page_title: Campaigns of Nader Shah
section_title: Conquest of Central Asia
hierarchical_section_title: Campaigns of Nader Shah / Conquest of Central Asia
caption_attribution_description: English: A black &amp; white illustration of a Persian slave in the Khanate of Kiva in the 19th century
context_page_description: The campaigns of Nader Shah, or the Naderian Wars, were a series of conflicts fought in the early to mid-eighteenth century throughout Central Eurasia primarily by the Iranian conqueror Nader Shah. His campaigns originated from the overthrow of the Iranian Safavid dynasty by the Hotaki Afghans. In the ensuing collapse and fragmentation of the empire after the capture of the Iranian capital of Isfahan by the Afghans, a claimant to the Safavid throne, Tahmasp II, accepted Nader into his service. After having subdued north-west Iran as well as neutralising the Abdali Afghans to the east as well as turning Tahmasp II into a vassal, Nader marched against the Hotaki Afghans in occupation of the rest of the country. In a series of incredible victories the Afghans were decimated and Tahmasp II returned to the throne as a restored Safavid monarch.
  In the aftermath of the Safavid restoration Nader campaigned in the western and northern reaches of the empire to regain territory lost to the Ottomans and Russians. After a bitter war lasting five years Nader had managed to restore the western frontier of Iran as well as reimposed Iranian suzerainty over most of the Caucasus.
context_section_description: During the mid-eighteenth century the Iranian empire of Nader Shah embarked upon the conquest and annexation of the Khanates of Bukhara and Khiva . The initial engagements were fought in the late 1730s by Nader Shah's son and viceroy Reza Qoli Mirza who gained a few notable victories in this theatre while Nader was still invading India to the south. Reza Qoli's invasions of Khiva angered Ilbares khan, the leader of Khiva. When Ilbares threatened to make a counterattack Nader ordered hostilities to cease despite his son's successes and later returned victoriously from Delhi to embark on a decisive campaign himself. After annexing Khiva he executed Ilbares and replaced him with Abu ol-Fayz Khan, who Nader considered to be more accepting of Nader's overlordship. The conflict resulted in the most overwhelming Iranian triumph against the khanates of Central Asia in modern history and with the admixture of his previous annexation in northern India, Nader's empire in the east surpassed all other Iranian empires before it, all the way back to the Sassanians and Achaemenids of antiquity.
caption: An Iranian slave in captivity in central Asia. The Khanates beyond the Iranian Empires border carried out regular raids into the border towns and villages which they would sack and loot.
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