The Mughal, Ottoman, and Safavid Empires are a couple of the most dominant empires we have to date. All three of these empires are similar and different in their own ways. Each empire had influential rulers, both art and literature affect each culture in a different way, and all had horrible leaders that lead to their decline. All of these characteristics play a huge role in how the empire’s impact the rest of time.
All of these empires are similar because they all had major rulers that impacted the society. Suleyman the Lawgiver, Shah Abbas, and Akbar are the three emperors that contribute to making a great society. Suleyman the Lawgiver contributed to the Ottoman Empire by helping it reach the peak of its time. Suleyman was a very important emperor and military leader that conquered important European cities; he later moves on to bigger and better cities.
Suleyman’s most important accomplishment was when he built a workable social structure for his society. He also created a new code to handle many actions causing problems throughout the society. He made taxation simpler which bettered the lives of everyday citizens. Shah Abbas also created an amazing paint in Safavid culture like Suleyman. It was the golden age that brought different empires together. He reformed both militaries and everyday life.
Abbas limited the power of the militaries and built his own army that is only loyal to him. He convinced merchants that he sis open minded about all types of religions this brought Christian ways into the empire. Akbar was one of the smartest rulers when it comes to cultural blending. Akbar was a big believer in religion and the freedom to practice the religion you believed in. Akbar got rid of two taxes against people; the tax on Hindu Pilgrims and tax on non-Muslims. The reason he changed this was he wanted it to be easier for common people to afford. Since he changed the taxes this brought more and more money into the empire. All of these empires had strong militaries because of their rulers and what they did to better them.
Arts and Literature were a big role in all of the empires and they also impacted all of the cultures. In every empire the spread of art and literature is always under the influence of the significant leaders that I’m writing about. In the Ottoman Empire art and literature thrived during Suleyman’s reign. Their arts resembled something similar to the Renaissance period.
The arts in the Ottoman Empire were influenced by Persian and Arabian art which is represented in a new Turkish style. In the Safavid Empire they brought hundreds of Chinese artisans by Abbas. They created many different types of art work and also did metalwork. This created cultural blending between the two ideas; Chinese and Persian.
The most important piece of culture to the Safavids was the Persian Carpets. They showed European designs and became a huge demand throughout the empire. In the Mughal Empire they had something different from the other empires. They had their own type of architecture called “Akbar Period Architecture.” This form of design was graceful stonework with very detailed stone work. These detailed drawings represented many different Hindu themes. In both the Safavid and in the Mughal Empires the Persian Carpets and the detailed drawings represent something. The carpets show European designs and the drawings show Hindu themes.
All of these empires fell because they had horrible leaders that made big mistakes. The Ottoman Empire started to lose the empires ground little by little. Suleyman assassinated his son, exiled the second, and the third son became the ruler. This pattern kept happening throughout the next couple of generations. Eventually because this happened so much it ruined the empire and it fell. Shah Abbas made the same mistake as Suleyman which caused the same kind of path. He executed his sons and his grandson took charge of the empire.
The Safavid decline happened more rapidly than any of the other empires. A different emperor causes the collapse of the Mughal Empire. Aurangzeb was the only one of the three rulers that did not did his sons. He simply drained the empire of all its resources. When he died he left the empire to his sons and they fought over it but eventually they just ruled together for 12 years and then it all fell apart.
Other empires can learn from these to keep a good empire alive and strong. These three empires made greedy decisions that cause the fall of the empires. The Ottoman and Safavid rulers killed their sons and the Mughal Leader took all of the resources. Besides the reasons for the downfalls of the empires were all sturdy and had important emperors.
