The Sun and the Lion

While the Portuguese were still running for faith and money in the Indian Ocean, Ibrahim, who had arranged the affairs of Central Asia, returned to his loyal Tabriz.

The King of Kings, who returned to the palace, naturally had to sort out his internal affairs. The first thing he had to do was to reward the ordinary soldiers based on their merits. The rewards for the ordinary soldiers had been distributed before they were disbanded. To deal with these, only enough Gold and silver property.

The trouble is that rewards for officers, mainly senior officers, confer upon them greater status and honors than mere possessions. However, until this time, the Safavid court did not yet have a complete military hierarchy system. Consolidating the hierarchy is what Ibrahim is thinking about at the moment.

The King of Kings already has a preliminary draft on how to construct this military rank system, but he needs to listen to some suggestions and opinions before it is officially promulgated.

The Grand Emir and the Military Vizier, who had been separated from him for a long time, first saluted and congratulated him on the great victory in Khorasan: "Your Majesty, all the battle reports you sent back have been read carefully by everyone in the palace. You conquered Khorasan." Everyone knows about Luo Shan's martial arts. Please accept my humble congratulations and respect."

The fact is as the two said, after the military exploits of recovering Khorasan spread, the reputation of the King of Kings was known from Venice to the river. Both the Ottomans and the Mamluks sent envoys to Tabriz to celebrate with gifts. Ibrahim's victory, the foreign affairs vizier has received a letter notifying the matter in advance.

These are all afterthoughts. Ibrahim accepted the flattery of the two and said: "These honors are insignificant and there is no need to talk about it too much. I summoned you today not just to listen to your beautiful words, I have something I need to discuss the matter with you.”

As soon as he finished speaking, Kamran, who received the signal, handed a draft of the document to the Grand Emir. Hussein glanced at it and handed it to the military vizier on the side.

He asked: "Your Majesty, do you want to reform the army?"

"I want to promulgate a new hierarchy system in the military, which is what you have seen. After reading it, you can report to me any thoughts and opinions you have." After saying that, Ibrahim found that the two of them did not Show resistance.

In the new military rank system, he followed the example of Mansabdar in determining quantified grades and corresponding benefits for officers at all levels through the number of cavalry. But except for the tribal nobles, Ibrahim did not intend to give real estate to the officers like Akbar so that they could support the cavalry on their own. In this case, it was not right to give the ten husbands a salary equivalent to ten cavalry. possible.

Therefore, the set he prepared was still aimed at senior officers above the rank of commander. Junior officers below the rank of commander were still given fixed powers and treatment according to their official positions.

As for the titles of senior military officers, he plans to no longer use Khan, Sultan, and Bey as military ranks, but as additional honorary titles. According to regulations, all senior officers can be collectively called generals. They can also use titles such as castle lord, supply officer, deputy commander in charge of various arms, or legion commander, commander of guards, governor, etc. who independently command an army. .

All of these titles are of Persian origin, and many of the words can be traced back to the late Classical era that has faded into dust, that is, the Sassanid Dynasty.

The minimum salary for senior officers is one hundred cavalry, which is equal to the income of one hundred cavalry. These are usually exchanged in the form of currency, and the maximum is five thousand cavalry. The higher levels can only be held by members of the royal family. At the same time, clear regulations have been made on the formal uniforms, armor decorations, military flag specifications, and private guard sizes of senior officers of different ranks.

Neither of them had any objections to these changes. They just picked up a few words from ancient times. The system was created by the King of Kings. Even though most senior officers of the Safavid Army currently speak Azerbaijani, Ibrahim still insisted that all documents in the palace be written in Persian, and the dignitaries finally accepted this result.

This military hierarchy naturally covers every part of the Safavid army, but the three parts of the central army, tribal army and local army are very different, and corresponding adjustments must be made on this basis.

The Central Army, that is, the Praetorian Guard and the Standing Army directly under him, everything they own comes from the palace, and they do not own territory or people. Moreover, the only senior officers in this system who are higher than the captain of the thousand are the commander of the bodyguards, Hashayar, the commander of the Model Army and Ghulam's regiment, Kehobad, and the artillery director Salman.

Although Ibrahim was trying his best to expand his standing army, the tribal army was still Safavid's largest source of troops. The seven red-headed tribes alone could provide him with about 60,000 to 80,000 high-quality tribal cavalry-as long as they were not Heavy losses were suffered in a short period of time - not to mention the politically marginalized other Turkmen tribes, Kurdish tribes and various tribes of the Eastern peoples. Find Shuyuan www.zhaoshuyuaｎ.com

In order to better draw resources from these various tribes that could reach a cooperative relationship with the court, Ibrahim planned to establish a stable feudal obligation-rights system that could include various tribes through this military hierarchy.

The core is still the red-headed tribe that has been following the religious order for a long time. The rated military service divided by Ibrahim for them is still the 60,000 previously registered. How to share this obligation requires an inventory of the real estate owned by each tribe.

As for the other excluded tribes, Ibrahim will arrange to invite these chiefs and nobles during the new year's hunting activities. As long as they swear allegiance to him in the royal tent in the hunting ground, they can be directly integrated into the palace. , is no longer the target of suppression.

It just so happened that he heard from Turgut that there were still remnants of the old Aries dynasty in Iraq trying to cause chaos. This way, he could also screen out the heroes who understand the current affairs and eliminate the rubbish who do not understand the current affairs.

The final local army refers to road guards, town guards, and militia organized by rural landowners. Their leaders will also be included in the system, and the garrison captains in large cities can be honored as castle lords. Leaders of small towns, scattered militia groups and road guard captains are only addressed by official titles below captain of thousands.

"The system designed by Your Majesty is already very complete and detailed. I really don't have any talent to make additions, deletions or modifications. The sage wisdom of the King of Kings is beyond the reach of me."

This compliment made Ibrahim very happy, and he turned to order the chief clerk on the side: "Kamran, copy these orders and send them to the emir and military vizier. I will also give them in front of the emperor." This decree was promulgated in public at the meeting and the rewards for the meritorious officials were announced."