Ismail, the last in line of hereditary…

Ismail, the last in line of hereditary Grand Masters of the Safaviyah Sufi order, prior to his ascent to a ruling dynasty, was born on July 17, 1487 in Ardabil.

His father, Haydar, is the sheikh of the Safaviyya Sufi order and a direct descendant of its Kurdish founder, Safi-ad-din Ardabili.

His mother, Martha, better known as Halima Begum, i the daughter of Uzun Hasan by his Pontic Greek wife Theodora Megale Komnene, better known as Despina Khatun, the daughter of Emperor John IV of Trebizond.

(She had married Uzun Hassan in a deal to protect the Greek Empire of Trebizond from the Ottomans.)

Ismail is a great-great grandson of Emperor Alexios IV of Trebizond and King Alexander I of Georgia.

In 1488, Ismail’s father had been killed in a battle at Derbent against the forces of the Shirvanshah Farrukh Yassar and his overlord, the Aq Qoyunlu, a Turkmen tribal federation that controls most of Iran.

In 1494, the Aq Qoyunlu capture Ardabil, killing Ali Mirza Safavi (the eldest son of Haydar), and forcing the seven-year old Ismail to go into hiding in Gilan, where he received education under the guidance of renowned scholars.

Before he died, Ali Mirza had designated his younger brother as leader of the Safaviyya.