royal guards) continued to be held by tribal groups, also primarily the Shamlu and Zanganeh. The post of qollar-aghasi (chief of the gholams) was held by officers of tribal and Georgian gholam origin. The post of sadr continued to be held by Tajik sayyids. The provincial bureaucracy mainly imitated that of the central bureaucracy, and was thus controlled by members of leading local Tajik families, often of sayyid origin. Personality Throughout his reign, Soltan Hoseyn became known for his extreme devotion, which had blended in with his superstition, impressionable personality, excessive pursuit of pleasure, debauchery, and wastefulness, all of which have been considered by both contemporary and later writers as elements that played a part in the decline of the country. Because of his piety, he received the nicknames "Darvish", "Molla" and "Molla Husayn," and became known as a monarch whose doings were only in line with the Sharia law. Soltan Hoseyn demonstrated his devotion by depriving alcohol and female dancers from royal ceremonies. However, a few months after his enthronement, he started drinking, reportedly under the influence of Maryam Begum, who also drank. Despite his religiosity, Soltan Hoseyn kept the openly Sunni Fath-Ali Khan Daghestani as his grand vizier for five years. The meek aspect of Soltan Hoseyn is reported by all eyewitnesses, who displayed it as either benevolence and rightfulness, or as an absence of determination, which played a part in the collapse of the Safavid kingdom. Judasz Tadeusz Krusinski considers Soltan Hoseyn to have been "less able and resolute than his father" and "good-natured and human" who "hurt no particular person and by that means hurt all mankind." When asked to make a choice, Soltan Hoseyn usually supported the suggestion made by the last person he spoke to, often with the words yakhshi dir ("It is good" in Turkic). He was said to have used that phrase so much that the eunuchs and courtiers nicknamed him after it in secret. The Iranologist Rudi Matthee considers Soltan Hoseyn's use of the phrase a demonstration of his naivety. Like Krusinski, Abd al-Hoseyn Khatunabadi also portrays Soltan Hoseyn as kind and against spilling blood. Contrary to the previous Safavid shahs, Soltan Hoseyn did not harm any of his opponents or family members, and was also unable to do the same to animals. While previous Safavid shahs had used death as a type of punishment, Soltan Hoseyn used relinquishment of wealth