128 Vambéry follows Narshakhi in ignoring this revolt, which was certainly a very serious one as far as Kutayba was concerned, but both versions of Tabari give detailed accounts of its various phases.
129 Old Persian word signifying commander-in-chief.
130 He was opposed to Nīzek’s design. We are also told that, in order that a certain appearance of respect might be kept up, his chains were of gold. Cf. Tabari, Annales, Series II. p. 1206.
131 Tabari, Annales, Series II. p. 1218.
132 On the river Jīhūn, one of the three principal towns of Khwārazm, of which Medīnat-el-Fīl, or the Town of the Elephant, was the largest.
133 Tabari relates that one day several Soghdians mounted the rampart and called out: “Oh ye Arabs, why do ye exert yourselves thus vainly? Know that we have found written in a book that our town shall not be taken except by one whose name is “Camel-Saddle,” whereupon Kutayba called out—“God is great! for verily that is my name.” (In Arabic, Kutayba means literally “camel-saddle.”)
134 He is said to have obtained no less than 20,000 native levies, men from Kesh, Nakhshab, and Khwārazm. Cf. Tabari, Annales, Series II. p. 1256.
135 In the year 95 Hajjāj died at the age of fifty-four.
136 Welīd had been most anxious to make his own son heir-apparent in the place of his brother, and in his designs had been supported by Hajjāj and Kutayba. Hence the bad blood that existed between the conqueror and the new Caliph.
Vambéry adds the following details without reference (not to be found either in Tabari or Narshakhi): “Having conquered Farghāna, he went through the Terek Pass into Eastern Turkestān. Here he encountered the princes of the Uïgurs, who in default of union among themselves were easily conquered. We are told that the Arabs extended their incursions into the province of Kansu.... Turfan, on the very first appearance of the Arabs, embraced Islam.” (Bokhara, pp. 31, 32).
137 Gibbon recognised the greatness of Kutayba as a conqueror, while lamenting the scanty notices to be found of him in European works; cf. Decline and Fall, chap. li. d’Herbelot, in his Bibliothèque Orientale, dismisses our hero, under the heading Catbah, in a very summary manner. “Ce fut un des plus villains Arabes de son siècle, Valid, sixième Khalife de la race des Ommiades, le fit général de ses armées en Perse, l’an de l’Hégire 88. Il conquît tout le grand pays de Khorazan, et obligea en ces quartiers-là à brûler leurs idoles et à bâtir de Mosquées. Après cette conquête, il passa dans la Transoxiana et prit de force les fameuses villes de Samarcande et de Bokhara, et défit Mazurk roi de Turkestan, qui s’était approché pour les sécourir. Ce grand capitaine finit ses conquêtes l’an 93 (sic) de l’Hégire.”
138 Tabari, Annales, Series II. pp. 1283–96.
139 An important town on the Perso-Turkish frontier, north-east of Baghdād.
140 This saying is not to be found in the Arabic Tabari, but in the Persian version. See Zotenberg, vol. iv. p. 204.
141 See Zotenberg’s translation of the Persian Tabari, vol. iv. p. 221.
142 After remaining, as Tabari tells us, four months in Khorāsān to settle the administration of the province.
143 Zotenberg, vol. iv. p. 225 et seq.
144 Tabari, Annales, Series II. p. 1318.
145 He directed that converts were to be exempt from all taxes, and placed on the same footing as the Arabs; while unbelievers were to be taxed to the utmost. No churches, synagogues, or fire-temples were to be destroyed, but the erection of new ones was forbidden. Cf. Muir, Caliphate, p. 380.
146 His post was the same as Hajjāj’s, and was equivalent to a viceroyalty of the Eastern conquests of the Caliphate.
147 Known by the sobriquet of Khuzayna, “the Village Girl,” because of his effeminate ways.
148 See Tabari, Annales, Series II. pp. 1431 and 1433. Vambéry (who reads the name as Tarshi) states that this man succeeded Yezīd ibn Muhallab on the appointment of Maslama. Cf. Bokhara, p. 37. The Persian Tabari also says that the nomination was made by Maslama. Cf. Zotenberg, vol. iv. p. 268.
149 The Annales devote many pages to his progress, but as the details are of small importance we refrain from summarising them, and merely follow the abridged account of the Persian Tabari.
150 He seems already to have been dismissed, and to have been reinstated.
151 It is very remarkable that from this point in the history the account in the Arabic is as prolix as that in the Persian translation is compressed and condensed.
