This book considers the economic, social and political importance of the silk trade in Safavid Iran. It focuses on four aspects of this trade: the role of silk in Iranian commercial policy, the interaction between agents of the state and foreign merchants, the routes along which silk was transported and, critically, the economic and social difficulties that contributed to the collapse of the regime in the 1720s. This represents a major contribution to the current debates on the social and economic history of the premodern world.