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7.2 CAMPAIGN_DESCRIPTIONS.TXT
{IMPERIAL_CAMPAIGN_PONTUS_TITLE}Yuèzhi
{IMPERIAL_CAMPAIGN_PONTUS_DESCR}We are a great nation now. We are masters of the grasslands to the north and west of the Chinese. From the oases of the western desert and the Tarim River to the cold plains of the east, our people dwells. Most roam with their herds, choosing what pastures they think best; some become traders and a few settle and grow crops. From the other nations of the steppe we receive tribute and allegiance. With the Chinese, we trade: they obtain horses and jade from us and they give in exchange the many nice things of the settled peoples and it has been so for a long, long time. From time to time, they send gifts too. Precious silk that we value highly and the other nomads envy. A sign of friendship, a show of their king’s grace, they call it. It may be so, but they also know that we could also gain it through the swiftness of our horses and the strength of our bows. Yes, it goes well for us and it has been so for a long while.\n\n
And yet, who know what the future may bring? North and east of us, the peoples of the steppe may acknowledge our king as overlord and send their young princes as hostages, to be raised at our courts, but they have no love for us and envy our wealth, our herds and our grazing lands. First among them are the Xiongnu, they grow in numbers and power and boldness. They have attacked other tribes and clans, the Hu and others and they now receive homage from them and they send riders that enlarge their hosts. They are savage and ruthless and the day may come they may try their strength against ours. In any case, the north and east are closed for us.\n\n
To the west, the desert will not support more of us than already live there, and beyond it the mountains are high and no one knows the passes, if there are any passes at all. There are tales of rich, fertile lands far beyond those peaks. Of a country with cities and settled peoples, some newly come, and goods from there reach us now and then. However, they say the mountains are barren and take weeks or months to travel, that it is a dangerous journey for a single rider, impossible for a people with herds and children.\n\n
To the northwest the way is open, though, and the pastures are good, even if the winters are cold. However, that land is not empty. The Wusun dwell there and although they are not as numerous or powerful as the Xiongnu, they are still a great people and will not cede their lands willingly.\n\n
It will not be easy in the future, but it has never been easy in the past either for there have always been dangers and threats. And we do not lack valour or numbers. Our mounted archers can rain arrows upon our foes until the sun is obscured and we can rely on those of our people who live as farmers to fight where horses would be hindered. Yes, it will take cunning and strength if we are to grow and prosper, but we have done it in the past and we are lords now and so it will be in the future.\n\n\n\n
History\n\n
In around the 4th millennium BC, the Eurasian steppes were dominated by Indo-European speaking peoples from the Caucasus and Anatolia and, in the 3rd millennium BC, these same Indo-Europeans founded the Yamnaya culture in today's Turkmenistan. From the Yamnaya culture sprung the later Afanasievo culture that may be dated from circa 3,000 BCE or earlier. These Indo-European peoples later moved southwards around 2000 BCE into the Lop Nor region in the Tarim, initiating the Bronze Age in the Tarim Basin. These immigrants were proto-Tocharians. From these same proto-Tocharian speakers emerged Tocharian speaking groups whose way of life depended on the cultivation of the relatively fertile oases of the Tarim. However, about 500 BCE, due to the climatic change in the Tarim which caused reduction in agrarian production that was previously abundant in the fertile oases, semi-nomadic groups emerged whose animal husbandry depended upon the cattle, horse, and the Bactrian two-humped camel (the latter two being introduced from the Central Asian steppes) though the scarcity of available pastures in the Tarim meant that these people were at best semi-nomadic and that their way of life remained largely sedentary. Other Tocharian groups who emerged around this time and who dwelled further north and east led a way of life that was, for the most part, nomadic, and whose way of life depended largely on animal husbandry, that of the horse, which also provided the source of military strength for these peoples. One group of these Tocharian speakers may have possibly been the ancestors of the Yuezhi.\n\n