152 Vambéry calls him (wrongly) Esresh.
153 Called by Vambéry, Jandab. He succeeded to the command in A.H. 111. He had previously been in Sind, and on his way to join the army at Bokhārā he narrowly escaped falling into the Khākān’s hands. Tabari relates that he obtained his promotion by offering to Hishām’s wife a necklace of precious stones, which the Caliph admired so greatly that Junayd procured another like it for him. See Tabari, Annales, Series II. p. 1527.
154 In this battle a nephew of the Khākān was taken prisoner, and afterwards sent to the Caliph. Tabari notices that there is a doubt as to the year in which these engagements took place, some saying A.H. 112 and others 113 (730, 731).
155 This defeat was known as the battle of the Defile (ash-Shīb), A.H. 112 (730).
156 Tabari, Annales, Series II. p. 1539.
157 About ten or eleven thousand perished in the battle, the remainder were betrayed to the Khākān (Tabari, loc. cit. p. 1542).
158 Tabari, loc. cit. p. 1543.
159 Junayd in his report seems to have laid the blame of his defeat on Saura for advancing too far out of Samarkand. According to Tabari, his words were: “Saura disobeyed me; I ordered him to keep near the river, but he did not do so” (loc. cit. p. 1544). Beladhori also, in his very brief account of this campaign, makes no mention of defeat or even disaster. He merely says that Junayd fought the Turks till he had utterly repulsed them, and then asked the Caliph for reinforcements. The account in the Persian Tabari is roughly as follows:—Junayd’s first brush with the Turks was successful; but their Khākān was not discouraged by his reverse. He mustered a host so formidable that Junayd found it necessary to order Saura, who had taken possession of Samarkand, to join forces with him. He then marched against the Khākān with 20,000 men. The Turkish leader adopted tactics which have again and again enabled a prescient leader to triumph against immense odds. On learning that Saura had left Samarkand, he turned and fell upon him with such ferocity that not one of his 20,000 troops escaped to tell the tale. Thereupon Junayd summoned every town of Khorāsān and Tokhāristān to send him its quota of reinforcements; and having thus gathered an army of 43,000 strong, despatched it under a trusted follower to relieve Samarkand, which was closely besieged by the victorious Khākān. The Mohammedans reached the city when their garrison was on the point of surrendering, and attacked the beleaguering host. For the first time during many disastrous years the banner of Islām prevailed. The Khākān was smitten hip and thigh, and forced to raise the siege of Samarkand. Junayd placed a garrison there of 5000 men under Nasr ibn Sayyār, and returned to Merv, where death soon closed his brilliant career.
160 He appears to have received the appointment from his brother Khālid, the governor of `Irāk.
161 It is worthy of remark that in the Persian Tabari the record of Asad’s second tenure of office is not only very brief, but even differs essentially from that of the Arabic original.
162 In Schefer’s edition of Narshakhi (p. 59) the date is absurdly given as 166.
164 Cf. Tabari, loc. cit. p. 1988 et seq.
165 Hārith ibn Surayj mentioned above was still with the Turks, and when Nasr ibn Sayyār reported his victory to the governor of `Irāk the latter ordered him to capture Hārith, subdue Farghāna, and destroy the town of Shāsh.
166 By the promulgation of a general amnesty the Soghdians were brought back to their allegiance.
167 Their names were Welīd II., Yezīd II., Ibrāhīm, and Merwān II.
168 His father, Mohammed, had died in A.H. 124.
169 An amusing incident is given in this connection by Tabari. Kirmānī was very stout, and the passage by which he had to escape was so narrow that his servant was obliged to drag him through by main force, and the operation very nearly killed him.
170 See note 1, p. 82.
171 For a full account of the story of El-Kirmānī and Hārith ibn Surayj, see Tabari, Annales, Series II. pp. 1855–69, 1887–90, and 1917–35.
172 The following table will explain the descent of the two branches:—
173 Zotenberg, op. cit. vol. iv. p. 323 et seq.
174 He was then not twenty years of age.
175 We are told that Abū Muslim wished to have a distinctive colour for his party, the Umayyads having adopted white. After making one of his slaves clothe himself in suits of various colours, he ordered him to dress in black, and finding the sombre hue the most awe-inspiring adopted it for his party. Cf. Zotenberg, lot cit. p. 327. Later the Khārijites adopted red, and the Shi`ites green.
