Islamic conquest of Afghanistan: Encyclopedia II - Islamic conquest of Afghanistan - Mongol Rule 1220-1506

Islamic conquest of Afghanistan - Mongol Rule 1220-1506

Followings years of conquest in China and Central Asia, the Mongol Empire had emerged as a major world power of its day and attempted to co-exist with some of their neighbors including the empire the Khwarezmia Shah (which included what is today Afghanistan) and sent emissaries to establish diplomatic and trading links. As either a bluff to dissuade the Mongols from aggression or as simply a haughty sign of disrespect, the Khwarezmia Shah Ala ad-Din Muhammad II had the diplomats executed and sent their heads back to the Mongols and this prompted a military confrontation. In 1220, the Islamic lands of Central Asia were overrun by the armies of the Mongol invader Genghis Khan (ca. 1155-1227), who laid waste to many cities and settlements and created an empire that stretched from China to the Caucasus. The Mongols under Genghis Khan responded with great severity to the insults they had taken from Muhammad II and took out their revenge against the inhabitants of Khwarezmia including, for example, exterminating every human being, including women and children, in the cities of Herat and Balkh. This devastation had severe consequences for the natives of Afghanistan as the destruction caused by the Mongols depopulated many of the major cities and caused much of the population to revert to an agrarian rural society. Thus, Afghanistan became dominated by cattlebreeding tribes who also specialized in horseback riding. Genghis Khan failed to extinguish or even particularly hamper Islam in Central Asia, if that was even his intent, as the religion continued to define many local inhabitants culturally. In fact, by the end of the 13th century, Genghis Khan's descendants had themselves become Muslims (many speculate that the Hazaras of Afghanistan are in fact the descendents of Genghis Khan and his Mongol hordes) and even the title of 'khan' became a not so uncommon name adopted by many local inhabitants. From the death of Genghis Khan in 1227 until the rise of Timur Lenk (Tamerlane) in the 1380s, Central Asia went through a period of fragmentation.

A product of both Turkish and Mongol descent, Timur claimed Genghis Khan as an ancestor. From his capital of Samarkand, Timur created an empire that, by the late fourteenth century, extended from northern India to eastern Turkey. The turn of the sixteenth century brought an end to the Timurid Empire when another Central Asian ruler of Turkic-Mongol extraction, Muhammad Shaybani, overwhelmed the weakened Timurid ruler in Herat. Shaybani (also a descendant of Genghis Khan) and his successors ruled the area around the Amu Darya for about a century, while to the south and west of what is now Afghanistan two powerful dynasties began to compete for influence.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Mongol Rule 1220-1506", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki