page_title: Sogdia
section_title: Notable Sogdians
hierarchical_section_title: Sogdia / Notable Sogdians
caption_attribution_description: English: Praṇidhi scene No. 14, Temple No. 9, dated to the 9th century, Bezeklik Thousand Buddha Caves, near Turpan, Xinjiang, China. This and many other paintings were removed by Albert von Le Coq from the Bezeklik caves. They were destroyed in the Allied bombing of Berlin during the Second World War. The kneeling, praying figures on the bottom left were identified as "Persian" people (see Plate 20) by Albert von Le Coq. However, they were likely Eastern-Iranian-speaking Sogdians who maintained an ethnic minority community in medieval Turpan. Modern scholarship has identified the Caucasian-looking men in Scene No. 6 of Temple No. 9 (the same temple as the scene shown above) as ethnic Sogdians, as outlined in the following source: Gasparini, Mariachiara. "A Mathematic Expression of Art: Sino-Iranian and Uighur Textile Interactions and the Turfan Textile Collection in Berlin," in Rudolf G. Wagner and Monica Juneja (eds), Transcultural Studies, Ruprecht-Karls Universität Heidelberg, No 1 (2014), pp 134-163. See also endnote #32. For information on the Sogdians of Turpan under the Chinese Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD) and Uyghur Kingdom of Qocho (856-1335 AD), see the following source: Hansen, Valerie (2012), The Silk Road: A New History, Oxford University Press, p. 98, ISBN 978-0-19-993921-3. For Sogdian influence on contemporary Uyghur religious life, including transmission of Manichaeism, Buddhism, and Nestorian Christianity, see: Peter B. Golden (2011), Central Asia in World History, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, p. 47, ISBN 978-0-19-515947-9. Liu, Xinru, "The Silk Road: Overland Trade and Cultural Interactions in Eurasia", in Agricultural and Pastoral Societies in Ancient and Classical History, ed. Michael Adas, American Historical Association, Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2001, p. 169. Albert von Le Coq, in his Facsimile-Reproductions of More Important Findings of the First Royal Prussian Expedition to Turfan in East Turkestan (German: CHOTSCHO: FACSIMILE-WIEDERGABEN DER WICHTIGEREN FUNDE DER ERSTEN KÖNIGLICH PREUSSISCHEN EXPEDITION NACH TURFAN IN OST-TURKISTAN), published in Berlin in 1913 by Dietrich Reimer (Ernst Vohsen), "by Order of General Management of the Royal Museums, From the Funds of the Baessler Institutes," (German: "IM AUFTRAGE DER GENERALVERWALTUNG DER KÖNIGLICHEN MUSEEN AUS MITTELN DES BAESSLER-INSTITUTES"), provided a cursory yet lengthy analysis (p. 28) of Praṇidhi scene No. 14 in Temple No. 9 of the Bezeklik caves. He called the kneeling figures on the left: "die augenscheinlich der iranischen Rasse angehören" (English: "apparently belonging to the Iranian race"). On the figure to the right wearing a green, fur-trimmed coat and presenting a bowl, which von Le Coq said perhaps contained bags of gold dust (German: "goldstaub"), he said that his facial features were Europoid (German: "das gesicht zeigt europäischen typus") and had bright green eyes (German: "die augen sind hellgrün") and black hair and beard (German: "der Bart und die Haare aber schwarz"). Of particular interest to von Le Coq was the man's head cap, which he found reminiscent of the headgear worn by earlier Sasanian Persian princes (German: "bemerkenswert ist die mütze, deren form am meisten an die mancher Adlerfittich-Mützen sassanidischer fürsten erinnert") He also noted the donkey and Bactrian camel in the foreground, loaded with tributary goods. It has been noted that the kneeling figure in the lower left corner is making an offering that resembles a chrysanthemum-shaped dessert excavated from Tomb No. 73, Zaghunluq, 5th-3rd century BCE, held in the Chärchän Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region Museum Collection (image available here: https://www.penn.museum/silkroad/exhibit_daily_life.php).