The Yuezhi were first mentioned in history in the Guanzi, a politico-economical treatise written by the ancient Chinese economist Guan Zhong (c. 645 BCE), where the Yuezhi are possibly known as the "Yuzhi" or the "Niuzhi" peoples who supplied jade to the Chinese. Ancient Chinese rulers had a strong attachment to jade. More than 750 jade pieces excavated from the tomb of Fuhao of the Shang dynasty were from Khotan, an oasis town in the southern Tarim. The source of jade that the Yuezhi supplied to the Chinese were said to have been from the mountains near the Yuezhi. The mountains in question may have been the Kunlun Mountains that border the southern Tarim and the Yuezhi's monopoly of jade may suggest that the oasis kingdoms of the southern Tarim were perhaps vassals/dependants/forced allies of the Yuezhi. By the early 3rd century BCE, the Yuezhi were still known as suppliers of jade and possibly horses. This may indicate the extent of the Yuezhi at this time and its domination over some of the oasis kingdoms of the Tarim, as Sima Qian clearly noted the strength and influence of the Yuezhi before the rise of the mighty Maodun Chanyu of the Xiongnu during the late 3rd century BCE.\n\n
The ancient Chinese historians described the Yuezhi as "a nomad nation, following their flocks and changing their homes. Their customs are the same as those of the Xiongnu. They may have 100,000 - 200,000 archers. In olden times, they relied on their strength, and thought lightly of the Xiongnu." The historians also indicated that the Yuezhi "originally lived in a place between Dunhuang and Qilian", which would approximate to the western part of today's Gansu province in the modern-day People's Republic of China. Another authority had suggested that both the names Dunhuang and Qilian have Indo-European etymologies and that both places actually refer to the Tianshan range north of the Tarim, suggesting that the homeland of the Yuezhi was near Turfan in the northeastern Tarim. He further argued that the Yuezhi, as a steppe people, grazed their horses on the pastures north of the Tianshan, ie those in Jungaria. Additionally, another authority argues that, given the relatively small area between modern-day Dunhuang and the Qiliang Mountains in today's Gansu province, the Yuezhi domains may have incorporated a larger and more extensive area of control than just western Gansu. Taking into consideration all these arguments and the passages in the ancient Chinese chronicles which suggest that the Yuezhi were a powerful nomadic people before the rise of the Xiongnu, it is not impossible that the former domains of the Yuezhi during the height of their empire, ie somewhere before the late 3rd century BCE, may have included all of the mentioned domains, which would suggest that the area between modern-day Dunhuang and the Tianshan range as well as the steppes north of the Tianshan (in Jungaria) were controlled by the Yuezhi at one point in history and that their influence possibly extended as far west as the oasis kingdom of Khotan in the southern Tarim.\n\n
By the late 3rd century BCE however, the Yuezhi were clearly known as suppliers of horses to the Chinese. This may be interpreted as a "waning" of the formerly strong Yuezhi empire, an indication that the Yuezhi may have lost control over some of the oasis kingdoms of the Tarim, particularly the ones who supplied jade to the Yuezhi. Alternatively, this can be seen as Chinese demands of jade shifting to horses to combat the growing Xiongnu threat. Regardless, the Yuezhi still appeared to have been a formidable power in the late 3rd century BCE, despite the possibility of being a less stronger power than during former times, and supplied horses to the Chinese, particularly the Qin dynasty. Sima Qian mentions a certain chief Lou of the "Wuzhi" (another variation of "Yuezhi" in archaic Chinese) as a major supplier of horses to the First Emperor, ie Qin Shi Huang of the Qin dynasty. Lou obtained silk by trading horses and cattle for it, and then resold the silk to other chiefs on the steppe. Through this method, Lou was said to have obtained a ten-fold profit from his investment in this trade which made him very rich. The importance of Lou as a major horse supplier in the eyes of Qin Shi Huang is evident when Qin Shi Huang granted him very high status, one which allowed him, along with the ministers of Qin Shi Huang's court, to have an audience with the emperor. It is evident that the Yuezhi were actively involved in the transcontinental trade across Asia and Europe and, according to one authority, they may have possibly been the very people who initiated the Silk Road trade.\n\n
