History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 5Gibbon, Edward
History
History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 5
Gibbon, Edward
Byzantine Empire -- History -- To 527; Rome -- History -- Empire, 30 B.C.-476 A.D.
3812 (return) [ Firouz died leaving a son called Ni-ni-cha by the
Chinese, probably Narses. Yezdegerd had two sons, Firouz and
Bahram St. Martin, vol. xi. p. 318.—M.]
39 (return) [ The two daughters of Yezdegerd married Hassan, the
son of Ali, and Mohammed, the son of Abubeker; and the first of
these was the father of a numerous progeny. The daughter of
Phirouz became the wife of the caliph Walid, and their son Yezid
derived his genuine or fabulous descent from the Chosroes of
Persia, the Caesars of Rome, and the Chagans of the Turks or
Avars, (D’Herbelot, Bibliot. Orientale, p. 96, 487.)]
After the fall of the Persian kingdom, the River Oxus divided the
territories of the Saracens and of the Turks. This narrow
boundary was soon overleaped by the spirit of the Arabs; the
governors of Chorasan extended their successive inroads; and one
of their triumphs was adorned with the buskin of a Turkish queen,
which she dropped in her precipitate flight beyond the hills of
Bochara. 40 But the final conquest of Transoxiana, 41 as well as
of Spain, was reserved for the glorious reign of the inactive
Walid; and the name of Catibah, the camel driver, declares the
origin and merit of his successful lieutenant. While one of his
colleagues displayed the first Mahometan banner on the banks of
the Indus, the spacious regions between the Oxus, the Jaxartes,
and the Caspian Sea, were reduced by the arms of Catibah to the
obedience of the prophet and of the caliph. 42 A tribute of two
millions of pieces of gold was imposed on the infidels; their
idols were burnt or broken; the Mussulman chief pronounced a
sermon in the new mosch of Carizme; after several battles, the
Turkish hordes were driven back to the desert; and the emperors
of China solicited the friendship of the victorious Arabs. To
their industry, the prosperity of the province, the Sogdiana of
the ancients, may in a great measure be ascribed; but the
advantages of the soil and climate had been understood and
cultivated since the reign of the Macedonian kings. Before the
invasion of the Saracens, Carizme, Bochara, and Samarcand were
rich and populous under the yoke of the shepherds of the north.
4211 These cities were surrounded with a double wall; and the
exterior fortification, of a larger circumference, enclosed the
fields and gardens of the adjacent district. The mutual wants of
India and Europe were supplied by the diligence of the Sogdian
merchants; and the inestimable art of transforming linen into
paper has been diffused from the manufacture of Samarcand over
the western world. 43
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