176 Nasr ibn Sayyār was a poet of no mean order, and Arabic histories contain many quotations from his compositions, specimens of which will be found on p. 87 and 88 of Nöldeke’s Delectus Vet. Carm. Arab.
177 Two very different versions of the end of Nasr are to be found in Oriental histories. That given in the text is the usually accepted one; but in the Persian translation of Tabari (cf. Zotenberg, loc cit. p. 329), in the Tārīkh-i-Guzīda, etc., we are told that he fled unaccompanied as far as Ray, where he died. No mention is made here of the engagements with Kahtaba, who, according to the author of the Guzīda, gained possession of Jurjān, Ray, Sāva, and Kum without striking a blow.
178 His horse ran away with him and, slipping on the banks of the river, threw its rider into the water, where he was drowned. His disappearance was not remarked until daybreak. The Guzīda says that Ibn Hobayra also perished in the battle.
179 Numbering, according to the Persian Tabari, more than 30,000 men.
180 The Caliph’s two uncles, Dā´ūd and `Abdullah,—the former in Mekka and Medīna, the latter in Palestine,—were responsible for the wholesale extermination of the Umayyads in those countries. The historians tell us that `Abdullah on one occasion invited seventy members of the house of Umayya to a feast, under promises of a full amnesty, and that, at a given signal, the servants fell upon the unsuspecting guests and put them all to death. This tragedy recalls the famous “Blood bath” in Stockholm, but the Umayyads had no Gustav Wasa to avenge their death. We are told that the spirit of revenge carried them so far that they caused all the tombs of the Umayyad Caliph to be opened, and what remained of their corpses to be scattered to the winds. Cf. Chroniques de Tabari, vol. iv. p. 343.
181 History of Bokhara, p. 40.
182 Es-Saffāh was ten years younger than Abū Ja`far, but, as Weil suggests, was preferred to the latter, because his mother was a free woman, while his brother’s was a slave.
183 See Weil, Geschichte der Khalifen, vol. ii. pp. 24, 25.
184 The correspondence is fully reported by Tabari; and Weil, recognising its historical interest, has translated in full three of the letters. Cf. Weil, op. cit. vol. ii. pp. 27, 28.
185 Tabari, Annales, Series III. p. 122.
186 An account of this man may be found in the Siasset Namèh, pp. 122–23 of Schefer’s text.
187 In the Arabic, Wadhālika innahu kāna min sanāyi`ihi.
188 Numbering 6000 men.
189 Wrongly read by Weil as Jumhur.
190 Tabari, loc cit. p. 120.
191 According to both versions of Tabari, he fell from a window and broke his back.
192 El-Mahdi, who was at this time about twenty years of age, had, we are told, a lieutenant to assist him in his duties as governor.
193 The Rāvandīs believed in the transmigration of souls, and held that the soul of the Deity was temporarily resident in the body of the Caliph, while the souls of Adam and Gabriel were residing in the bodies of two of his generals. For accounts of this sect, see Weil, Geschichte der Khalifen, vol. ii. p. 36 et seq.; Muir, The Caliphate, p. 448; Tabari, Annales, Series III. p. 129 et seq.; and Zotenberg, Chroniques de Tabari, vol. iv. p. 137 et seq.
194 In the preceding pages undue space may appear to have been given to the history of the Caliphs, but the growing importance of Central Asia will in future render our history almost independent of events at Baghdād.
195 The famous Annales of Tabari (which have been our Haupt-Quelle for the history of the Arabs in Central Asia), like those of Ibn el-Athīr, are arranged under the heading of each succeeding year. We make a point of giving throughout the name of each governor of Khorāsān appointed by the Caliphs, for, though such details are in themselves trivial, no list of them has, to our knowledge, appeared in any European work.
196 Weil, op. cit. vol. ii. p. 65, says that he gave himself out as a prophet, but Tabari says nothing of this. Cf. Tabari, Annales, Series III. p. 149.
197 El-Mahdi had held this post since A.H. 141 (758).
198 We have not thought fit to dwell at any length on the adventures of this famous impostor. Professor Vambéry, in his History of Bokhara, devotes no less than ten pages to the rising. The story, in its main outlines, is familiar to Englishmen from Moore’s Lalla Rookh.
