Body conflict, our familiar of yesterday and today/ Morteza Hamoonian
A body belonging to Reza Shah was discovered in the garden of Touiti Shah Abdolazim Hosseini. However, this body was a reminder of the behavior of Sheikh Sadegh Khalkhali, the first ruler of the Revolutionary Courts in Iran after the revolution, who destroyed the mausoleum of the Pahlavi dynasty and never got his hands on Reza Khan’s body. This behavior of Khalkhali in that year and recent behaviors with the attributed mummy, however, can raise the question whether such a history of such treatment of the bodies of previous rulers existed in the past of Iran? Is Khalkhali’s behavior and the behaviors of the Islamic Republic towards the bodies of opponents (deceased or executed) a specific example of a character and behavior, or is it a precedent?
Although describing and expanding on such behaviors certainly requires a very broad scope and it may be necessary to conduct an extensive historical research in this regard, the brief answer to the above question is affirmative. Whether right or wrong, the history of Iran is full of such behaviors where new rulers have treated the bodies of previous rulers with disrespect or have taken revenge on their opponents. Out of anger, hatred, and animosity, they have not spared the bodies of previous rulers or their opponents, and have done whatever they could to soothe their anger and calm their hearts. However, violence and revenge have never been and will never be a soothing and healing remedy for anyone’s heart. Let it be known that these rulers of the time, in every era, have been among the most ruthless, and if given the chance, they have made a pile of corpses.
Perhaps one of the most famous accounts is the story of the encounter between the Qajar dynasty and the founder of the Zand dynasty. According to historical reports, Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar took the bones of Karim Khan Zand out of his grave and brought them to Tehran… and buried them at the threshold of the royal court so that he could trample on the bones of his enemies every day in his imagination. (1)
Thirteen years after the death, shrouding, and burial of the attorney of the subjects, Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar, when he reached Shiraz, he turned a blind eye to the rights and old affections of the attorney towards himself and ordered for the destruction of the attorney’s tomb on the day of his arrival in the city on 18 Shawwal 1206 AH. He also ordered for the remaining body to be taken to Tehran and buried in the place of his daily passage. Although this account has intentionally been omitted in many official sources of the Qajar period, it has been mentioned in many other sources: “Rahman Khan Yuzbashi said, ‘Bring the head and bones of Karim Khan to Shiraz, as the wise Anvari said, ‘Like a plant grown from the soil, it is time to lift him from the ground.’ Bring his bones to me and bury them in the place of my daily passage, so that every time
And of course, this body finally, after about 150 years after the death of Karim Khan, comes to life during the reign of Reza Shah Pahlavi and the bones are returned to Shiraz to be buried in their rightful place.
But the lawyer of the people was not the only victim of this issue. The body of Nader Shah Afshar and his children also did not have a happy fate. Nader Shah Afshar had already built his own tomb. “Nader Shah Afshar built his first tomb in 1143-1145 lunar years, and after officially becoming the king of Iran and returning from his prosperous trip to India, he built a tomb for himself in Mashhad and transported large blocks of black marble from Dehkhwarqan in Azerbaijan to Khorasan for its construction.” Ali Shahidi, an expert in historical research, continued in a report titled “The Tomb of Naderi and the Bones They Brought from Tehran to Mashhad” in February 2013, stating that “some of these stones, weighing between twenty to sixty kharvars, cost one and a half kharvar of silver to transport, which is why three pieces of these stones were called
The witness also says: “This mausoleum was built on the north side of the street, in front of the previous mausoleum, where the mausoleum of Nader Shah is now located. He also built another suitable mausoleum for his family in Kalat Naderi, but in the end he was not buried in any of these tombs.” The body of Nader Shah Afshar, however, was initially buried in Tehran after his murder in a rebellion by his commanders and later, during the late Qajar period, Qavam al-Sultan ordered the grave to be dug up and Nader Shah’s bones to be transferred to his new tomb in Mashhad. (3)
Nader’s children also did not have a happy fate in this regard. “Shahrokh Mirza began his reign in Mashhad in 1161, instead of his father Nader. He did not hand over all of Nader’s jewels to Agha Mohammad Khan, so the Qajar dynasty ordered his head to be crushed and then poured molten lead on his head. He was sent to Mazandaran while he was only 63 years old and died on the way, and the location of his grave is unknown.” Additionally, “The last king of the Afsharid dynasty, Nader Mirza, was the son of Shahrokh who ruled in Mashhad for a while, but Fath Ali Shah Qajar captured him in 1218, arrested him and sent him to Tehran, where he was killed. The location of his grave is also unknown.” (4)
And of course, this tradition had been practiced before the burial of Afsharid and Karim Khan, some of the Safavid kings had also participated in this tradition.
