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“Frequently Invaded Iran”: Relations between the Ottoman and Safavid Empires

Discussion of teaching the Ottomans & Safavids in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries

Bram Hubbell
Bram Hubbell
— 4 min read
“Frequently Invaded Iran”: Relations between the Ottoman and Safavid Empires
Ottoman illustration of the Battle of Çıldır in 1578. Source: Wikimedia Commons.
From page 71 of the AP World History Course and Exam Description
From page 71 of the AP World History Course and Exam Description

Textbooks often present the Ottoman-Safavid wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as stemming from and contributing to a divide between Sunni and Shi’a Islam. Some historians have even argued that the divide between Catholics and Protestants in Europe was similar. Although the Ottomans and Safavids went to war multiple times, their relationship in these centuries was more complicated.

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