Nizam al-Mulk

Nizam al -Mulk Abū ʿ Alī al -Hasan ibn ʿ Alī ibn Ishaaq at- Tusi (Arabic نظام الملك أبو علي الحسن بن علي بن إسحاق الطوسي, DMG Nizam al -Mulk Abū ʿ Alī al - Ḥasan ibn ʿ Alī ibn Ishaq aṭ - Tusi; * April 10, 1018, † October 14, 1092 ) was the vizier of the Seljuk sultans Alp Arslan and Malik Shah. His fame is mainly due to the fact to reason that he was ever since the murder of Alp Arslan ( 1072 ) in all respects, the actual ruler of the Seljuk Empire and reigned with suffocating success. His great achievements and appreciates input contemporary authors such as Ibn al - Athir even the "realm Nizam al - Mulk " ( الدولة النظامية, ad - Daula to - niẓāmīya ).

Life

Nizam al -Mulk was born in the small village Radkan at Tus in Khorasan. His family belonged to the resident -Persian nobility, the Dehqānān. Little is known about his youth, that his father served the Ghaznavids as a financial officer, among others. When the Seljuk Turks conquered Khorasan in 1040, Nizam al - Mulk fled father to Ghazni, where Nizam al -Mulk was probably working within the government. Around the year 1043 he entered the service of the Seljuks, followed him Alp Arslan appointed vizier in 1063 with the honorary title of " Nizam al -Mulk " ( "Order of the Empire ").

Nizam al - Mulk As clever politics entered the Seljuk an economic, cultural and scientific development time. Of particular importance here is that Nizam al -Mulk in cities such as Baghdad, Amul, Isfahan, Nishapur, Mosul, Basra and Herat madrasahs founded, to which he summoned the greatest scholars of his time. Of these, designated as Niẓāmīya schools after him that Baghdad was the most important. In addition, Nizam al -Mulk wrote an important work called Siyasat - nāma ( "Book of statecraft " ), in which he set out his view with reference to exemplary stories and anecdotes how to govern and manage a kingdom properly. The book is considered together with the QABUS - nāma as a prototype of the literary genre of the mirror prince and should even have influenced later European publications like Machiavelli's Il Principe.

The policy objectives Alp Arslan and Nizam al - Mulk included, among others:

• The creation of employment opportunities for the numerous Turkmen, who had immigrated during the Seljuk war successes to Persia and their nomadic way of life to some extent represented a significant threat to the political and economic stability of the country,
• The demonstration of the power of the Sultan (ie the strength and mobility of his forces, but also his grace towards docile Rebel)
• Sunni and Shiite maintaining local rulers as vassals of the Sultan and the increased use of relatives of the Sultan as provincial governors,
• The prevention of a dispute over Malik Shah successorship as Sultan and
• Maintaining good relations with the Abbasidenkalifat.

As once the Barmacides - viziers Nizam al -Mulk also represented - which contemporary poets and historians was considered a great organizer as well as an ideal soldier and scholar - the historic but now Islamized strong Persian civilization during the " barbarian " conquest of Iran. Only thanks to him it was the Turkic Seljuk possible to establish themselves in their new home as a true monarch. He was not only the leader of the Persian -dominated bureaucratic state apparatus ( Divan ), but - in his role as Atabeg Malik Shah - also of the royal court ( dargah ) and acted as political as a mediator between the two culturally very different camps of the Iranians and Turks. His mysterious assassination in 1092, which shocked the nobility and Hofestablishment of the empire, thus marked the beginning of the end of the Großseldschuken.

Works

• Nizamulmulk: Siyāsatnāma: thoughts and stories. For the first time from the Persian into Dt. speak. and inlaid. Karl Emil damage Binger of Schowingen. Alber, Freiburg / Munich 1960.