199 Cf. Tabari, loc. cit. p. 631.
200 This powerful family took its descent from one Barmek, a physician of Balkh. One of its members, Khālid ibn Barmek, became vezīr of the first `Abbāsid Caliph, and under El-Mahdi was intrusted with the education of the heir-apparent Hārūn. Khālid’s son Yahya succeeded him as vezīr in A.H. 170 (786), and showed himself one of the most capable rulers of his age. For an account of their fall consult Sec. iii. of the Terminal Essay in vol. x. of Burton’s Thousand and One Nights.
201 August Müller, generally so accurate, calls him erroneously Isā ibn Alī, and equally erroneously states that he was killed in battle in the year 191, whereas he did not die till 195 (see below).
202 Zotenberg, op. cit. iv. p. 469.
203 Cf. Müller, op. cit. i. p. 497; Vambéry, Bokhara, pp. 53, 54; Zotenberg, op. cit. iv, 71 et seq.
204 Its exact nature is not known, but it was probably the fruits of a life of reckless dissipation.
205 Cf. Zotenberg, op. cit. tome iv. p. 481.
206 He was minister of both the civil and military departments, and was hence known as Dhu-l-Rīyāsatayn, or “Lord of the two Ministries.”
207 Cf. Weil, Geschichte der Khalifen, vol. ii. p. 197.
208 He was called “the Magian, the son of a Magian.”
209 Ma´mūn had conceived an aversion for Tāhir (some authors say because Tāhir reminded him of his brother Amīn’s death), and, being conscious of this, Tāhir naturally feared the proximity of the Caliph. He superseded a certain Ghassān, whom Ma´mūn had left in charge of Khorāsān.
210 Who died A.H. 166 (782).
211 His full title was Sāmān-Khudāt, being lord of a village which he himself had built and given the name of Sāmān. He claimed descent from the Sāsānide Bahrām Chūbīn. Cf. Narshakhi, ed. Schefer, pp. 57, 58.
212 Vambéry (Bokhara, p. 55) notes that “the fact that Sāmān, whilst still a heretic, had held a command long after the Arab conquest, proves the small progress Islāmism had at first made among the followers of Zoroaster.”
213 See above, p. 96.
214 See note 1 above, p. 100.
215 Narshakhi, ed. Schefer, reads absurdly 292!
216 Cf. Mīrkhwānd, Historia Samanidarum, ed. Wilken, p. 3. Narshakhi says that Ahmed was made governor of Merv, but from what follows this seems erroneous.
217 d’Herbelot quotes a Persian quatrain in which the Tāhirides are enumerated—
Translation.—In Khorāsān, of the house of Massāb (Tāhir’s name was Tāhir ibn Husayn ibn Massāb) there were the following princes—Tāhir, Talha, `Abdullah, another Tāhir and then Mohammad, who gave up throne and crown to Ya`kūb.
218 He ruled from A.H. 232–247 (846–861).
219 In Arabic Saffār, whence the dynasty took its name.
220 Cf. Khwāndamīr’s account of the Saffārides in his Habīb-us-Siyar. We refer the reader also to Nöldeke’s brilliant sketch of this man’s career, entitled “Ya`qūb the Coppersmith” (Sketches from Persian History, pp. 176–206).
221 Malcolm, History of Persia, vol. i. p. 148.
222 Cf. Müller, op. cit. vol. ii. p. 29.
223 Narshakhi (ed. Schefer, p. 78) gives the date as A.H. 260 (872), Mīrkhwānd (ed. Wilken, p. 4) as A.H. 261 (873).
224 Narshakhi, loc. cit. Muwaffak is here spoken of as Caliph, but he was merely chief minister of state to his brother the Caliph Mu`tamid.
225 This point is not made clear by Persian historians. The Saffārides had by their victories become masters of all the provinces ruled by the Tāhirides, of which Transoxiana was certainly one. It is hard to conceive either that they should have renounced their claim on Transoxiana, or that the feeble Caliph should have taken upon himself to pronounce the Samānīdes independent of Khorāsān.
226 Narshakhi, ed. Schefer, p. 79.
227 Vambéry is in this place (see Bokhārā, p. 58) guilty of a curious error, for he says that this Rāfi` was the Rāfi` ibn Layth who had rebelled against Hārūn er-Rashīd in A.H. 190 and was pardoned in 196 by Ma´mūn. He would by the year 272 have been rather old to receive a governorship of a province.
