Educational situation of women in the Safavid court; based on Safavid European travelers journals and paintings

The situation of women in Safavid court and haram drew the attention of the European travelers who had come to Iran for political or religious missions. Some of those travelers described the women in Safavid haram as lazy and useless people that their duty was just for giving pleasure to the king and bringing up his children. So, they did not have any kind of education or learning skills and spent their life in vain. But there are other reports by the Safavid historians and European travelers which indicated that many haram women were educated and had social activities. Moreover, there are a number of Safavid paintings that supported the latter point of view. This paper examines and compares these two views to understand the situation of a significant class of women in Safavid era.