Maria E. Subtelny's Timurids in Transition is a valuable addition to the growing body of scholarship on fifteenth-century Central Asia and Iran, and particularly on the region of Khorasan and its oasis centers. The scene for a cultural renaissance and privileged with a greater variety of sources than other adjacent contemporary locales, Khorasan in the second half of the fifteenth century has been the focus of scholarship for some time, including prior significant contributions by the author herself. This volume, however, attempts to venture beyond the cultural and artistic accomplishments by examining a key question: Which factors allowed for, or compelled, a powerful nomadic dynasty that adhered by and large to a set of steppe-based principles to transform itself into an equally strong agrarian power during the reign of the last Timurid, Sultan Husayn Bayqara? In the book's six chapters, Subtelny charts the acculturation of the descendants of Timur (Tamerlane)...

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