Sefer Muratowicz and the Armenian Connection: trans-imperial subjecthood and diplomacy between Poland, Persia, and the Ottoman Empire

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Armenian merchant and Ottoman subject Sefer Muratowicz emigrated to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the late 16th century. Soon after, he appeared before Safavid Shah ‘Abbas I as the personal envoy of King Sigismund III Vasa on a royal diplomatic mission unsanctioned by the Commonwealth’s parliament. Though the trajectory of Sefer Muratowicz’s life is not without precedence in the heterogeneous social milieu of Poland-Lithuania, his documented involvement in the private royal embassy of 1601-1602 to Safavid Persia presents an exceptional view into the critical role of the diasporic Armenian population in the diplomatic and economic relations between Europe’s largest republic and the Islamic world in the early modern period.

Throughout most of the 16^th century, a period otherwise characterized by intense regional conflicts, the maintenance of peaceful relations was a critical element of both Polish-Lithuanian and Ottoman grand strategies. This situation began to change, however, after the subsequent election of Sigismund III Vasa (r. 1587-1632), as the pro-French, Ottoman-friendly faction within the greater body of Commonwealth citizenry was confronted by the staunchly Catholic king’s desire for rapprochement with the Ottomans’ most potent enemy— the Habsburgs. Sigismund III, acting in accordance with historical attempts of Christian rulers to ally themselves with distant Persia against more proximate Islamic polities, viewed the Safavids as a potential ally in any future wars with the Ottoman Empire. Significantly, Safavid Shah ‘Abbas I had embarked on a diplomatic scheme in 1599 by sending his envoys to contact eight separate Christian rulers, including the King of Poland-Lithuania, in hopes of establishing an anti-Ottoman alliance. The failure the Persian embassy to arrive in Warsaw due to the purported intervention of the Muscovite Tsar appears to have prompted Sigismund III to send Sefer Muratowicz to the Safavid court. Upon his return to Warsaw in 1602, the Armenian merchant-cum-envoy left an account of his journey.

The shifting balance of power in the Black Sea region at the turn of the 17^th century offers fertile ground to expand the role of trans-imperial subjects within the unique political structures of the region. These individuals “straddled and brokered political, linguistic, and religious boundaries” (Rothman, 2009), serving as key interlocutors between the major regional powers of East/Central Europe and the Black Sea region; the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Holy Roman Empire/Hungary, Muscovy, the Ottoman Empire, and Safavid Persia. Although the populations of these polities were remarkably heterogeneous, they were dominated by Catholic, Orthodox, Sunni, and Shi’a religious systems respectively, and were further differentiated by disparate political structures drawing from diverse traditions of jurisprudence. Sefer Muratowicz, an Armenian merchant native to Anatolia who came to reside in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth royal city of Lwów, successfully navigated not only the vast geographical distances between Warsaw, Caffa, Istanbul, and Isfahan, but also the different sociopolitical spaces governed by these polities.

Muratowicz’s legal position within the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was determined by his membership in the sizeable native Armenian community located in major centers of trade operating mainly along the Polish/Ottoman frontier. As a subject of both the Ottoman sultan and the king of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Muratowicz inhabited liminal social and legal zones offering opportunities for advancement through his collaboration with power brokers in return for his unique abilities and personal connection to the diffuse Armenian ecumene that stretched from the Atlantic to the Pacific in the early modern period. In the context of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth society at the turn of the 17th century, Sefer Muratowicz acted as an agent in the protracted struggle between royal and parliamentary power. By privately engaging a member of the Armenian community through Krzysztof Dzierżek, the royal translator and former resident of Istanbul, King Sigismund III Vasa effectively circumvented his parliament’s legal right to determine the Commonwealth’s foreign policy and re-opened dormant channels of communication with the Safavid Shah, ‘Abbas I.

