MANY years ago, I was in Tehran for my summer vacation from university, and went to see the crown jewels then located in the basement of the state bank.

The stunning display was a feast for the eyes, with its collection of huge rubies, diamonds, emeralds, sapphires and pearls. Many of these brilliant gemstones had been part of the magnificent Peacock Throne that had been the most precious part of this dazzling selection, apart from the Koh-i-Noor.

Most of this treasure had been looted from Delhi in 1739 by Nader Shah, whose name remains a byword for cruelty centuries after his death. For generations after his invasion of India, mothers frightened their children with his name. But most of us in the subcontinent know him only for his brief but deadly incursion into India.

After defeating the Mughal army at the battle of Karnal, 75 miles from Delhi, the Persian king entered the capital at the head of his army of qizilbash (red hats). Here, he proceeded to squeeze citizens, nobles and the Mughal emperor for money, gold and gems until some notables instigated an urban revolt against the invaders. The Persian retribution was swift and terrible Nader commanded his troops to massacre the rebels in certain areas of the city. By the time he ordered them to halt, around 30,000 people had been killed.

The value of the wealth Nader Shah took with him from Delhi has been authoritatively estimated at around £88m at the time, or some £90bn in today's money. Thousands of camels, horses and donkeys were required to haul this king's ransom to Persia.

As usual, the defeat at Karnal was largely due to rivalries among the Mughal commanders, outdated weapons, and lack of coordination between the different wings of the huge army. But what ultimately defeated them was the superb force Nader Shah had created. He was the first military commander in the region to have a professional standing army that drilled daily when not at war; was armed with modern weapons provided by the state; and paid a regular salary.

With this army, Nader Shah drove out the marauding Afghans, defeated the Ottomans and forced out the Russians. His dizzying rise from a shepherd's son to the throne of shahinshah (king of kings) is an amazing story of warfare, intrigue and ambition. Recounted with gusto and an occasionally numbing eye for detail by Michael Axworthy, The Sword of Persia is a fascinating account of the fall of the Safavid dynasty, and the bloodstained reign of Nader Shah.
The basic problem of having a large standing army — as many governments have found before and since — is that it costs a lot of money. At one point in his career, records show that Nader's forces numbered 375,000. In order to pay, feed and arm such a large force, it was necessary to tax the country to the point where different parts of the country often revolted; in many villages, peasants fled to avoid the ruthless punishments that followed non-payment of taxes. So despite Nader Shah's many victories over Persia's enemies, there was constant discontent in the land.
It was this need to pay for his army that drove Nader Shah to invade India in the first place. But once the weakness of the Mughal Empire had been exposed by the defeat at Karnal and the subsequent sack of Delhi, others took advantage. Already weakened by nobles in Bengal, Oudh and Hyderabad Deccan who had virtually declared their independence, the foreign trading companies that were gradually expanding along the Indian coast saw their opportunity. The Marathas and the Afghans were similarly emboldened.

To the west of Persia, the Ottoman Empire was in a similar state of decline. Forced to withdraw from the swathes of Persia it had captured when Safavid power was in freefall, their weakness was exposed. Nader Shah's many victories against the Ottoman war machine were another demonstration of his brilliant leadership, as well as of Turkish frailty when confronted by a modern army.

But as happens so often in dynastic empires, after Nader Shah's death (at the hands of those close to him, again part of a familiar pattern), Persia went into decline. Thus, almost simultaneously, the three great Muslim empires of that time entered a period of irretrievable collapse. Persia again fell prey to rebellion and invasion. In a sense, the unfortunate country had come full circle.

One intriguing aspect of Nader Shah's life that has still not been adequately explained is his attempt to reconcile Shia and Sunni Islam. During his reign, he issued an edict that mullahs leading prayers at mosques should no longer use pejorative terms for the early Sunni heroes. Perhaps he wanted to break the hold of the traditional Persian aristocracy that had come to power under the Shia Safavids. Or perhaps he wanted to reduce tensions between Shia Persians and Sunni Ottomans. Whatever his motive, it is interesting to speculate what relations between Muslims belonging to these two sects would have been like had Nader Shah managed to make his innovations permanent.

Whatever his real reasons, it is clear that the king was himself no fanatic. His fondness for drink was well known, although he never allowed his evening sessions to interfere with the affairs of the state. In those days, there was a tradition among Turkish and Persian warriors to indulge in heavy drinking, while Afghan soldiers had the same austere habits they do today. The Persian expression for their hard-living attitude was encapsulated in the expression razm-o-bazm (fighting and boozing).

One oddity in Nader Shah's character that historians have noted was his considerate treatment of women. He once had the bellies of 30 soldiers slit open because they observed an Indian woman being raped and did nothing to stop the crime. Again and again, he ordered his soldiers to return unharmed captive women rather than treating them as the spoils of war, a common practice at the time.

But he could be cruel, as his son Reza Quli discovered when his eyes were plucked out on a suspicion that he had conspired to assassinate his father. It was after the blinding of his beloved elder son that Nader Shah went into a decline. His actions became more capricious, and he aroused the hatred of many who had earlier been loyal. When he was murdered in 1747, there were few to mourn him as his family was put to death soon afterwards.
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