During the reign of Shah Abbas I, the Uzbeks attacked Khorasan and committed atrocities, killing and beheading people and destroying their livelihoods. They also went after the body of Shah Tahmasb I in order to humiliate the Safavids. After his death, the body of Shah Tahmasb I was entrusted to the mausoleum of Prince Hussein Qazvini. According to the history of Alam Ara-ye Abbas, the body was then buried in the shrine of Imam Reza. However, the Uzbeks attacked and removed the body from the grave. They later found out that the body of Shah Tahmasb was buried in another location and a man named Dostam Bahadur was tasked with taking his bones to Bukhara. Along the way, one of the supporters of the Safavid dynasty convinced Dostam Bahadur to return the bones and he agreed. Shah Abbas I then declared that the body that had been previously insult
After the fate of the body of the first Tahmasb, the son of the founder of the Safavid dynasty, Ismail I, it seemed that the Safavid shahs had learned not to place the body of a deceased shah in a known location. Therefore, most of the tombs of the Safavid shahs (not all, but many) are hidden and in unknown places. So much so that we do not have accurate information about the tombs of Ismail II and Mohammad Khodabandeh. However, we do know that the latter is buried in the holy shrines, but the exact location is unknown.
Even regarding the power and reign of the Safavids, specifically Abbas I, the accounts are not definitive. Hassan Naraghi, in his article titled “A View of the Tomb of Shah Abbas the Great in Kashan and its Historical Documents,” after thorough document analysis, states that “it can be said with certainty and complete conviction that the real burial place of Shah Abbas the Great is known and determined, and it is the famous tomb located in the shrine of Habib ibn Musa in the back of Mashhad Kashan, with a large and expensive black stone, and nothing else.” However, some also mention the uncertainty of the location of Abbas I’s burial. They say, “But in reality, whether Shah Abbas’ remains were transferred to one of these places or remain in the same neighborhood behind Mashhad Kashan, no one knows for sure. According to one account, he was secretly taken to Qom to be buried in the holy shrines, and was temporarily left
As mentioned at the beginning, a detailed historical research is needed to tell how many of the kings of Iran, before and after Islam, have suffered such a fate and when this negative tradition has been established in the power relations among Iranian rulers. What has been mentioned above is only a handful of examples. Until researchers bring its detailed account to light.
But it was not only the kings who were sacrificed and their bodies destroyed in the era of Iranian kings. In the era of sultans, those who saw themselves at the peak of power and considered themselves above all creation, from artists to political dissidents and opponents, and even any human being who dared to oppose the “world’s qibla”, did not have the safety of their own lives and families, and their bodies were also not safe from the furious storms of royal anger.
One example of these artists is Mir Emad, the most famous and great calligrapher of Iran. Shah Abbas Safavi despised Mir Emad because of a story (which should be mentioned elsewhere). “The end of Shah Abbas Safavi’s hatred towards Mir Emad caused him to send a group of ruffians, led by Bik Qazvini, the chief of the Shahsoon tribe in Qazvin, to kill him in the darkness of the night when Mir Emad was going to the bathhouse. And because Mir Emad had angered the Shah, for several days no one dared to gather his body, which had been left for decomposition, from the ground and bury it! Until finally Abu Torab, the calligrapher of Isfahan who was a student of Mir Emad, did this and buried him at the gate of the goldsmiths in Isfahan.” (7)
And then we began talking with Reza Khan Mirpanj, who later became the Shah, and the story of the discovered mummified body attributed to him. But what did this very Reza Khan/Shah do with the bodies of his opponents?
