Part 2

The early Arabic sources are remarkably rich in material for the reconstruction of the conquests in Khurāsān and Transoxania. For the earlier period the narratives of Yaʿqūbī and Balādhurī are nearly as full as those of _T_abarī, but the special value of the latter lies in his method of compilation which renders the traditions amenable to critical study and thus provides a control for all the others. Moreover, while the other historians, regarding the conquests of Qutayba as definitely completing the reduction of Transoxania, provide only meagre notices for the later period, _T_abarī more than compensates for their silence by the enormous wealth of detail embodied in the accounts he quotes from Al-Madāʾinī and others of the last thirty years of Umayyad rule. As a general rule, these three historians rely on different authorities, though all use the earlier histories of Al-Madāʾinī and Abū ʿUbayda to some extent. The monograph of Narshakhī (d. 959 A.D.) based on both Arabic and local sources, with some resemblance to Balādhurī, is unfortunately preserved only in a Persian version of two centuries later which has obviously been edited, to what extent is unknown, but which probably represents the original as unsatisfactorily as Balʿamī’s Persian version of _T_abarī. Even so it preserves to us some account of the peoples against whom the Arab invaders were matched, and thus does a little to remedy the defects of the other historians in this respect. It may well be doubted, however, whether some of its narratives merit the reliance placed upon them by van Vloten[17]. The much later historian Ibn al-Athīr introduces very little new material, but confines himself for the most part to abridging and re-editing the narratives in _T_abarī, with a tendency to follow the more exaggerated accounts. The geographer Ibn Khūrdādhbih gives a list of titles and names, which is, however, too confused to supply any reliable evidence.

Reference has already been made to certain aspects of the conquests in which the Arab historians are misleading. Their information on the Turks and the principalities of Sogdiana can now, fortunately, be supplemented and parts of their narratives controlled from Chinese sources, chiefly through Chavannes’ valuable “Documents sur les Tou-Kiue (Turcs) Occidentaux.” But there are two other facts which also demand attention: one, that the Arabic authorities, as we possess them, and even with all allowance made for their limitations, are by no means exhaustive; _i.e._, reliance on omissions in the narratives is an unsafe principle of criticism: the other, that by critical study it is possible to distinguish at certain points several lines of tendentious tradition or legend, directed to the interests of national feeling or of some particular tribe or faction, and centred in some cases round specific persons. These may most conveniently be summarised as follows:

1. A Qaysite tradition, centred on the family of Ibn Khāzim:

2. An Azd-Rabīʿa tradition, centred on Muhallab and hostile to _H_ajjāj. This became the most popular tradition among the Arabs, and is followed by Balādhurī, but opposed by Yaʿqūbī:

3. A Bāhilite tradition, centred on the tribal hero, Qutayba b. Muslim. In general it found little favour but is occasionally quoted somewhat sarcastically by _T_abarī.

4. A local Bukhārā tradition, followed by Yaʿqūbī, Balādhurī and Narshakhī. It presents the early conquests under the form of an historical romance, centred on the Queen Khātūn in the part of a national Boadicea. Other local traditions, which are frequently utilised by _T_abarī, seem to be much more free from serious exaggeration:

5. The few notices in Dīnawarī follow an entirely divergent and extremely garbled tradition from unknown sources, which may for the most part be neglected:

6. The quotations made by Balādhurī (_e.g._ 422. 10) from Abū ʿUbayda show the influence of a rewriting of episodes with an anti-Arab bias, directed to the interests of the Shuʿūbīya movement, in which Abū ʿUbayda was a prominent figure[18].

7. In the later period, there appears also the fragments of a tradition of which Nasr b. Sayyār is the hero.

Some, if not all, of these traditions developed in some detail, and where they are not balanced by other versions they present a distorted narrative of events, verging in some cases on the fictitious. The most noteworthy examples of this are the Khātūn legend (see below p. 18) and the typical story of the exploits of Mūsā b. Khāzim in Transoxania in a style not unworthy of Bedouin romance[19]. It is therefore most important to disentangle these variant traditions and assign its proper value to each. The Bāhilite accounts of Qutayba’s conquests, for instance, contain wild exaggerations of fact, which, nevertheless, have sometimes been utilised in all seriousness by modern historians, amongst other purposes to establish synchronisms with the Turkish inscriptions[20].

