Acknowledgements
This book was borne out of fieldwork carried out in Iran in 2015–2016 and was made possible by the help and support of many people to whom I am deeply grateful. Since this is a revised version of my PhD dissertation, I am indebted to my supervisor, Iván Szántó, for his invaluable guidance and precious support during my doctoral studies. My deep appreciation also goes out to Professor Éva Jeremiás for her consistent encouragement and feedback on the various stages of my research. I owe a great debt of gratitude to the Avicenna Institute of Middle Eastern Studies for providing numerous research and travel grants. Without the constant assistance and generous support of the director of the Institute, Professor Miklós Maróth, this book would never have materialized.
I am also pleased to say thank you to the staff of the Institute of Iranian Studies at Vienna for their kind help and endless patience. I am especially indebted to Professor Christine Nölle-Karimi, whose expertise and dedicated support was immensely influential throughout the development of this work, and to Florian Schwarz for approving and aiding my frequent visits to Vienna. Throughout the completion of my research, I had received a great deal of advice from the late Professor Bert G. Fragner (1941–2021) whose life and work are a constant inspiration to many young scholars in the field of Iranian studies.
My sincere thanks also go to all my teachers and lecturers at the Eötvös Loránd University (Budapest) and the Dānishgāh-i Shahīd Bihishtī (Tehran) for sharing scholarly knowledge and providing precious help and suggestions with the practical aspects of conducting research in Iran.
I am heartily grateful to the Central Library of the Āstān-i Quds-i Rażawī for enabling my research in Mashhad and their kind permission to reprint the images of the royal decrees. Very special thanks are due to the Islamic Research Foundation of the Āstān-i Quds-i Rażawī for their assistance I received during my fieldwork, and I would particularly like to thank Ilāha Maḥbūb Farīmānī, without whose generous help this research would not have come into being. I am also extremely grateful to Muzhda Muḥammadī, whose insightful recommendations on the subject of this book were truly indispensable.
I would also like to express my sincere appreciation to the editorial board of the Iran Studies series for including my book and to Brill’s Teddi Dols and Pieter te Velde for being instrumental in bringing this project to fruition. Also, the reviewers are profusely thanked for helping me improve the manuscript.
Finally, my special gratitude goes out to my parents, whose tremendous understanding and encouragement have enabled me to this work. Last but by no means least, I wish to thank my wife, Dorka, who has been by my side throughout the writing of this book, living every single minute of it and supporting me all the way. This book is dedicated to you.
András Barati
August 2023
Budapest