Fath-Ali Shah Qajar (; May 1769 – 24 October 1834) was the second Shah (king) of Qajar Iran. He reigned from 17 June 1797 until his death on 24 October 1834. His reign saw the irrevocable ceding of Iran's northern territories in the Caucasus, comprising what is nowadays Georgia, Dagestan, Azerbaijan, and Armenia, to the Russian Empire following the Russo-Persian Wars of 1804–1813 and 1826–1828 and the resulting treaties of Gulistan and Turkmenchay. Historian Joseph M. Upton says that he "is famous among Iranians for three things: his exceptionally long beard, his wasp-like waist, and his progeny." At the end of his reign, his difficult economic problems and military and technological liabilities took Iran to the verge of governmental disintegration, which was quickened by a consequent struggle for the throne after his death. Under Fath-Ali Shah, many visual portrayals of himself and his court were created in an effort to commend the crown. These notable include rock reliefs next to the ones erected under the pre-Islamic Sasanian Empire (224–651) in Ray, Fars and Kermanshah. This was done so that he could represent himself as heir to the ancient Persian Empire to his countryfolk and the generations that followed. Early life He was born in May 1769 in the city of Damghan, then under the governorship of his father. He was called Fath-Ali, a name borne by his prominent great-grandfather. But he was mainly known by his second name of Baba Khan until his coronation in 1797. However, the Russians still called him Baba Khan until 1813, as they refused to recognize his rule. He was the eldest son of Hossein Qoli Khan Qajar (the brother of Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar) and the daughter of the Mohammad Agha Ezz al-Dinlu of the Ashaqa-bash branch of the Qajar tribe. Due to Hossein Qoli Khan being suspected of plotting to rebel against the Zand dynasty, Baba Khan (then aged five) was sent as a hostage to the court of the Zand ruler Karim Khan Zand () in Shiraz. There Baba Khan joined his uncle Agha Mohammad Khan, who was also a hostage at the court. Baba Khan later returned to Damghan (according to the 19th-century Iranian writer Reza-Qoli Khan Hedayat, this took place in 1775), where he was witness to the conflict amongst the Davallu Qajar chiefs of Astarabad, which ultimately led to the murder of his father by the Kuklan Turkmens in