With these precautions, it is possible to follow up and reconstruct, with comparative certainty and completeness, that progress of the Arab arms in Central Asia whose vicissitudes are outlined in the following pages.

NOTES

(Full Titles in Bibliography)

[1] Franke, Beiträge 41 ff., 67. Cordier, Chine I, 225.

[2] If Marquart’s identification (Ērānshahr, 201 f.) is correct.

[3] Cordier I. 229: Ērānshahr 50 ff.

[4] Yuan Chwang I. 103. Prof. Barthold suggests that the connection between the Ephthalites and the Huns may have been political only, not racial.

[5] Chavannes, Documents 155: Ērānshahr 89.

[6] _T_ab. I. 2885. 13 and 2886. 3: Yaʿqūbī, History, II, 193: Yāqūt (ed. Wüstenfeld) I. 492: Balādhurī 403: Ērānshahr 65 f., 77 f., and 150. Bādghīs was still a nomad pasture-ground in the XIVth century: Ibn Ba_tt_ū_t_a, III, 67 f.

[7] Yuan Chwang I. 105; II. 266; Chav. Doc. 161: Ērānshahr 250 ff.

[8] Tomaschek, Soghdiana, 170.

[9] See Marquart, Chronologie, 71: Shiratori in Keleti Szemle III (1902) footnote to pp. 122-3.

[10] _Cf._ Narshakhī 29. 4. On the Iranisation of nomadic elements, Blochet, Introduction à l’Histoire des Mongols, (Leyden, 1910) p. 211 note; Peisker, The Asiatic Background, pp. 353-6.

[11] Chavannes, Notes 91, and _cf._ below p. 80.

[12] _Cf._ Barthold, in Zeitschrift für Assyriologie XXVI (1911) p. 262.

[13] Yuan Chwang I, 75 n. 2, 102 ff: II 270: Chav. Doc. 200 f.

[14] _E.g._ _T_ab. II, 1448, 7-10: _cf._ Ērānshahr 228.

[15] _Cf._ Yaʿqūbī, Geog. 287: _T_ab. II 1205. 12: Ērānshahr 66, 87 ff.

[16] Chavannes, Doc. 201, Note 37.

[17] Narshakhī’s unreliability is even more marked in his account of the origins of the Sāmānid dynasty: _cf._ Barthold, Turkestan 215 n. 3.

[18] See Goldziher, Muhammadanische Studien, I, 195 ff.

[19] Prof. Barthold has drawn my attention to the fact that the story of Mūsā also includes (twice over) an episode from the popular legend of Zopyrus. See his article in Zapiski XVII (1906) 0141, and Wellhausen, Arabische Reich, 257, 265.

[20] _E.g._ Marquart, Chronologie, p. 8.

II. THE EARLY RAIDS

_The Conquest of Lower _T_ukhāristān._

Arab legend relates that the Muslim forces, pursuing Yazdigird from the field of Nihāwand in 21/642, had already come in contact with the “Turks” of _T_ukhāristān before the death of ʿOmar. But the final destruction of the Sāsānid power and first imposition of Arab rule on Khurāsān only followed ten years later, by the troops of ʿAbdullah ibn ʿĀmir, ʿOthmān’s governor in Ba_s_ra. The Ephthalites of Herāt and Bādghīs submitted without a blow, and the first serious check to their advance was met in the Murghāb valley, when al-A_h_naf b. Qays with an army of 4,000 Arabs and 1,000 Persians found himself opposed by the organised forces of Lower _T_ukhāristān and was compelled to retire on Merv-Rūdh. A second expedition under al-Aqraʿ b. _H_ābis, however, defeated a weaker force in Jūzjān, and subsequently occupied Jūzjān, Fāryāb, _T_ālaqān, and Balkh. Small divisions made plundering raids into the neighbouring territories, _e.g._, to Siminjān (a town within the frontiers of _T_ukhāristān proper, governed by a Turkish prince, the Ruʿb Khān), and to Khwārizm, not always with success; on the other hand, a successful raid was made on Māyamurgh in Sogdiana in 33/654, which is mentioned by Abū ʿUbayda alone of the Arabic authorities[21]. A general insurrection which broke out shortly afterwards, headed by a certain Qārin, apparently a member of the noble Persian family bearing that name, seems to have been instrumental in causing the Arabs to evacuate Khurāsān for a time[22], though several raids are recorded of ʿAlī’s governors between 35 and 38 A.H. These earliest “conquests,” in fact, were little more than plundering raids on a large scale, the effect of that movement of expansion whose momentum was carrying forward the Arabs irresistibly. According to the Chinese records, which, however, require to be used with caution at this point, the retreat of the Arabs in 655 was followed up by the army of _T_ukhāristān who reinstated Pērōz, the son of Yazdigird, as titular king of Persia[23].