The news of Mirza’s death reached Mohammad Khan Salarshoja, the brother of Amir Moqaddar Talash, who was an enemy of Mirza. He went with a group of gunmen to the Gilavan Khanqah in Khalkhal and prevented the locals from burying the bodies. Then he ordered one of his companions, named Reza Eskastani, from the village of Eskastan in Khalkhal, to decapitate Mirza’s frozen head from his body. Mohammad Khan then took the head to his brother Amir Moqaddar in Masal and from there to Rasht, where he surrendered to military commanders. The body of Mirza Kuchak Khan was buried without a head in the village cemetery, among the graves and the cries of the local women. Mirza Kuchak Khan’s head was placed near the Rasht barracks, in a place known as Nobel Oil Warehouse, where it was displayed to the public for a long
According to the telegram, congratulations on the successful pursuit and capture of Mirza Kuchak. The team has been chasing him for four consecutive days and finally, due to the intensity of the pursuit, Mirza Kuchak was forced to retreat to the mountains of Masal. Some Kazakhs were also chasing him and there was an accident on the way. Mirza Ne’matollah, the son-in-law of Hasan Khan Kish Darreh, was killed and the rest managed to escape. On the other hand, the Talysh people also sent a team to prevent Mirza Kuchak from escaping. Eventually, Mirza Kuchak and Gha’ouk took refuge in the Giloovan Khalkhal pass, where they died from the intense cold. Before the chasing Kazakhs arrived, the Talysh and Tarmi people had a conversation and cut off Mirza Kuchak’s head. The Kazakhs arrived and took the head to
Certainly, the list of those whose bodies did not meet a good end due to their opposition to the ruling of their time is much more detailed than we can cover due to the brevity of our patience. Also, mentioning the story of Mirza Kuchak Khan is not intended to justify the behavior attributed to Reza Shah Pahlavi, or the behavior of Khalkhali towards the tomb of the first Pahlavi king. Both of these behaviors have been ugly and against human principles. Just as the Islamic Republic government has taken the lead in such behaviors after the revolution. From the bodies of the executed of the previous regime in the early days of the revolution, to the massacres of the 1960s, and the reports of political prisoners of those days who counted the night of 300 and 400 executions, to the massacres of the summer of 1988. The bodies of the majority of this group were never handed over to their families, and no specific
Many times we ask why such violence is prevalent in our society. But it is good to take a look back at ourselves and our history. We have also done what we should not have done, to the extent of our ability and power. Criticizing ourselves and our history and our past can be a guide for the future. Hopefully, we will be people who are critical of ourselves.
Notes:
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The story of the burial of the bones of Karim Khan Zand in Golestan Palace, ISNA, November 25, 1395.
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طور که
As
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Karim Khan Zand’s grave was excavated by order of Reza Shah, in Reyvaz-e Jonub on 5 Farvardin 1395.
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Ma’iri, Maryam, Naderi Garden in Mashhad and the tomb of Nader Shah Afshar, Janketayim, 24 Bahman month 1396.
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Where is the tomb of Iranian kings? Parsineh, 16 Azar month 1394.
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Naraqi, Hasan, and Nazari visited the tomb of Shah Abbas the Great in Kashan and its historical documents, the Great Islamic Encyclopedia, on February 3rd, 2016.
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His body remained on the ground, an artist whose lines were worth gold, ISNA, September 3rd, 2014.
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Mirza Saleh, Flama Hussein, Qajar’s collapse and the rise of Pahlavi (Report of the British Consulates), Tehran: Negah-e Moaser Publications, 1387, p. 272.
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Karim Khan started his life as an actor. Monthly Peace Line Magazine Mortazai Hamoonian Mr. Mohammad Khan Qajar Mummy of Reza Shah peace line Reza Shah