From an early age, she was well-loved by her father and was allowed to partake in the court activities, gradually becoming an influential figure who attracted the attentions of the prominent leaders of the militant Qizilbash tribes.

She expected to rule while Mohammad remained a figurehead but his influential wife, Khayr al-Nisa Begum, emerged as an opponent to Pari Khan and successfully plotted her death.

Regarded as the most powerful woman in Safavid history, she was praised by her contemporaries for her intelligence and competence, though in later chronicles she was portrayed as a villain who murdered two of her brothers and aspired to usurp the throne.

Writers of the time dedicated works to her, like Abdi Beg Shirazi and his Takmelat al-akhbar, and she was also compared to Fatima, the daughter of Muhammad, prophet of Islam.

In a society that imposed harsh restrictions on high-class women, Pari Khan was able to take leadership of the ineffective Safavid court and gather hundreds of loyal followers.

[5] She showed immense interest in Islamic law, jurisprudence and poetry, and excelled at them all, to the point that the Safavid historian Afushta'i Natanzi deemed her "distinct from the females".

[2] Yet, as his favourite daughter, Tahmasp did not allow Pari Khan to leave the capital Qazvin for Sistan, Badi-al Zaman's abode and appanage.

[2] The foremost concern of the Qizilbash was Haydar's maternal origin, which would have potentially curbed their influence in the court by an influx of Georgians entering the military ranks.

[15] Pari's mother, Sultan-Agha Khanum at the request of her daughter would slander Haydar Mirza to Tahmasp and smear his image as a traitor while presenting Ismail's faction as loyal and true.

[2] The Safavid historian Iskandar Beg Munshi writes that Pari Khan assumed the care of her father and stayed at his bedside.

Pari Khan discovered the plot and informed Tahmasp, who dispatched a group of Afshar musketeers to Qahqaheh to watch over Ismail.

[22][2] On 4 June 1576, Ismail arrived at Qazvin, but due to the inauspiciousness of the date (according to the astrologers), he stayed at the house of Hossein-Qoli Kholafa, leader of the Rumlu tribe, instead of heading to the palace.

According to Iskandar Beg, he snubbed the nobles and said to them: "Have you not understood, my friends, that interference in matters of state by women is demeaning to the king's honour?

"[22] He forbade the Qizilbash leaders from seeing Pari Khan, decreased the number of her guards and attendants, confiscated her assets and was unfriendly to her when he gave her an audience.

[28] Meanwhile, the Kholassat ot-Tavarikh by Ahmad Monshi Ghomi does not associate Pari Khan with the assassination; in modern historiography, the theory remains unproven.

[2] The contemporary chronicler, Hasan Beg Rumlu, records that Pari Khan was openly opposed to Mohammad's succession and tried to prevent him from arriving at Qazvin.

[29] On the other hand, according to Iskandar Beg, Pari Khan considered Mohammad as the best possible candidate, as his blindness would have allowed her to control the administration of the empire.

[2] When the shah and his wife were approaching the palace, Pari Khan greeted them while sitting on a golden litter with four to five hundred guards and staff at her side.

[35] At the time of her death, Pari Khan had an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 tomans of wealth, four to five hundred servants, and owned a house outside the harem quarters in Qazvin.

[7] In the Takmelat al-akhbar by Abdi Beg Shirazi—which itself was dedicated to Pari Khan[37]—there are several poems attributed to her under the takhallus (pen name) Haghighi (truthful).

[48] She was more confident that she was better suited to handle the affairs of the country than male princes and therefore became the indirect leader of the stale and ineffective Safavid court.

[49] The presence of these two women indicates other smaller female influence in society,[50] which may suggest that Pari Khan's politicking was not only unusual, but may have been accepted.