Ghurids
From Includipedia, the inclusionist encyclopedia
The Ghurids (or Ghorids; self-designation: Shansabānī) (Template:PerB) were a Sunni Muslim dynasty in Khorasan, most likely of Eastern Iranian Tājik[1][2] origin. The Ghurid empire was based in the region of Ghor (now a province of modern Afghanistan), and stretched over a vast area that included the whole of Afghanistan, parts of modern Iran and South Asia (India and Pakistan).
Contents |
History
Between 1175 and 1192, under the leadership of Muhammad of Ghor, they put an end to Ghaznavid rule in India. They also captured their base in Lahore and founded the second Islamic state in India called the Ghurid state (543-613 A.H. 1148-1215 A.D.). This was named after Ghur their native province, located in present day Afghanistan between Herat and Ghazni. Sultans of this state did not remain in India permanently; instead, they settled in their capital Ghazna and ruled India through their Turkish Mamluks. They made the Khilijs to slave in Ghazna who lived beside the Ghaznavids and occupied Uch, Multan, Peshawar, Lahore, and Delhi. In 1206, one of the Ghurid generals, Qutb-ud-din Aybak, the conqueror of Delhi, made himself independent and founded the first of a succession of dynasties collectively known as the Delhi Sultanate (1206-1526). After the Delhi-Sultanate, the Khilij began to create the slave-dynasty of India. Sultan Mohammed El Ghurid bought large numbers of mamluks and looked after their education and prepared them for invasion and holy war. It is reported that whenever he was reminded of the necessity of having a son to preserve his rule, he used to say: I have thousands of sons i.e. Turkish Mamluks". Some of these mamluks became rulers and leaders like Yildiz, ruler of Ghazna, and Nasir al-Din Kubacha, in the Sind, and Qutb al-Din Aybak, in Delhi, with the strongest influence. Thus, Mohammed al-Ghurid managed, thanks to his mamluks especially Aybak, to capture all Indian lands to the north of the Vindhya mountains as far as the mouth of the Ganges river. Islam spread there; its Hindu temples were changed into mosques and its rajas paid tribute.
In 603 A.H. (1206 A.D.) Sultan Mohammed al-Ghurid was assassinated on banks of the River Sind by a radical member of Ismailia sect. On his death, Ghazna and Ghur disappeared and were replaced by Delhi as the Islamic capital for the Mamluk Sultans in India. [3]
The Ghoris were great patrons of Persian culture, language, and identity, arts and literature, although many of the written works have been lost. In the arts they transferred the Khurasanian architecture of their native lands to India - with great examples of it in the Minars they built.
Origin of the Shansabānī family
According to Faizal Ahmad Chendawoli, the Shansabānī had ancestral lines to the Sassanian royal family who - led by Prince Pirooz - fled with some hundred thousand of followers from Western Iran to Khorasan, following the Arabic conquest of Persia. He further explains that they were still Zoroastrians and isolated from all Arab-Islamic influence until the 11th century when they were eventually converted to Islam by the Samanid and Ghaznavid ghazis. Their isolation in the rough terrain of Ghor's mountains may be an explanation to why their language remained conservative and free of Arabic influence. While Dupree believes that the Ghurids were remnants of the Tocharian Kushans, Bosworth points out that the actual name of the Ghurid family, Āl-e Šansab (Persianized: Šansabānī), is the Arabic pronunciation of the originally Middle Persian name Wišnasp, further pointing to a (Sassanian) Persian origin.[4]
Language of Ghurids
The language of the Ghurids is subject to some controversy. What is known with certainty is that it was significantly different from the New Persian literary language which dominated the kingly courts of the eastern Islamic lands. According to some old sources, it was related to Middle Persian, the language of the Sassanians. That would - to some extent - support the theory that the Ghurids were related to House of Sāsān and indeed formed a part of the eastward migration of Persian families following the Arab-Islamic conquest of Persia.
Some modern linguists also connect the language to certain Eastern Iranian languages, most of all to Yaghnobi which itself derives from ancient Sogdian.
Nevertheless, like the Samanids and Ghaznavids, the Ghurids were great patrons of New Persian literature and poetry, and promoted this culture in their courts.
See also
Notes
- ^ Encyclopaedia Iranica, "Ghurids", C.E. Bosworth, (LINK): "... The Ghurids came from the Šansabānī family and where till the 11th. century still zoroastrians. The name of the eponym Šansabānasb probably derives from the Middle Persian name Wišnasp (Justi, Namenbuch, p. 282). [...] Nor do we know anything about the ethnic stock of the Ghori's in general and the Sansabanis in particular; We can only assume that they were eastern Iranian Tajiks ... The sultans were generous patrons of the Persian literary traditions of Khorasan, and latterly fulfilled a valuable role as transmitters of this heritage to the newly conquered lands of northern India, laying the foundations for the essentially Persian culture which was to prevail in Muslim India until the 19th century. ..."
- ^ Encyclopaedia of Islam, "Ghurids", C.E. Bosworth, Online Edition, 2006: "... The Shansabānīs were, like the rest of the Ghūrīs, of eastern Iranian Tājik stock. ..."
- ^ Ira M. Lapidus, A History of Islamic Societies 2nd ed. Cambridge University Press 2002
- ^ Encyclopaedia Iranica, "Ghurids", C.E. Bosworth, (LINK); with reference to Justi, "Namenbuch", p. 282
External links
- Encyclopaedia Britannica (Online Edition) - Ghurid Sultanate
- Encyclopaedia Britannica (Online Edition) - Muizz-ud-Din-Muhammad a.k.a. Mohammad of Ghor
- Columbia Encyclopedia (Sixth Edition) - Muhammad of Ghor
- Ghurids
<span id="interwiki-ur-fa" /> ar:غوريون de:Ghuriden es:Imperio Gurida fr:Ghurides ja:ゴール朝 ru:Гуриды fi:Ghuridit sv:Ghuriderna tr:Gurlular ur:سلطنت غوریہ zh:古尔王朝