Despite the strength of the Yuezhi at this time, the power of the Xiongnu was gradually growing and by c. 209 BCE, a certain Maodun, after killing his father Touman, who had earlier sent Maodun as a hostage to the Yuezhi in an attempt to have him killed, became supreme Chanyu of the Xiongnu and organized the Xiongnu state, transforming it into a major power that would eventually become supreme on the steppes. After he became Chanyu, the Donghu (literally "Eastern Barbarians") to the east and the Yuezhi to the west of the Xiongnu were described as states "likewise flourishing" by Sima Qian, but Maodun Chanyu subdued both of them. The Yuezhi were subdued by Maodun Chanyu sometime around 176 BCE, shortly before Maodun himself died in about 174 BCE. During the reign of Laoshan Chanyu (c. 174-158 BCE), the Xiongnu attacked the king of the Yuezhi and made his skull into a drinking vessel. After this defeat, the majority of the Yuezhi then migrated out of their homeland in the western Gansu-Turfan area, most likely going through the Tianshan range and possibly Jungaria. A small group of the Yuezhi who were unable to migrate with the rest of their kinsmen fortified themselves at the southern mountains (the mountains south of Gansu) and sought refuge with the Qiang (probably a proto-Tibetan people) tribes living around the area. From then on, the majority of the Yuezhi who migrated out of their homelands were known in the Chinese histories as the Da Yuezhi (Greater Yuezhi) while the the minority of the Yuezhi who sought refuge with the Qiang were known as the Xiao Yuezhi (Lesser Yuezhi). Meanwhile, the Da Yuezhi reached the Yili Basin, where they defeated and drove out the Sai (Saka) tribes, who were the original inhabitants of the area. These Saka tribes were said to have moved south, crossing the Hindu Kush and settling in places like Jibin (in Gandhara). The Yili Basin remained a temporary dwelling place of the Da Yuezhi until around 132 BCE, the Kunmo of the Wusun, intent on avenging the attack inflicted upon them by the Yuezhi in 173 BCE when they were their neighbors in Gansu, sought permission from his Xiongnu overlord, Junchen Chanyu, to lead a force of Wusun cavalry into the Yili Basin region. Upon arriving there, the Kunmo of the Wusun defeated and drove out the surprised Da Yuezhi, settling there and establishing it as the new home of his Wusun state. After this defeat, the Da Yuezhi again migrated west, this time passing through Dayuan (Ferghana) and most likely through Kangju (north of Sogdia) into the kingdom of Daxia (Bactria), where the Da Yuezhi were said to have reduced Daxia into vassalage and established their capital north of the Amu Darya river. Daxia is described in the Chinese histories as a state "without a leader", "weak and afraid to wage war" and "were accustomed to set up petty chiefs over their cities". These descriptions of Daxia has led some scholars to doubt that the Daxia being described was, as is more commonly thought, one of the successor states of Alexander the Great's former empire that became the Hellenistic kingdom of Bactria. According to some authorities, Daxia was a Chinese rendering of Tochara. The fact that this name was applied to the region of Bactria instead of the name Bactria itself may suggest that, at the time of the Da Yuezhi invasion of Bactria, the region was already out of Greek hands and was possibly ruled by other Tocharian speaking peoples. In addition, the archaeological evidence for the destruction of Ai-Khanoum, which is dated to around 145 BCE, doesn't match with the date the Da Yuezhi were said, in Chinese sources, to have left the Yili valley, which was around 132 BCE. So the Tocharoi mentioned by Strabo may not necessarily be the Da Yuezhi. This further suggests that the Greco-Bactrian kingdom may have already been destroyed and that it was possibly ruled by other Tocharian speaking peoples or even Saka nomads driven west by the recent Yuezhi migrations; this way all have occurred before the Da Yuezhi invasion of Bactria.\n\n