Sefer Muratowicz came to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth from the north Anatolian Ottoman village of Karahisar. He first arrived in the city of Lwów in 1597 by way the Ottoman Black Sea trade port at Caffa and the via tartarica trade route stretching over the Pontic Steppe into the heart of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In the late medieval and early modern periods the Armenian population of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was deeply involved in trade with the Ottoman Empire, the Crimean Khanate, and Persia. Early waves of Armenian immigrants had their roots in the Crimea and spoke a Kipchak Turkish language until the end of 17th century. Taking advantage of these strong linguistic, cultural, familial and economic links, the Polish kings began to regularly employ individuals like Sefer Muratowicz as court translators, information gatherers, and couriers to the Ottoman Empire, Safavid Persia, and the Crimean Khanate as early as 1414, when a certain Grzegorz the Armenian took part in the first Polish diplomatic mission to the Ottoman Sultan.

After his initial arrival in Crown Polish territory, Muratowicz worked with other local Armenians

Carpet purchased by Muratowicz,
bearing Polish coat of arms

intrade with the Ottoman Empire. As a legal subject of the Sultan, Muratowicz was able to petition the Ottoman envoys to advocate on his behalf at the royal court in Warsaw. In 1601 King Sigismund III sent Sefer Muratowicz to Safavid Persia as his personal merchant and royal envoy. Muratowicz’s destination was stipulated by his contract with the King; under the rule of Shah ‘Abbas I, the city of Kashan was a key entrepôt for the Persian silk trade throughout the 16th and 17th centuries, and served as an ideal location to commission and purchase the King’s items. Several rugs purchased by Muratowicz can still be found in the Residenz-Museum in Munich. It is evident, however, that there were ulterior political motives behind Muratowicz’s sojourn in Safavid lands; the desire to ensure open and regular contact with a potential ally against the Ottoman Empire was the main reason that the king sought to re-open friendly relations with Persia. Sefer Muratowicz’s status as a trans-imperial subject of both the Polish king and Ottoman sultan, as well as his skills as an experienced merchant, allowed him to operate effectively in the vast distances between Warsaw and Isfahan, and he proved to be an ideal agent to deliver the king’s subtle message of friendship to Shah ‘Abbas I.

By engaging the services of this agent, the king pursued his own political agenda vis-à-vis two of the Commonwealth’s main rivals, the Ottoman Empire and Muscovy, by entering into dialogue with the Safavids. The most critical event that this document is connected to is Shah ‘Abbas I’s attempt in 1599-1600 to send an official embassy to “the princes, potentates and republics of Europe” in hopes of establishing an anti-Ottoman alliance. To this end, letters and gifts were prepared for the leaders of eight Christian states, including the King of Poland-Lithuania. The mission was led by the Persian ambassador Husayn ‘Ali Beg Bayat and the English soldier of fortune Anthony Sherley, who had recently appeared in the Shah’s court along with his brother Robert. The Safavid embassy of 1599 and was immediately beset with difficulties. Traveling north to Astrakhan and on to Moscow, the delegates were forcibly detained by Tsar Boris Godunov for a period of five or six months. When the Tsar released them, they traveled north to the port of Archangelsk, rather than directly overland through the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and took ship. The mission eventually made land in Stettin after two months of difficult Arctic Sea travel.

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In the end, the only rulers to officially receive the Persian embassy were Emperor Rudolf II, Pope Clement VIII, and King Phillip III of Spain. Apropos to the story of Sefer Muratowicz’s 1601 mission is the question of why the Persian embassy never made it to the court of Sigismund III. Once in the presence of ‘Abbas I, Muratowicz explained that Tsar Boris Godunov intentionally held the Safavid embassy captive and made Anthony Sherley promise that he would not visit the court of King Sigismund III before releasing the envoys and sending them on to Archangelsk. Sherley’s captivity in Muscovy is well attested to in numerous sources written by members of his party, though none mention the Tsar’s demand that the mission avoid the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. As the Shah’s embassy continued on its long, difficult journey through Europe, Sefer Muratowicz arrived in the Persian court. There ‘Abbas I learned from Muratowicz that his letters and gifts to King Sigismund III had never arrived. The Shah then questioned Robert Sherley, who knew of his brother Anthony’s confinement in Moscow. Robert Sherley stated that the Tsar let Anthony go only after receiving his promise to bypass the Polish-Lithuanian court.

