[Special Feature: The Dynamics of Islamic Knowledge and Practice: Across Texts, Rituals, and Societies] “The Forgotten of the Obscure zāwiya”: Loyalty and Humility in the Supplications of Mīram Siyāh Qazvīnī's Inshā' (ca. 900 AH/1500 AD)

This article is a historical study of the Inshā' (epistolary) collection authored by Mīram Siyāh Qazvīnī. Mīram Siyāh Qazvīnī was a Malāmatī Sufi who lived in Iran and Central Asia during the late Timurids era (end of the 9th and beginning of the 10th century AH/end of 15th and beginning of 16th century AD). His letters have been copied in a few manuscripts; however, they remain unpublished and little-studied. The oldest known manuscript dates back to the 11th century AH/17th century AD and is the chief source of this study. The letters are addressed to important figures of the time, such as Babur, Sulṭān Ḥusayn Bayqara, Shāh Ismā‘īl, and Naqshbandī Sufi shaikhs. This article used the institutional history approach advocated by Alexandre Papas to study this source. It analyzed the epistolary language used by Mīram Siyāh Qazvīnī to increase and maintain a wide geographical and social network and obtain protection from sovereigns or religious leaders. It argued that the Sufi discourse on poverty and humility could be strategically reinvested as rhetorical patterns to acquire protection from powerful figures in troubled times.