In 1722, Hotak Afghan forces captured Isfahan after a siege, bringing Safavid power to collapse. The fall of the Safavid capital created years of turmoil in Iran. It disrupted a major centre of Persianate courtly and artistic life.

The fall of Isfahan affected Persian literary patronage and sharpened themes of ruin, exile and political instability. Poets writing in Iran and Indo-Persian courts inherited a transformed map of power.