Diplomacy in action: an eye-witness account

Sefer Muratowicz was an Armenian merchant; sent to Persia by the King of Poland (Sigismund III) to buy tents, carpets, weapons and fine textiles.

It was Muratowicz who described (in another posting, here) the greedy Russian ambassador and his party fighting over golden tableware and ripping up expensive textiles. He also tells some great tales about his own travels, and especially about his three meetings with Shah Abbas. This posting is about the second of those meetings.

Shah Abbas had also summoned the Venetian Ambassador; a courtier of the Grand Prince of Moscow; and the ‘English ambassador’ – actually Robert Shirley. The Shah grabbed the chance to humble both the Muscovite and Shirley, as well as to impress the Venetian and the Pole.

Abbas first asked “is there in the world a Lord more eminent than the Emperor of all Russia?”  He listed all the various ‘Ambassadors’ who had visited, before quizzing Muratowicz: “So why doesn’t your King send a man or a letter to me?”

Muratowicz pointed out that Shah Abbas had himself avoided contacting the King of Poland; and the Shah took this up with a vizier– who said that a letter had definitely been sent. Abbas then demanded to know why Robert Shirley’s brother, Anthony, hadn’t presented the letters he was given – and Robert said that Anthony had been prevented from doing this, when the Russian king had put him in jail for 3 months.

Muratowicz interrupted to say that he was “but a simple subject, and beg[ged] pardon for speaking”; but that he “can’t support an injustice”, and must now declare that the King of Poland, and not the prince of Moscow, is the true prince of Russia (see painting to the right).  Abbas looked at his viziers, and the Ambassadors, and said to his first minister: “See this man! Not being an ambassador, he knows how to defend the honour of his lord”.

Then Pirr Kuli, the courtier who had travelled with Anthony Shirley, was sent for. He revealed that he had been frightened to say what had actually happened in Russia. When Shah Abbas (surely with an evil glint in his eye!) asked what sort of punishment he should give to those who lied to him, he was told: “all the punishment that he sees fit”.

Then Abbas spoke gently to another vizier: “Take this guest [Muratowicz], give him new clothes and a sabre from my treasury and take him from here”. So the merchant was given honorary robes, and went homewards in the company of the Venetian ambassador – “not directly home, but through a large market place”, where he saw Pirr Kuli on the ground and “with his tongue and eyes beside him”.