When peace was restored to Islām by the recognition of Muʿāwiya in 41/661, Ibn ʿĀmir was again entrusted with the conquest of Khurāsān. The same rough and ready methods were adopted as before; there appears to have been no definite plan of invasion, and even the order of governors is uncertain. Not only are traditions relating to A.H. 32 and 42 confused by the different authorities, but a vast amount of the whole is affected by tribal legends. Hints of fierce resistance are given from time to time. Qays b. al-Haytham, the governor’s first legate, was faced with a fresh revolt in Bādghīs, Herāt, and Balkh. He recaptured the latter and in retaliation destroyed the famous shrine of Nawbahār, but left the Ephthalites to be dealt with by his successor, ʿAbdullah ibn Khāzim. It is clear that there was no ordered progress of the Arab arms until Khurāsān was brought under the administration of Ziyād b. Abīhi. After an experimental division of the province under tribal leaders, a policy obviously dangerous and quickly abandoned, Ziyād, realising the danger of allowing Persian nationalism a free hand in the East, backed up by the resources of _T_ukhāristān, centralised the administration at Merv, and organised a preventive campaign. In 47/667 his lieutenant, al-_H_akam b. ʿAmr al-Ghifārī, opened a series of campaigns directed to the conquest of Lower _T_ukhāristān and Gharjistān, in the course of which he crossed the Oxus and carried his arms into Chaghāniān, and drove Pērōz back to China in discomfiture. On his death, three years later, the conquered provinces rose in revolt, but the new governor, Rabīʿ b. Ziyād al-_H_ārithī, the first conqueror of Sijistān, after reducing Balkh, pursued the Ephthalite army into Quhistān and dispersed it with great slaughter. Again an expedition was sent across the Oxus into Chaghāniān (clearly indicating the connection between Chaghāniān and Lower _T_ukhāristān), while another directed down the left bank of the river secured Zamm and Āmul, the two chief ferry points for Sogdiana. Mention is also made of a conquest of Khwārizm. All these expeditions seem to point to a methodical plan of conquest, arranged between Ziyād and his governors; the Arab power was thus firmly established, for the moment at least, in the Cisoxanian lands, and the way prepared for the invasion of Sogdiana. A further important step was the colonisation of Khurāsān by fifty thousand families from Ba_s_ra and Kūfa[24], settled according to Arab practice in five garrison towns, for the double purpose of securing the conquests already made, and providing the forces for their further extension.

_The First Invasion of Bukhārā and _S_ughd._

Although at this junction Ziyād himself died, his policy was carried on by his sons, in particular by ʿUbaydullah. Scarcely any governor, not even _H_ajjāj, has suffered so much at the hands of the traditionists as the “Murderer of _H_usayn,” though his ability and devotion to the Umayyads are beyond question. It is not surprising therefore that his earlier military successes should be so briefly related, in spite of their importance. Yet as he was no more than 25 years of age when appointed by Muʿāwiya to the province of Khurāsān on probation, and only two years later was selected to fill his father’s position in ʿIrāq, his administration must have been markedly successful. The policy of Ziyād had now firmly secured Khurāsān and made it feasible to use it as a base for the extension of the conquests into the rich lands across the river. On his arrival at Merv, therefore, in the autumn of 53/673, the new governor began preparations for an invasion of Bukhārā.