When the Da Yuezhi arrived in Bactria, they set up 5 xihou (yabghu) called Xiumi, Shuangmi, Guishuang, Xidun, and Dumi, all of which were probably situated in the eastern mountainous area of the former state of Bactria. According to some sources, the 5 xihou (yabghu) in question can be interpreted as being composed of either of the following: tribal chiefs, either Tocharian or Saka peoples, who were in the Bactrian region before the arrival of the Da Yuezhi, and were, thus, subjects/dependants of the Da Yuezhi; or Da Yuezhi themselves, being divided into 5 xihou after they invaded and conquered Bactria. In all probability, it seems more likely that the 5 xihou were initially subjects/dependants of the Da Yuezhi and consisted primarily of the Tocharian or Saka tribal chiefs of Bactria that ruled the region before the arrival of the Da Yuezhi and that, during a course of "more than a hundred years" after the Da Yuezhi conquest of Bactria, the Da Yuezhi gradually came to replace the native Bactrian tribal chiefs as leaders, with the Da Yuezhi clans later coming to represent the 5 xihou. It was probably around this time that the Da Yuezhi gradually transformed from a nomadic state to a sedentary one. All of this probably happened around 130 BCE - early 1st century CE. Around the early 1st century BCE, Heraios, or, more correctly, Sanab, who might have been a father or a distant relative of the later Guishuang/Kushana leader Qiujiu Que (Kujula Kadphises) emerged as a leader of the Guishuang/Kushana xihou, as suggested by numismatic evidence.\n\n
One source tells us that, "more than a hundred years later", a leader of the Guishuang xihou, a man called Qiujiu Que (Kujula Kadphises), attacked and exterminated the other 4 xihou and set himself up as king of a kingdom called Guishuang/Kushana, or more commonly known as Kushan. Kujula Kadphises probably rose to prominence sometime around the first quarter of the early 1st century CE and had united the Da Yuezhi by about 40 CE. Kujula took Kabul (eastern Afghanistan), a reportedly "weak" kingdom, to their southwest. He invaded Parthia and was said to have taken Puta, which most probably referred to the ancient town of Old Nisa (northwest of what is now Ashgabat in south-central Turkmenistan), possibly an old capital of the Parthians, in around 55 CE. At around the same time, he also took a kingdom called Jibin (probably referring to a part of an ancient region called Gandhara, an area approximating to what is now northeastern Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan), which at the time was probably ruled by the Sai (or Saka) peoples who had been driven from their homeland in the Yili Basin by the more recent Da Yuezhi migrations. According to the Chinese sources, Kujula was "more than eighty years old when he died". His son was known as Vima (Wima) Taktu, or Yan Gaozhen in Chinese sources, and inherited the Kushana throne from Kujula probably during the middle-third quarter of the 1st century CE. During his reign, the kingdom recorded in Chinese sources known as Tianzhu (or sometimes known as Juandu), which most likely referred to a kingdom in the Indus River valley in northwestern India, was conquered by Vima Taktu and their king killed, with a Da Yuezhi/Kushana general established there to rule over the people of Tianzhu. The Da Yuezhi/Kushanas became very rich after this. This is hardly surprising, as in the Chinese sources, Tianzhu was described as a kingdom that produced elephants, rhinoceroses, turtle shell, gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, and tin. It is also indicated that Tianzhu traded with the Roman empire (known in Chinese sources as Da Qin), and various products from Rome as well as fine cotton cloths, excellent wool carpets, perfumes of all sorts, sugar loaves, pepper, ginger, and black salt were found in Tianzhu.\n\n
Around the third quarter-last half of the 1st century CE, Vima Taktu's son, Wima Kadphises, succeeded him as of emperor of the Kushanas. During Wima Kadphises' reign, the Kushanas felt strong enough to again meddle in foreign affairs. In 84 CE, Kangju, a powerful nomadic state centered around what is now modern-day Tashkent (in the northeastern corner of present-day Uzbekistan) and the Chu, Talas, and middle Syr Darya Basin (all of which approximates to what is now northwestern Kyrgyzstan and south-central Kazakhstan), sent a princess in marriage to the Kushana emperor when the Kushanas were also able to get Kangju to desist sending troops to help the oasis kingdom of Kashgar in the western Tarim resist against Later Han expansion. The Han general Ban Chao was able to bribe the Kushana emperor into doing this, which then enabled Ban Chao to conquer Kashgar for the Han empire. In return, the Kushana emperor asked for a Han princess in marriage but was refused. In 90 CE, the Kushanas invaded the Tarim with 70,000 troops lead by their viceroy Xie to attack Ban Chao at Kashgar. Ban Chao was greatly outnumbered and so decided to resist the Kushanas inside the city. Xie and his Kushana troops plundered and pillaged but nothing was obtained, with the result that Ban Chao was able to hold out for several months. Xie's food supplies were slowly depleting which caused him to asked Qiuci (Kucha, which, according to the Han Shu, was the largest out of all the kingdoms of the Tarim, and which was located in the northern part of the Tarim) for help, sending horsemen bearing gold, silver, pearls, and jade as presents for Qiuci. However, these Kushana emissaries were ambushed and killed by Ban Chao and his soldiers. At this point, Xie knew defeat was certain and then abandoned the siege, establishing a peace treaty with the Later Han and returning home.\n\n
Kanishka, who is traditionally dubbed as the "4th" Kushana emperor, probably succeeded to the throne between 105 - 116 CE and, in particular, probably around 115 CE, though due to the imprecision and conflicts of the various dating methods used, there is still disagreement and debate among scholars who study Kushana history. Kanishka is the most famous of the Kushana emperors and was a supporter of many religions. The coins of the Kushanas dated to the time of Kanishka and that of his immediate successor, Huvishka, depict deities ranging from Zeus to Mithra to Siva, which are gods from the Graeco-Roman, Iranian, and Indian religious traditions respectively. The Buddha is also depicted for the first time in human form on the coins of Kanishka. Some of the coins even depict the Sumerian goddess Nana on her lion. That the Kushanas were tolerant of various religious traditions is further backed up by archaeological discoveries of various sites that can be dated to the Kushana period. For example, the excavations at Ai-Khanoum, a site on the southern side of the Amu Darya river, reveal the coexistence of both Hellenic and Iranian deities in the area, and the three temples in the vicinity of the site may actually have been altars for Zoroastrian fire worship rather than Greek temples. However, the Kushana rulers, and Kanishka in particular, seemed to have showed a special interest in Buddhism. The traditional account, though it is to be kept in mind that this sole account contains semi-mythical elements, has it that Kanishka sponsored the 4th Buddhist council under his reign. It was said that Kanishka was interested in Buddhism and invited a different monk in every day to explain to him Buddhist philosophy, but that because none of the monks could agree, Kanishka decided to hold a council in order to resolve these differences. He invited the most learned men in his empire to participate in the council and, as a result, a solution was reached in which all the 18 sects of Buddhism were recognized to be legitimate and in which definitive copies of the most important Buddhist texts were made. It seems possible that this council was held for resolving both religious and political disputes within his empire. Regardless of the truth behind the 4th Buddhist council and Kanishka's real intentions, it seems evident that Buddhism was especially popular in the Kushana empire under Kanishka and his immediate successors. For example, Buddhist art flourished under the Kushanas at this time. The Gandharan Buddhist art, which flourished alongside the style of Buddhist art in Mathura (in north-central India), is no doubt Hellenic in style, and may even be Hellenic in origin but retained Indian iconography. Besides exhibiting large Hellenic influences, Buddhist statues under the Kushanas also show steppe influences, which are indicative of the origins of the Kushana rulers themselves. For example, the well-known coin of Kanishka from the Ahin-Posh stupa near Jalalabad (in eastern Afghanistan) depicts a nomadic Buddha in a typical posture of horse-riding peoples, ie standing with two feet pointing outwards. Buddhist literature eulogized Kanishka as the royal patron second only to the great Mauryan empror Ashoka, who held the previous 3rd Buddhist council in the 3rd century BCE.\n\n
Many historians feel that it was under the reign of Kanishka, a warlike emperor, that the Kushana empire reached the height of its power as a powerful state in Central Asia. According to one source, during the yuanchu period (114 - 120 CE) of Emperor An of the Later Han, a certain An Guo, a king of Kashgar, exiled his maternal uncle Chen Pan to the Kushanas for some offense. The Kushana emperor, presumably Kanishka, became very fond of Chen Pan. Later, when An Guo died without leaving a son, his mother decided to put Chen Pan's nephew on the throne of Kashgar. Chen Pan objected to this and appealed to the Kushana emperor to be the king of Kashgar. To this, the Kushana emperor agreed and sent Kushana soldiers to escort Chen Pan back to Kashgar, meeting no opposition along the way. Thus, the Kushanas, by installing a king on the throne of Kashgar by their will, was able to exert Kushana influence as far east as Kashgar. Later, the