ĪĀĪ
Dīvānbegī was the designation for the highest-ranking officer in the Timurid office of finance and justice (ī-e aʿlā). The īԲī (cf. Pers. amīr-e ī) was responsible for placing the seal on decrees and was particularly concerned with increasing tax revenues and associated problems (Herrmann, p. 188). The Timurid administration was organized in two main branches, the top personnel of which consisted of ٴDZčīīs (Pers. ٴDZčī), military inspectors, and of īԲīs, respectively. These two amir-/beg-groups together constituted the grand amirs (omarāʾ-e ʿeẓām), with the title oloḡ beg. The chiefs of both branches were called amīr al-omarāʾ (q.v.), which explains why in Timurid sources two amīr al-omarāʾ are sometimes reported as having simultaneously served a single ruler. The office of the īԲīs, i.e., ī-e aʿlā, is already attested under Tīmūr (771-807/1370-1405), but the earliest mention of the office of ٴDZčīīs (i.e., ī-e ٴDZčī, ī-e laškar, or tork īī) is after the reign of Šāhroḵ (807-50/1405-47). Other synonyms for ī-e aʿlā were ī-e molk wa māl, ī-e māl, and sart īī (Mīr ʿAlī-Šīr, p. 29; Ando, pp. 224-27). Ḵᵛāndamīr reported (fols. 20b, 21a) that, according to the Mongol customary law (, ū), the omarāʾ-e ī-e māl ranked second after the omarāʾ-e ī-e ٴDZčī. It seems that at the same time several īԲīs were attested. For example, in 771/1370 Tīmūr named eight members of his entourage as ٴDZčī and six as amīr-e ī (īԲī; Yazdī, fol. 141b). Most īԲīs were of Turkish origin, but especially under Solṭān-Ḥosayn Bayqarā (875-912/1470-1506) there were reports of the activities of Persian īԲīs. The Timurids tended not to appoint members of tribes considered aristocratic, like the Barlās or the Arlāt, to influential posts as īԲīs, but rather only personal intimates of the ruler (Ando, pp. 234-39).
Bibliography:
ʿAbd-Allāh Morvārīd, &Dz;-峾, facs. ed. and tr. H. R. Roemer as Staatschreiben der Timuridenzeit. Das Šaraf-nāmä des ʿAbdallāh Marwārīd, Wiesbaden, 1952, pp. 169 ff.
Mīr ʿAlī-Šīr Navāʾī, ²īⲹ, ed. A. Ḥekmat and B. Čūbānzāda, Baku, 1926.
S. Ando, Timuridische Emire nach dem Muʿizz al-ansāb, Berlin, 1992.
G. Herrmann, Der historische Gehalt des “Nāmä-ye nāmī” von Ḫāndamīr, Ph.D. diss., Göttingen University, 1968.
Ḡīāṯ-al-Dīn Moḥammad Ḵᵛāndamīr, Nāma-ye nāmī, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, ms. Suppl. pers. 1842.
Moʿezz al-ansāb, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, ms. Pers. ancien fonds. 67.
Šaraf-al-Dīn ʿAlī Yazdī, Ẓaڲ-峾, ed. A. Urunbayev, Tashkent, 1972.
A. Z. Velidi Togan, “Ali Şîr,” İ I, pp. 349-57.
(SHIRO ANDO)
In the Safavid administrative system, the īԲī was one of the high-ranking amirs (addressed ʿī-) residing at court (omarā-ye dawlat-ḵāna). From the time of Shah ʿAbbās I onwards, there were normally seven ʿī-amīrs who together constituted the council of state (ī, Աī)). As an official of the internal palace administration, the īԲī had the status of moqarrab al-ḵāqān (Taḏkerat al-molūk, ed. Minorsky, pp. 44, 56ff; Savory, p. 355). Minorsky’s designation of the īԲī as “Lord High Justice” (Taḏkerat al-molūk, p. 119) is close to the mark. Although the īԲī could not rule on cases involving one of the four capital crimes under &Dz;īʿ law (murder, rape, the breaking of teeth, and blinding) unless the ṣas were present (Taḏkerat al-molūk, pp. 42. 50), the īԲī’s court was the highest appellate court in the land, and received appeals from the courts of the żī and from that of the šayḵ al-eslām (Taḏkerat al-molūk, p. 120, quoting Chardin, ed. Langlès, VI, pp. 54-55).
