Turk Shahis | |||||||||||||||||||
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665–822 CE[1][2] | |||||||||||||||||||
Capital | Kabul (summer capital) Udabhanda (winter capital) | ||||||||||||||||||
Common languages | Bactrian | ||||||||||||||||||
Religion | Buddhism Hinduism | ||||||||||||||||||
Historical era | Early Middle Ages | ||||||||||||||||||
• Established | 665 | ||||||||||||||||||
• Disestablished | 822 CE[1][2] | ||||||||||||||||||
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Today part of | Afghanistan Pakistan |
Turk Shahi rulers 665-822 CE | ||||||||||||||
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The Turk Shahis or Kabul Shahis were a dynasty of Western Turk, or mixed Turko-Hephthalite, or a group of Hephthalites origin,[3] that ruled from Kabul and Kapisa to Gandhara in the 7th to 9th centuries AD.[1][4][5] They may have been of Khalaj ethnicity.[6][7][8] The Gandhara territory may have been bordering the Kashmir kingdom and the Kannauj kingdom to the east.[9] From the 560s, the Western Turks had gradually expanded southeasterward from Transoxonia, and occupied Bactria and the Hindu Kush region, forming largely independent polities.[10] The Turk Shahis may have been a political extension of the neighbouring Western Turk Yabghus of Tokharistan.[4] In the Hindu Kush region, they replaced the Nezak Huns – the last dynasty of Bactrian rulers with origins among the Xwn (Xionite) and/or Huna peoples (who are sometimes also referred to as "Huns" who invaded Eastern Europe during a similar period).[4]
The Turk Shahis arose at a time when the Sasanian Empire had already been conquered by the Rashidun Caliphate. The Turk Shahis then resisted for more than 250 years the eastward expansion of the Abbasid Caliphate, until they fell to the Persian Saffarids in the 9th century AD.[11] The Ghaznavids then finally broke through into India after overpowering the declining subsequent Hindu Shahis and Gurjaras.[1][4]
Kabulistan was the heartland of the Turk Shahi domain, which at times included Zabulistan and Gandhara.[12]
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A Bactrian Document (BD T) from this period brings interesting information about the area to our attention. In it, dated to BE 476 (701 AD), a princess identified as `Bag-aziyas, the Great Turkish Princess, the Queen of Qutlugh Tapaghligh Bilga Sävüg, the Princess of the Khalach, the Lady of Kadagestan offers alms to the local god of the region of Rob, known as Kamird, for the health of (her) child. Inaba, arguing for the Khalaj identity of the kings of Kabul, takes this document as a proof that the Khalaj princess is from Kabul and has been offered to the (Hephthalite) king of Kadagestan, thus becoming the lady of that region. The identification of Kadagestan as a Hephthalite stronghold is based on Grenet's suggestion of the survival of Hephthalite minor stares in this region...
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