Kashgar kingdom gained overlord status over Yarkand, an oasis kingdom to the southeast of Kashgar, and also attacked Kucha and Khotan, kingdoms to the northeast and southeast of Kashgar, respectively. However, it seems Kushana influence over Kashgar at least waned by 127 CE and 130 CE when Chen Pan presented offerings and tribute to the Later Han empire and, by 168 CE, had ended with the death of Chen Pan when he himself was shot while hunting by He De, his youngest paternal uncle. Conquests in other directions were also made by Kanishka. He most likely conquered a kingdom, called Dongli in Chinese sources, in eastern India, whose center was the town of Saketa, or modern-day Ayodhya in eastern India, below western-central Nepal. Dongli was described as a big kingdom to the southeast of Tianzhu (northwestern India) which had similar products to Tianzhu, and that, although its people were tall, they were "cowardly" and, as a result, were conquered by the Da Yuezhi/Kushanas. Dongli's people were also described as riding elephants or camels when traveling and using the former to wage war. It seems likely that by this time, the Kushana empire had reached its greatest territorial extent ever as an empire in Central and South Asia.\n\n
While the chronology of the Kushana emperors is, again, still subject to debate among scholars, it seems probable that the immediate successor to Kanishka, whose reign probably ended c. 138 CE, was Huvishka. It had been suggested by one authority, based on an inscription and several other pieces of evidence, that after Kanishka's death, a "triple kingship" emerged where Vasishka acted as a regent and ruled jointly with his son, Kanishka II, and Huvishka, and that after both the former had died (first Vasishka and then Kanishka II) that Huvishka remained the sole ruler of the Kushana empire. Though this theory makes sense, it also has some major conflicts with the other evidence at hand, particularly the distribution of the inscriptions thought to be associated with the two kings, Huvishka and Vasishka, and the lack of numismatic evidence for the existence of Vasishka as a contemporary of Huvishka. Considering the lack of clarity concerning the succession of the rulers of this time period, the available evidence at hand still points to and suggests that Huvishka smoothly succeeded the Kushana throne after Kanishka's death, and that both Vasishka and Kanishka II can be identified with Kushana rulers after the reign of Vasudeva, ie c.. 177 - 212 CE, and who is considered the last of the great Kushana emperors. Meanwhile, under the reign of Huvishka and that of his immediate successor, Vasudeva, the Kushanas probably remained a very rich and powerful empire. In fact, the revenue gained from Tianzhu (northwestern India), which had been conquered under Vima Taktu's reign about a century ago or less, had probably accumulated to a significantly abundant amount by now, indicating that the sea trade in Tianzhu's ports that had been going on with the Roman empire allowed the maintenance of a wealthy urban population that, according to one source, included carpenters, bankers, caravan traders, perfumers and innumerable other professions. Vasudeva, the probable successor of Huvishka, ruled the Kushana empire for the remaining part of the 2nd century CE until the early 3rd century CE, ie c. 212 CE, when the once-powerful empire of the Kushanas became fragmented and divided after his death, possibly due to both internal dissension and a major war fought with the Sassanians, a newly arisen power further west in Iran. Vasudeva is traditionally regarded as the last of the great Kushana emperors and was also the first Kushana emperor to take an Indian name. After Vasudeva's reign, which probably ended c. 212 CE, coins are fewer in number and inscriptions even fewer than that of coins, which may serve to indicate the disintegration and division of the Kushana empire.\n\n
Further to the southwest of the Kushanas, the Parthians were overthrown and the Sassanian empire was founded in the early 220s CE. It seems likely that from this time to c. 248 CE the Sassanians fought a war with the Kushanas, one which ended in the disintegration and division of the already waning Kushana empire into two states. One of these states was situated to the south of the Hindu Kush and was probably ruled by the "legitimate" Kushana kings. This state is generally known as the "Lesser" Kushanas. By the end of the 3rd century CE, it appears that Kushana control of the Gangetic plain and many of the Kushana territories in eastern India were lost. Somewhere in the 4th century CE, during the reign of the emperor Samudragupta