The Shao-wu principality of Bukhārā was at this time second in importance only to Samarqand. It included not only the greater part of the oasis (“al-Bukhārīya”) then much more thickly populated than now, but also the great emporium of Paykand, which controlled the trade route across the Oxus at Āmul. Of its early history we have two accounts, both confused, inaccurate in detail, and often conflicting. From these it may be gathered that the prince, who held the high Turkish title of Shād[25], resided at Paykand, the citadel of Bukhārā being either founded or restored by the Bukhār Khudāh Bidūn, probably in consequence of the Arab invasions. This prince at his death left a son only a few months old on whose behalf the regency was exercised by the Queen-Mother. This princess, known under the title of Khātūn (a Turkish form of the Sogdian word for “lady”) became the central figure in the local traditions, which represent the Arab invasions as occurring precisely during the period of her regency. This version is the one accepted by Balādhurī, Yaʿqūbī, and Narshakhī, but though not altogether devoid of historical value, it is certainly misplaced, and the true account of the early conquests must, for cogent reasons, be sought in the brief and widely divergent narratives of _T_abarī. In the first place the Khātūn-legend, like all such legends, has grown by natural elaboration of detail, as in the account given by Narshakhī of Khātūn’s administration of justice and by continual accretions from other streams of tradition, as seen, on comparing the narratives of Balādhurī and Narshakhī, in the introduction of episodes of Ibn Khāzim and Muhallab. Critical examination also reveals alternative traditions and chronological inconsistencies, as, for example, the birth of _T_ughshāda after the invasion of Saʿīd b. ʿOthmān, Khātūn’s reign of 15 years, and others mentioned below. There is clear evidence of the late compilation of the tradition in the frequent references to “_T_arkhūn, King of _S_ughd,” though his reign did not begin until considerably after 696[26]. It may be noticed that in the variant account of the conquests prefixed to the Persian edition of Narshakhī and ascribed to An-Naysābūrī there is no reference at all to Khātūn. Moreover there are indications that _T_abarī was aware of the local tradition and completely rejected it; this, at least, would account for the unusual practice of specifying Qabaj-Khātūn as “the wife of the king” in 54 A.H. Even Balādhurī rejects the more fantastic developments of the legend. _T_abarī’s narratives, however, require to be collated with the additional material in Balādhurī, who has not relied entirely on the local tradition. The germ of the native version is probably to be found in a confusion of the Arab conquests with the later war between Bukhārā and Wardāna[27], whose echoes are heard in Qutayba’s invasions thirty years after.

In the spring of 54/674 ʿUbaydullah b. Ziyād crossed the river and marched directly on Paykand. After a partial success, he led his forces forward towards Bukhārā and severely defeated the army of the Bukhār Khudāh. From _T_abarī’s narrative, which relates only that two thousand men of Bukhārā, skilful archers, were taken by ʿUbaydullah to Ba_s_ra, where they formed his personal guard, it is left to be inferred that a treaty was concluded under which the Bukhār Khudāh became tributary. The local tradition magnifies the expedition by adding a siege of Bukhārā (during the winter) and bringing in an army of Turks to assist Khātūn, but confirms the success of the Arabs. ʿUbaydullah’s practice on this occasion of forming a bodyguard or retinue of captives appears to have been a common one. ʿAbdur-Ra_h_mān ibn Samura had previously brought captives from Sijistān to Ba_s_ra, where they built him a mosque, and later governors of Khurāsān continued the practice, as will be seen. In this may be recognised perhaps the germ of the Turkish guards recruited by the later ʿAbbāsid Caliphs.