On four days a week, including Saturdays and Sundays when he was joined by the ṣa-e ḵāṣṣa, the īԲī presided over a court in the &Dz;ī-ḵān (guard house) at the ʿĀlī Qāpū palace. On other days he heard cases involving customary law (ʿǰ) in his own home. In both courts, if the case concerned ī revenue, or was a suit brought against an official of the central bureaucracy, the case was sent on to the vizier. If the case concerned ūčīs, ḡo峾s or members of other military units, or employees of the royal workshops (see BOYŪTĀT-E SALṬANATĪ), it was referred to the senior official (ī&Dz;-ī) of the appropriate department. Cases not involving ī revenue were decided by the īԲī himself. Plaintiffs from the provinces who had grievances against provincial governors and other officials and had not presented their cases heard in the vizier’s court, could apply to have their cases heard before the īԲī (Mīrzā Rafīʿā, p. 88; Taḏkerat al-molūk, pp. 42, 50-51). The salary of the īԲī was set at 500 toman, but could be as much as 1,000 toman; in addition, he received a ٴDzū (assignment; Taḏkerat al-molūk, p. 152) officially evaluated at 15 toman but yielding in reality 92 toman, 3,845 ī; Mīrzā Rafīʿā (p. 88) states that this ٴDzū had “recently” been cancelled.
Although the īԲī was one of seven ʿī- amīrs, his was not “high-profile” position, and the holders of this office are mentioned relatively rarely in the sources. The first person recorded as holding this office is Mīrzā ʿAlī Solṭān Qājār, who was the īԲī at the time of the death of Shah Ṭahmāsb (984/1576; Eskandar Beg, I, p. 140; tr. Savory, I, p. 226). This leads one to suppose that, during the earlier, formative period of the Safavid state, the legal functions of the īԲī were performed by officials such as the qāżī al-qożāt, the qāżī ʿaskar, and the šayḵ al-eslām. Qezelbāšamirs continued to hold the post of īԲī until toward the end of the reign of Shah ʿAbbās I, when the appointment is recorded in 1036/1626-27 of the aide-de-champ (yasāvol-e soḥbat) Rostam Beg, who continued to hold the office under Shah Ṣafī (Eskandar Beg, II, p. 1060; tr. Savory, II, p. 1283) and was succeeded in office by his son, Ṣafīqolī Beg (Waḥīd Qazvīnī, p. 221). Occasionally, the holder of the office of īԲī also held that of &Dz;ī-ī-&Dz;ī (e.g., ʿAlīqolī Khan Šāmlū and Kalb-ʿAlī Khan; see Eskandar Beg, II, pp. 887, 1040, tr. Savory, II, pp. 1104, 1261; Mofīd Bāfqī, III, p. 214). The office of īԲī also existed in the Uzbek administrative system in Transoxania in the late 16th and early 17th centuries (e.g., Eskandar Beg, I, pp. 456, 548, 553, II pp. 706, 927; tr. Savory, II, pp. 629, 728, 734, II, p. 898, 1145).
Bibliography:
Mīrzā Rafīʿā, Dastūr al-molūk, ed. M.-T. Dānešpažūh, MDAT, nos 63-70, 1347-48 Š./1968-69.
Moḥammad Mofīd Mostawfī Bāfqī, Jāmeʿ-e mofīdī, ed. Ī. Afšār, Tehran 1340 Š./1961.
R. M. Savory, “The Safavid Administrative System,” in Cam. Hist. Iran VI, 1986.
Moḥammad-Ṭāher Waḥīd Qazvīnī, ʿ-峾, ed. E. Dehgān, Arāk, 1329 Š./1950.
(ROGER M. SAVORY)
(Shiro Ando, Roger M. Savory)
Originally Published: December 15, 1995
Last Updated: November 28, 2011
This article is available in print.
Vol. VII, Fasc. 4, pp. 439-440
Shiro Ando, Roger M. Savory, “ĪĀĪ,” Encyclopædia Iranica, VII/4, pp. 439-440, available online at http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/divanbegi- (accessed on 30 December 2012).