of the rising Gupta empire in northern India, the Lesser Kushanas submitted to Samudragupta but retained their territories in Gandhara (an area approximating to what is now northeastern Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan) and the Punjab (a region around northern India and northern Pakistan). However, by the beginning of the reign of Chandragupta II, the successor of Samudragupta, and whose reign approximates to the end of the 4th century - beginning of the 5th centuries CE, the Lesser Kushanas lost their territories in the Punjab and were either annihilated by the Guptas or retained some territory in Gandhara. These Lesser Kushanas later fell either to the Chionites or the Ephthalites. Both ways, the once-powerful Kushana empire was, by now, no more.\n\n
The other state was situated in the northwestern part of the former Kushana empire and seemed to have been a puppet state installed by the Sassanians. The rulers of this state called themselves Kushanshah, or King of the Kushanas. There is evidence that these Kushanshas overthrew their Sassanian overlords and established brief independence around 283 CE under their leader Hormizd I, but otherwise they were subject to Sassanian control. Around this time, a new group of invaders appeared in the Bactrian region, and they were known as the Chionites or, alternatively, the Kidarites. The Kushanshahs fell to these invaders and were conquered by them when the last Kushanshah, Varahran II, was defeated by the Chionites around 360 CE. After this time, by the end of the 4th century CE, the Chionites eventually came to first dominate Bactria and then eventually much of the territory of the old Kushana empire, as indicated by numismatic evidence in Bactria and Sogdia. Their domination of the old dominions of the Kushana empire was brief however, and though they tried to achieve a revival of the old Kushana empire as indicated by their imitation of Sassanian, Kushanshah, and Lesser Kushan coins, they too eventually fell to a new group of invaders called the Ephthalites, or sometimes known as the White Huns. These Ephthalites are known in the Chinese sources as the Yetai and were invaders who originally dwelled in the Junggar Basin northeast of the Tianshan, which comprises what is now roughly the northern part of Xinjiang province. These Ephthalites overwhelmed the Chionites in the late 5th century CE.\n\n
Significance\n\n
At the height of its power during the first half of the 2nd century CE, the Kushana empire ranked among the foremost powers of the world, its power and strength rivalling that of Han China, Rome, Parthia, and the Xiongnu at their heights. In wake of the Da Yuezhi migrations, the Saka tribes from the Yili Basin were displaced and moved south of the Hindu Kush, where they settled and formed several kingdoms only to later fall again to the rising power of the Kushanas. Bactria was overrun by the Da Yuezhi and the local Saka, Tocharian, Greek, and native Bactrian peoples were incorporated or driven out of the area by the Da Yuezhi. Parthia was humiliated and her eastern territories, particularly the ones in south-central Turkmenistan, were lost to the Kushanas. Northwestern India (which was previously ruled by Saka, Greek, and Indian kingdoms) and almost the entire span of northern India eventually became dominions of the Kushana empire. Kushana political influence extended as far east as Kashgar where she was able to exert dominance in local politics for a time. Even Kangju (a powerful nomadic state that occupied what is now northeastern Uzbekistan, south-central Kazakhstan, and northwestern Kyrgyzstan and had Sogdia and possibly the Alans as its dependencies), which is to the northeast of the Kushanas, felt it necessary to form a political alliance with the Kushanas by sending a Kangju princess to the Kushana emperor. During the period of its greatest territorial extent in the first half of the 2nd century CE, Kushana territory stretched as far south and east as eastern India and as far north and west as south-central Turkmenistan.\n\n
The Kushana expansions under the early emperors gave the Kushanas control over part of the Silk Road trade that spanned across Asia and Europe. Sharing the role of middlemen of this trade route with Parthia, its western neighbor, the Kushanas gained immense profits off of the Parthian and Roman traders. Considering that Rome was one of the foremost consumers of silk, getting access to it meant that establishing trade relations with Parthia or the Kushanas was a necessity. The excessive demand for silk in Rome eventually gave her an economic burden, and though the ultimate benefactors of the Silk Road trade would seem to be the producers themselves, ie Han China, the Kushanas as well as the Parthians were still able to rake huge profits. The Kushanas were the first rulers in India to issue gold coins on a wide scale and also introduced red pottery to India. In addition, the Kushanas also introduced large-scale irrigation in the territories they ruled, particularly their northwestern territories in Central Asia.\n\n