ʿUbaydullah’s successor, Aslam b. Zurʿa, remained inactive, but in 56/676 Saʿīd b. ʿOthmān, who had obtained the governorship of Khurāsān by importuning Muʿāwiya, carried the Arab arms more deeply into Transoxania, defeated the _S_ughdians in the open field and reduced their city. Taking fifty young nobles as hostages, he retired from _S_ughd and subsequently occupied Tirmidh, an important fortress on the Oxus controlling the main North and South trade route, having presumably marched through the Iron Gate. The conquest of _S_ughd was thus definitely co-ordinated with that of Chaghāniān. _T_abarī’s narrative is strangely vague and abrupt; it contains no mention of Bukhārā nor any definite reference to Samarqand, except for the statement that it was the objective of Saʿīd’s expedition. Using this narrative alone, one would be inclined to suspect that the city captured by Saʿīd was not Samarqand but Kish (since it has been established by Marquart that Kish was formerly called _S_ughd), and that the reference to Samarqand was due to a later misunderstanding of the name[28]. On the other hand, both the local tradition and Abū ʿUbayda speak of a siege of Samarqand by Saʿīd, though their narratives are far from being in agreement in detail, and there are other indications of confusion between Saʿīd and Salm b. Ziyād. All accounts except Narshakhī’s, however, agree that the hostages who were carried by Saʿīd to Madīna and there murdered him were _S_ughdians[29]. Balādhurī’s tradition of Saʿīd’s expedition is as follows. On his crossing the river, Khātūn at first renewed her allegiance, only to withdraw it again on the approach of an army of Turks, _S_ughdians, and men of Kish and Nasaf, 120,000 strong. Saʿīd, however, completely defeated the enemy and after a triumphal entry into Bukhārā, marched on Samarqand, his forces swelled by Khātūn’s army, besieged it for three days and made it tributary. On his return he captured Tirmidh and while there received the tribute due from Khātūn and the allegiance of Khuttal. Narshakhī’s account is the same in essentials, adding only a number of imaginative details.

Saʿīd was unable to retain his position in Khurāsān, and for five years the conquests were stayed (except for summer raids) under the indolent Aslam b. Zurʿa and the avaricious ʿAbdur-Ra_h_mān b. Ziyād. In 61/680-681 Yazīd I appointed Salm, another son of Ziyād, to Khurāsān and Sijistān. Eager to emulate his brother, Salm, even before leaving Ba_s_ra, announced his intention of renewing the expeditions into Transoxania and enlisted a picked force on the spot, including such tried leaders as Muhallab b. Abī _S_ufra and ʿAbdullah b. Khāzim. From a poem preserved in the _H_amāsa of Abū Tammām[30] it would appear that somewhat unwilling levies for this expedition were raised even in Mesopotamia. Towards the close of the winter a surprise attack was made on Khwārizm, with some success. _T_abarī gives two versions of this expedition, the first of which is a highly embroidered one from the Muhallabite tradition. During the same year, Salm marched into _S_ughd and occupied Samarqand, where he appears to have made his headquarters over the winter. Balādhurī mentions a subsidiary raid on Khujanda under Aʿshā Hamdān, in which, however, the Muslims were defeated, and a _S_ughdian revolt which was crushed with the loss of its leader, here called Bandūn. The name is almost certainly to be read as that of the Bukhār-Khudāh, Bīdūn[31], and in view of the silence of _T_abarī raises rather a difficult problem. It may be conjectured that what Balādhurī intended was a revolt of the Bukhariots, combined with _S_ughdian forces. The origin of this statement may perhaps be sought for in the Bukhārā tradition, which Balādhurī does not follow in his general account of the expeditions of Salm, but which he may have tried to work in with the other. On the other hand he nowhere refers to Bīdūn as the Bukhār Khudāh. As related by Narshakhī and Yaʿqūbī Salm’s expedition is directed solely against Bukhārā. Khātūn, on promising her hand to _T_arkhūn, receives a reinforcement of 120,000 men from _S_ughd, and Bīdūn (here still alive) recruits an army in “Turkistān,” including the “Prince of Khotan.” After severe fighting, the Muslim forces, numbering 6,000, kill Bīdūn and rout the unbelievers, taking so much booty that the share of each horseman amounts to 2,400 dirhems. Khātūn, thoroughly humbled by this decisive proof of Arab invincibility, sues for peace and pays a heavy tribute. Beyond the fantastic exaggerations and incoherencies of the legend, there is nothing inherently improbable in a Bukhariot revolt. In support of this view, it may be remarked that the death of Bīdūn at this point would agree with the slender data we have for the internal wars which probably formed the original basis of the Khātūn-legend, and would also provide a foothold for the later developments of the tradition. Without fuller evidence, however, we can get no further than reasonable conjecture.