Bahman Mirza

Bahmam Mirza Qajar
Portrait of Bahman Mirza taken in Karabakh, 1862.
Born	11 Oktober 1810 Tehran, Iran
Died	11 February 1884 Karabakh, Russian Empire
Burial	Shusha
House	Qajar
Father	Abbas Mirza
Mother	Assiyeh Khanom

Bahman Mirza (11 October 1810 – 11 February 1884) was a Persian prince of the Qajar Dynasty, son of Abbas Mirza and grandson of Fath Ali Shah. He was Vicergerent (vali) of Azerbaijan and Governor-General of Tabriz. He later migrated to neighboring Imperial Russia, where he was received with great honor and lived a prestigious life in Shusha. Many of his offsprings either returned to Iran where they had political or military careers, or served in the Russian military, and later played an important role in the military of Azerbaijan Democratic Republic. Beside political figures, he is also the great grandfather of Afrasiyab Badalbeyli, Azerbaijani composer and author of the first Azeri balet and the first ballet in the Muslim East.

Bahman Mirza is the ancestor of the Bahmani family with the branches of the Russian Princes Persidskii, and the Bahmanov and Kadjar lines of Azerbaijan as well as of the Iranian families Bahmani-Qajar and Bahman. Thus, Bahman Mirza was also the (great-)grandfather of Ambassador Ali Akbar Bahman.

Bahman Mirza, influenced by the European Enlightenment, was the fourth son of Prince Abbas Mirza, viceroy (nayeb os-saltaneh) and crown prince (vali ahd) of Fath Ali Shah by his first wife and cousin, Assiyeh Khanom, daughter of Amir Mohammad Khan Qajar-Davallu. Thus, with the younger Ghahreman Mirza he was the only full brother to Mohammad Shah Qajar. Bahman Mirza was born in Golestan Palace at Tehran on 11 October 1810 and educated privately in Tabriz. 1831 to 1834 he was appointed governor (hakem) of Ardabil, in 1834 governor of Teheran and commander-in-chief (sepah-salar), then governor-general (beglerbegi) of Borujerd and Silakhor, and governor of Hamadan from 1834 to 1841. After the death of his brother Ghahreman Mirza in 1839 he succeeded him as prince-governor of Azerbaijan in 1841, but was forced to resign and exiled to Tiflis in 1848 due to political intrigues at court. He moved to Shusha in the Russian occupied Karabakh region in 1853 and died there on 11 February 1884. He was buried in his mausoleum at the cemetery in Barda, near Shusha.