Ilkhanid Households, Work and Social Obligations in Iran and Iraq

Household resources in Ilkhanid Iran could include buildings, livestock, stored goods, income claims and the work of dependants. At court, powerful women managed mobile households whose wealth also supported political influence. In Tabriz, the foundation of Rab’-e Rashidi connected housing and provisions with paid employment, study and coerced service. These settings expose different relationships between property and work.

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Household resources, state demands and dynastic families

State demands affected the resources available to households. Taxes, extraordinary levies and officials’ requisitions could take money, produce or service. Ghazan’s programme sought recorded assessments and controls on repeated collection. Maintaining cultivation required enough security and predictability for people to remain on the land and keep water systems working.

At court, an ordo was more than a group of tents. It comprised a royal household and its people, herds, goods and income. A khatun, a high-ranking woman, could administer such resources through attendants and officials. Marriage, widowhood and succession could determine who controlled the household and its accumulated wealth.

Bulughan Khatun, wife of Abaqa and later Arghun, maintained an ordo and helped raise Ghazan. Accounts linked the household’s eventual transfer to that foster relationship. Her death in 1286 did not simply dissolve the group: its resources continued under later holders. Family care, property and dynastic succession were closely connected within the royal household.

Farming depended on access to workable land and water, while the Rab’-e Rashidi’s own regulations show how an institution could organize these resources. Its gardens and fields were linked to water channels, and grain and other food supplies were stored for use in kitchens and bakeries. The foundation’s needs were met through endowed assets and their income, rather than by relying only on the personal wealth of its founder. The regulations also connected property management to daily provision: revenue had to support staff, students, patients, religious observances and charitable meals.

An endowment as a working institution

A waqf was an endowment assigning property and income to specified purposes. Rab’-e Rashidi’s deed of 1309 laid out posts, services and residential provision in detail. Revenue collection and accounts had to turn property into regular support for teachers, students, patients and workers. The institution therefore joined legal obligations with daily tasks such as storing grain, baking and carrying water.

Administration was divided among officials. A steward managed the foundation, a financial inspector oversaw receipts and expenses, and a deputy assisted with administration. The deed assigned them responsibilities for handling income and maintaining records; it also describes revenue kept securely under their joint control. Income from endowed property supported ongoing costs. For example, rent from a bathhouse was directed to the foundation’s needs. This arrangement tied the work of administrators to the use of property and to the provision of services.

Housing, food and service

The Rab’-e Rashidi’s residential spaces served different groups. Some employees lived in the complex, while married staff members were also housed in a nearby quarter. There was accommodation for students and other workers, and a separate residence for orphaned children, who were placed under a caretaker and taught by a teacher. These arrangements show that the foundation provided more than workplaces: it organized shelter and care for people whose labor or education formed part of its purpose.

Food was another regular obligation. Salaried staff received bread and other provisions as well as pay, while the foundation’s kitchens prepared food for residents and guests. The regulations also provided for meals for poor people. The deed specified different bread allowances for different categories of workers, including a larger ration for some people assigned physically demanding duties. Such provisions made food an organized part of employment and institutional care, rather than an incidental benefit.

The deed assigned 220 enslaved workers and their wives to the foundation. Among them were 150 gardeners and 30 workers who cleaned underground water conduits. Other named workers had responsibilities for protection, property collection and maintenance. Their allocated bread and housing did not remove their status as people held in enslavement.

Farming, craft work and changing obligations

Cultivation and maintenance connected the foundation’s land with its kitchens and income. Clearing conduits kept water flowing, while gardeners tended plantings. Cooks, sweepers and water carriers sustained buildings used by teachers, students and residents. The division of tasks made many people’s work necessary to one institution’s services.

The foundation also supported book production. A paper-making facility, library and book workshop brought together materials, storage and skilled copying. Its regulations provided for the copying of religious texts and other works. Early manuscripts of Rashid al-Din’s Compendium of Chronicles are associated with the complex; a large Shahnameh manuscript made in the 1330s has also been linked to it, though that attribution is not certain. After Rashid al-Din was executed in 1318, the foundation declined. His son Ghiyas al-Din revived its activities in the 1330s, a phase of successor patronage that extended beyond the end of the Ilkhanate in 1335. Ghiyas al-Din was killed in 1336, and the complex was looted.

Homes, furnishings and household goods in Ilkhanid communities

The foundation housed employees and students and provided short-term hospitality for visitors. Accommodation came with responsibilities for rooms, stores and valuable furnishings. Carpets, kilims (flat-woven floor coverings) and other goods required custodians, while food was distributed according to the status and work of recipients. Housing therefore formed part of an organised support system.

Artisans and workshop life in the Ilkhanate

Skilled production brought other obligations. Copyists and painters contributed to manuscripts, while supervisors checked texts and arranged distribution. Funding came from endowed resources, and food and lodging helped maintain the workforce. Bookmaking thus depended on both specialist skills and the wider service community.

For the wider setting, see Daily Life in Ilkhanid Communities: Households, Work, and Worship.