Because of the unification of almost the entire breadth of northern India, political and religious unification was possible under the reign of Kanishka. His 4th Buddhist council legitimized the 18 sects of Buddhism and further enforced the religious tolerance that began under the reigns of his predecessors. The 4th Buddhist council in effect legitimized Mahayana Buddhism. The Gandharan and Mathura schools of Buddhist art flourished under the Kushanas. The former school incorporated the realism of Hellenic art styles when depicting the Buddha in human form and produced beautifully unique Buddhist sculptures that also showed steppe influences. Because of this special patronage of Buddhism, the Kushanas also helped further spread Buddhism. This is evident in that during the Kushana period, the center of Buddhist activities moved from the middle-lower Gangetic plain in central and eastern India to the northwestern part of the Kushana empire. Legends attracting pilgrims, like the one concerning the begging bowl of Buddha, first appeared in this region under Kushana rule. Buddhist missionaries carrying the surname "Zhi" (to denote that these missionaries were from the Da Yuezhi/Kushana empire) appeared in Luoyang and other major cities in China to spread Buddhism. Though it wasn't until much later that Buddhism began to gain a stronghold in China, ie the 4th-6th centuries CE, the presence of these early Buddhist missionaries, most of them from the Kushana empire, laid an early foundation in China for Buddhism to gradually grow. That early Buddhist sculpture and Buddhist philosophy in China was greatly influenced by the Kushanas is clear. For example, the earliest artistic representation of Buddhism on a large scale appeared in relief on the rock face of a hill on the east coast of China, at Kongwangshan in Jiangsu province, central-east China. The sculptures of both the Buddha and his layman worshippers are in postures that are strikingly similar to those found in Buddhist sculptures produced in the Kushana empire, indicating that the unique Buddhist sculpture of the Kushanas that exhibited steppe influences had penetrated as far east as Han China. As the majority of the Buddhist missionaries to Han China were from the Kushana empire, it can be said that the Kushanas helped spread and develop equestrian culture in South and East Asia. This is evident in the legend of the first Buddhist missionary to China where it was said that a white horse carrying Buddhist sutras arrived in Luoyang. The background of this legend could perhaps be traced to the Kushanas, who were known to have possessed a good number of "heavenly" horses. At least the Kushana rulers themselves found it convenient to retain and develop their own equestrian culture by patronizing Buddhism, where after the wheel of Dharma, horses were ranked as the second treasure out of all the seven treasures of the early Buddhist concept of an ideal state.\n\n
Militarily, the Da Yuezhi/Kushanas helped spread the use of more advanced cavalry equipment, ie primitive forms of a leather hook-stirrup and horse barding as well as other relevant cataphract equipment to northern India, either directly through their conquest of the region or through the peoples, ie the Saka nomads, they displaced during their migrations and conquests. Through their relations with their neighbors further east, ie Han China, Kangju, et al., the Da Yuezhi/Kushanas may have also helped spread the use of the newer, larger and more-powerful "Hunnish" type of recurved composite bow, one with prominent bone laths/reinforced ears and asymmetrical limbs. This bow quickly gained popularity in East and Central Asia and replaced the older and smaller "Scythian" recurved composite bow. The "Hunnish" recurved composite bow was too big to be stored in the Scythian gorytos and was stored in a larger bow quiver apart from another quiver used to store larger arrows. According to one authority, later Parthian and Sassanian recurved composite bows had larger reinforced ears; this may be an indication that the Kushanas, through their relations with Parthia, helped spread the "Hunnish" recurved composite bow further west.
The Yuezhi
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