The Best Prophet of the Future is the Past

The Best Prophet of the Future is the Past.

Early History of Uzbekistan (V-XII c.)

History of Uzbekistan: Early Middle Ages Ephtalite State

Food for Thought

• What do you know/comment on:
• Ephtalites
• Buddhist traditions
• Sogdiana

• In the 5th century Ephtalites conquered all the cities of Central Asia and created a vast empire that stretched from the Caspian Sea to Kashgar, and from the Aral Sea to India. They preferred not to interfere in politics of Sogdiana, which meanwhile had been divided into many kingdoms, the largest of which was Samarkand. Ephtalits promoted Buddhist traditions, they built many Buddhist temples. Ephtalites carried on active foreign trade through the Great Silk Road. They had good relations with China, India and Byzantine. They traded silk, jewelry and spices.

Turkic Khanate

• In the 6th century the Ephtalite State was destroyed by the Turks, who in 550-750 through the union of various nomadic tribes and Altai nations established a powerful state, Turkic Khanate, stretching from China to the Volga. Central Asia became its part. Turkic Khanate lived by endless wars, by which it became richer. Captives were settled in special villages and paid to Khagans by products or handicrafts. Sogdiana and Fergana cities under the reign of Turks preserved a relative autonomy and paid only a tribute to kaghans.
• The Turkic Khanate took part in political and economic relations of the largest states of that period: Byzantine, Sasanid Empire, Iran and China and struggled for the control on the Silk Road. Cotton and silk production were actively developed. In the early Middle Ages cotton and silk were the main resources of the region; local gold and silver were highly estimated too.

The Arab conquest and early Muslim expansion

• In the 7th century AD a Sogdian fertile land became a subject of keen interest of the Arabs who from 673 started to invade these lands. The Arabs called it Mawarannahr ("that which is beyond the river").
• In 709-712 the Arab leader Ibn Muslim Kuteiba conquered the main centers of Mawarannhr: Samarkand, Bukhara and Khorezm. As a result, Uzbekistan and practically the whole Central Asia became a part of the Arab Caliphate under the control of the Baghdad caliphs (Omeiad Dynasty till the middle of 8th century and since 750 the Abassid dynasty).
• The Arab influence in the Mawarannahr became dominant. The Arabs brought Islam and forcibly converted residents of the conquered lands to this new religion. By the 10th century the entire population of Mawarannahr (the region between the Amu Darya and Syr Darya) adopted Islam. All attempts of local people to resist the invaders were not successful. But such major rebellions as the rebellion of Mukanna and Rafi ibn Leis forever remained in the chronicles of the liberation movements of Central Asian nations.