were composed mainly of cavalry archers, were as Selim had a modern army with muskets and an artillery corps. The Ottomans suffered very few casualties, but Hassan's army was virtually wiped out. Selim spent the next six months in Azerbaijan hunting down several more of the Aq Qoyunlu princelets, whose forces were even smaller than Hassan had been, and by the autumn had secured the area and installed garrisons in Ardabil and Tabriz. He then marched down the length of Iraq, which capitulated with little resistance. Selim spent the next few months in Baghdad, and met with emisaries from Shaybani Khan, who had successfully secured most of Persia, including the cities of Isfahan, Shiraz, and Qazvin. While the negociations were uneasy-with the Uzbek side trying to get the Ottomans to give up Azerbaijan and Iraq-in the end the two agreed to formalize the de facto partition of the old Aq Qoyunlu empire. Sultan Selim returned to Constantinople in triumph.

*In addition to the OTL Republic of Azerbaijan, the historical region of that name also covers a large part of OTL northwestern Iran.
 
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Oh, and here's a map of the Mideast, in case anyone needs it.

And, the Aq Qoyunlu empire at its height. This area has now been essentially split in half between the Ottomans to the west and Shaybani Khan's Uzbeks to the east.

Aq_Qoyunlu.png
 
Despite his recent victory against the Aq Qoyunlu, Sultan Selim couldn't afford to rest for long. His aquisition of Iraq had virtually guaranteed a conflict with the Mamluk Sultanate, which controlled Egypt and Syria and now feared Ottoman encirclement. In 1518, learning that the Mamluks were preparing an invasion of Iraq, Selim decided to strike first. His army entered Syria and, near Aleppo, defeated a smaller Mamluk army at the Battle of Marj Dabiq, capturing the titular Caliph. The Abbasid Caliphate had ceased to exist as a political entity in the 13th century with the Mongol invasion, but a relative of the dynasty had fled to Cairo and been recieved by the Mamluk Sultan. He and his descendants claimed the title of Caliph, though they excercised no political power, and only served to formally entitle the Mamluk Sultan at his coronation. Selim for his part sent the Caliph to Constantinople, where he agreed to surrender his title to the Sultan. The next year, Selim marched into Egypt itself, and destroyed the last Mamluk army at the Battle of Ridaniya outside of Cairo. The Mamluk Sultanate was no more, and its lands-Syria, Egypt, and the Hejaz*-were annexed into the Ottoman Empire. Selim now controlled Mecca and Medina, and in addition to Caliph also took the title "Servant of the Two Holy Mosques".

*The west coast of Saudi Arabia
 
Two things: Where is the line in Azerbaijan? Ardabil? Farther south? The Iranian Plateau is such a natural barrier... Also, what's the Caliph doing in Syria where he was captured? Shouldn't he simply remain in Cairo? Minor change I guess but I'm not sure I see the logic behind it.
 
Two things: Where is the line in Azerbaijan? Ardabil? Farther south? The Iranian Plateau is such a natural barrier... Also, what's the Caliph doing in Syria where he was captured? Shouldn't he simply remain in Cairo? Minor change I guess but I'm not sure I see the logic behind it.

To the first question, the line is a little to the south of Ardabil, but not very clearly defined, and yes, the Ottomans in Azerbaijan are kind of exposed and Shaybani Khan would really like to have the whole province himself. This is going to cause problems further on.

The Caliph being in Syria is OTL-the Sultan bought his entire court with almost all the officials, including the Caliph, to Syria for the battle, and they were all captured/killed. The vizier, Tuman Bey, was the only major personage left behind in Cairo, and afterwards declared himself Sultan, though he was killed by the Ottomans the next year during the conquest of Egypt.
 
While 1519 was the year of triumph for the Ottomans in Egypt, things were not going nearly so well on the opposite end of their domains.

Croatia had been ceded by Hungary to the Ottoman Empire in 1515 after the Battle of Mohacs, but from the start, Ottoman rule their wasn't smoothe. Ottoman government officials and tax collectors found themselves the objects of deep anger and resentment in Zagreb, and any who tried to impose Imperial authority in the rugged mountains of western Croatia often paid with their lives. Four years after the beginning of Ottoman control, renewed attempts to systematically impose the jizya (the poll tax on non-Muslims) and deveshirme (collection of young boys for service in the Janissary Corps and Ottoman bureaucracy) caused the building popular anger to spill over into a general revolt.

The uprising was led by a Croatian nobleman named Ivan Karlovic, but officially had the goal of installing Louis of Bohemia, son of the previous Hungarian king Vladislus II, as King of Hungary and Croatia*. Because Selim and the main Ottoman army were in Egypt, the first person to respond to the rebellion was none other than John Zapolya himself, who was both deeply offended by Karlovic's attacks on his legitimacy and eager to prove his loyalty to the Ottomans. Thus, in late 1519, Zapolya led a mixed force of Hungarian troops and Turks pulled out of garrisons in Banat and Budapest into Croatia to reestablish Ottoman authority. Zapolya's force easily cleared the plains of Slavonia in eastern Croatia of rebels, and took the city of Zagreb in February of 1520. The main force of rebels, however, had retreated westward into the Croatian alps, and when Zapolya attempted to pursue them, his forces were ambushed at the Battle of Barilovic and suffered heavy losses.

Having settled things in Egypt and returned to Constantinople, Sultan Selim gathered a much larger Ottoman army-including the much-feared Janissaries-and departed for Croatia himself, determined to crush the rebellion. However, the Hapsburgs and Venetians, who had no love for the Turks, had begun running much needed cash and supplies to Karlovic's rebels, who would become a major irritant to the Ottomans over the next few years. Karlovic's rebels avoided facing the much larger Turkish and Hungarian armies, but fought a guerilla war, launching numerous hit-and-run attacks and ambushes, and always seemed to melt away into the mountains whenever the Turks tried to find them. Selim was forced to return to Constantinople in 1521 with the rebellion undefeated, and the generals he assigned the task to didn't do any better. Meanwhile, relations with the Shaybanids were deteriorating, and Selim faced the ever-increasing possibility of a campaign in Persia. Finally, in 1524, he secretly approached Ivan Karlovic with terms-if Karlovic agreed to recognize John Zapolya as King of Hungary and submit to the Ottomans, then he would be allowed to rule Croatia as an Ottoman vassal. Karlovic agreed, and was officially recognized by the Sultan as Ban** of Croatia. His territory didn't include Slavonia or Dalmatia, and he still had to recognize the suzrienity of the Sultan and pay tribute, but when he marched into Zagreb in triumph, he could justily claim to have outlasted one of the most powerful armies in Europe.

Meanwhile, frusterated in the Balkans, Sultan Selim readied his troops for the coming war in Persia....

*Though Hungary was an elective monarchy, the disregarding of Louis in favor of Zapolya was highly unusual, and Zapolya was widely considered a Turkish puppet.
**A south slavic title roughly meaning "lord"
 
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