The case of Sefer Muratowicz shows how widespread familial and personal contacts amongst the greater Armenian diaspora, and the knowledge of several key languages, allowed trans-imperial subjects to operate successfully in different sociopolitical milieus. We learn that the Safavid Vizier Tachmas, who initially presented Muratowicz to the Shah, was an Armenian and a Christian by birth who had never before met Sefer, but had “…heard all good things about him from his brothers, who were good friends.” It is unlikely that Muratowicz would have been chosen to lead the royal trade mission and royal embassy to Persia without a connection to notable individuals with that territory. It is therefore possible that the Vizier Tachmas was indeed a familial acquaintance of Muratowicz, whose position allowed the visiting Armenian access to the Shah’s court. The history behind this relationship can only be speculated upon, though Muratowicz’s knowledge of Turkish and Persian, both of which were in use in the court of ‘Abbas I, speaks to the young merchant’s personal connection to both Ottoman and Safavid lands. His linguistic capabilities made a positive impression on the Shah; in the Relacyja, ‘Abbas I is recorded as saying “I am not as content with any of [the Christian envoys] as I am with this one, with whom I am able to speak my own language, because through translation speech has no taste.”

The most peculiar portion of the Muratowicz’s account deals with the Shah’s relationship to Christianity. The author writes boldly of ‘Abbas I’s feelings towards the Christian faith, claiming that the Shah had been secretly baptized and desired the conversion of his entire nation. The naiveté of this notion is deep, though it reflects a larger notion present in Christendom’s vision of a Muslim ruler whose tolerance towards his Christian subjects was widely renowned. Pope Clement VIII, acting upon similar reports bearing witness to ‘Abbas I’s purported inclinations towards conversion, sent a brief to the Shah, as well as his mother, relating his joy at this news on February 24th, 1601. Additionally, a small detail contained within this passage appears in other contemporary sources; Muratowicz’ description of an ornamental crucifix worn by ‘Abbas I appears in several non-related accounts left by French and Italian observer in the Persian court. The religiosity of ‘Abbas I is further attested to in Muratowicz’s account of the leader’s departure on his famous 1601/1010 pilgrimage to Shi’a holy site in Mashhad

The immediate effects of Sefer Muratowicz’s unofficial mission to the Shah are evident in the revival of diplomatic activity between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Safavid Empire. In 1605, the Shah’s envoy, Mehdi Kuli ben Turkman, arrived in the Polish court in Warsaw with news of the Shah’s victories over the Sultan. It was hoped that this would entice the King into joining ‘Abbas I in an anti-Ottoman coalition. The parliament still desired peace with the Ottoman Empire, however, and the king became occupied with the Zebrzydowski rokosz (legal rebellion) in 1607. In 1609, another Safavid embassy arrived in Kraków, this time led by Robert Sherley, the brother of Anthony Sherley. He delivered two letters from the Shah proposing an anti-Ottoman coalition involving Spain, England, France, the Holy Roman Empire, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Muscovy. The plan proposed by the Shah suggested that the combined Christian forces rendezvous with the Persian army in Aleppo. Sigismund III had recently renewed peace with the Ottomans through the envoy Grzegorz Kochanowski, however, and could only offer his personal friendship to the Shah.

Bibliography:

1. Aslanian, Sebouh David. 2011. From the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean: the global trade networks of Armenian merchants from New Julfa [Berkeley: University of California Press].
2. Nadel-Golobič, Eleonora. 1979. "Armenians and Jews in Medieval Lvov: Their Role in Oriental Trade, 1400-1600." Persee.
3. Niesiołowski, Kazimierz. 1743. Otia Publica Vix Domestica, [Vanities, Public and Domestic]. (Warsaw)
4. Połcyzński, Michael. 2014. “The Relacja of Sefer Muratowicz: 1601-1602 private royal envoy of Sigismund III to Shah ‘Abbas I”. The Turkish Historical Review, 5. [Leiden: Brill]
5. Rothman, Natalie. 2009. “Self-Fashioning in the Mediterranean Contact Zone: Giovanni Battista Salvago and his Africa Overo Barbaria (1625)” in, Renaissance Medievalisms, Eisenbichler, Konrad (ed.) [Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies]
6. Szuppe, Maria. 1986. “Un marchand du roi de Pologne en Perse, 1601-1602”, Moyen Orient et Océan Indien 3.    

Posted by:
 Michael Połczyński, doctoral candidate at Georgetown University. For more on author see: academia.edu