228 Mīrkhwānd (ed. Wilken, p. 6) says that it was in connection with this friendship that certain mean persons poisoned the mind of Nasr against his brother. This author tells us that Isma`īl had requested and received of Rāfi` the province of Khwārazm, and this, so Nasr’s advisers said, was merely a plot to deprive Nasr of Transoxiana.
230 Five farsakhs to the south of Aulié-ātā. For a full account of what is known of Christianity in Central Asia in early times we refer the reader to an excellent monograph on this subject by M. Barthold, of St. Petersburg, which was published in vol. viii. of the Zapiski, or Journal of the St. Petersburg University Oriental Faculty. Much valuable information on this subject is also to be found in Col. Yule’s Cathay and the Way Thither.
231 Ed. Schefer, p. 84.
232 Bellew (Forsyth Mission, p. 119) says that Isma`īl received his patent of succession from the Caliph while engaged in this campaign; but this is not in agreement with Narshakhi, whom he gives as his authority.
233 See above, p. 105.
234 Cf. Weil, op. cit. ii. p. 483.
235 Weil, op. cit. ii. p. 485, hints at this duplicity, basing his statement on the fact that the Caliph praised and rewarded Isma`īl when he heard of his victory over `Amr. Khwāndamīr, in his Habīb-us-Siyar, leaves the question open, and expressly says that Isma`īl acted “either on the Khalif’s orders or on his own initiative.”
236 Nizām ul-Mulk, in his Siyāset Namé, tells an amusing anecdote in this connection. After `Amr had been taken prisoner, towards nightfall one of his fellows, having procured some meat and borrowed a saucepan, was preparing a meal for his master: while he for a moment left his cooking to fetch some salt, a dog came and poked his head into the saucepan. In trying to pull out a bone the handle of the pot fell round his neck, and he scampered off, carrying the scalding pot with him. On seeing this, `Amr remarked: “This morning 300 camels bore my kitchen, and to-night a dog has carried it off.”
237 Narshakhi, ed. Schefer, p. 90. The editor was here (as in only too many places in this uncritical edition) guilty of allowing an absurd date to be printed in his text; for the date of `Amr’s death is given as 280!
238 Narshakhi, loc. cit. Vambéry points out (op. cit. note to p. 66) that Sind and Hind are “a random boast” of the author.
239 The governor before him had made Bokhārā his residence.
240 A very striking description of the literary talent gathered there is given by ath-Tha`labi, in the Yatīmatu ´d-Dahr, vol. iv. p. 30 (Damascus ed.).
241 Vambéry (Bokhara, p. 67) adds to this list Kazwīn, Shīrāz, and Isfahān, which were towns in the dominion of the Būyides. The Būyides and the Sāmānides practically shared the whole of Persia and Central Asia as follows:—
Sāmānides—Khorāsān, Sīstān, Balkh, Bokhārā, and Samarkand.
Būyides—The two `Irāks, Fars, Kirmān, Khuzistān, and Luristān.
Tabaristān and Jurjān were continually changing hands.
242 He died of some malady at a place called Zarmān, whither the doctors had sent him for change of air.
243 Dawlat Shāh, in his Lives of the Poets (see Browne’s edition, p. 44), quotes from `Unsuri the following quatrain in which the rulers of the house of Sāmān are enumerated—
Translation.—Nine members of the house of Sāmān were famous in the government of Khorāsān, namely, Ismā`īl, one Ahmad, one Nasr, two Nūh’s, two `Abd el-Melik’s, and two Mansūr’s.
244 Cf. Vambéry, Bokhara, p. 81, and Bretschneider, Mediæval Researches from Eastern Asiatic Sources (London, 1888), vol. i. p. 236 seqq. An interesting article was published in 1874 by Grigorieff in the Memoirs of the Eastern Branch of the St. Petersburg Archæological Society, vol. xviii. p. 191 seqq. This article contains the Turkish text of an extract from the Tārīkh-i-Munajjim-Bāshī, with an introduction, a translation, and copious notes. The name of Kara-Khānides was first suggested by Grigorieff for this dynasty, after Satuk Kara Khān, who was the first of its kings to embrace Islām. The title is more convenient than the others by which this dynasty has been known, such as Uïghūrs, Ilek-khāns, and Ilkhāns, as will appear from note below, p. 116. Bretschneider, whom on such subjects it is hard to contradict, was by no means convinced by Grigorieff’s positive assertion that the Kara-Khānides were not Uïghūrs.