context_page_description: Sogdia or Sogdiana was an ancient Iranian civilization that at different times included territory located in present-day Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan, such as Samarkand, Bukhara, Khujand, Panjikent, and Shahrisabz. Sogdiana was also a province of the Achaemenid Empire, eighteenth in the list on the Behistun Inscription of Darius the Great. In the Avesta, Sogdiana is listed as the second best land that the supreme deity Ahura Mazda had created. It comes second, after Airyanem Vaejah, "homeland of the Aryans", in the Zoroastrian book of Vendidad, indicating the importance of this region from ancient times. Sogdiana was first conquered by Cyrus the Great, the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. The region would then be annexed by the Macedonian ruler Alexander the Great in 328 BC. The region would continue to change hands under the Seleucid Empire, Greco-Bactrian Kingdom, Kushan Empire, Hephthalite Empire, and Sasanian Empire.
  The Sogdian states, although never politically united, were centred on the main city of Samarkand.
context_section_description: Alexander IV of Macedon, the Basilius of Macedon, son of Alexander the Great and Roxana, the latter a daughter of the Sogdian nobleman Oxyartes, making Alexander IV half-Sogdian
  An Lushan (安祿山), a military leader of Sogdian (from his father's side) and Tūjué origin during the Tang dynasty in China; he rose to prominence by fighting (and losing) frontier wars between 741 and 755. Later, he precipitated the catastrophic An Lushan Rebellion, which lasted from 755 to 763 and led to the decline of the Tang dynasty.
  An Qingxu (安慶緒), son of An Lushan
  An Chonghui (安重誨), a minister of China's Later Tang
  An Congjin (安從進), a general of Later Tang and China's Later Jin (Five Dynasties)
  An Chongrong (安重榮), a general of the China's Later Jin (Five Dynasties)
  Antiochus I Soter, second king of the Seleucid Empire, who was half-Sogdian and Macedonian-Greek due to his maternal (Apama) and paternal (Seleucus I Nicator) lineage, respectively
  Apama, daughter of Spitamenes (see below) and wife of Seleucus I Nicator, founder of the Seleucid Empire
  Azanes, son of Artaios, who led a contingent of Sogdian troops in the Persian army of Xerxes I during the Second Persian invasion of Greece in 480 BC
  Divashtich, 8th-century ruler of Panjakent
  Fazang, Buddhist monk of the 7th century, a colleague of Xuanzang
  Gurak, 8th-century ruler of Samarkand
  Kang Senghui (康僧會), Buddhist monk of the 3rd century who lived in Jiaozhi (modern-day Vietnam) during the Three Kingdoms period
  Kang Jing (康景)?- a possible Sogdian who worked at the Ming dynasty Mansion of the Prince of Qin (明朝藩王列表 (秦王系)) as a servant
  Khaydhar ibn Kawus al-Afshin, a general of the Abbasid caliphate and a vassal of the Abbasids as the prince of Osrushana during the 9th century
  Kaydar Nasr ibn 'Abdallah, Abbasid governor of Egypt during the 9th century
  Li Baoyu (李抱玉), formerly known as An Chongzhang (安重璋) and ennobled as Duke Zhaowu of Liang (涼昭武公), a general of the Chinese Tang Dynasty who fought against the rebellion of An Lushan and the Tibetan Empire
  Malik ibn Kaydar, a 9th-century general of the Abbasid caliphate.
  Muzaffar ibn Kaydar, son of Kaydar Nasr ibn 'Abdallah (see above), and yet another Abbasid governor of Egypt during the 9th century
  Oxyartes, Sogdian warlord from Bactria, follower of Bessus, and father of Roxana, the wife of Alexander the Great
  Roxana, the primary wife of Alexander the Great during the 4th century BC
  Spitamenes, a Sogdian warlord who led an uprising against Alexander the Great in the late 4th century BC
  Tarkhun, 8th-century ruler of Samarkand
  Abu'l-Saj Devdad, emir and official of the Abbasid caliphate and ancestor of the Sajid dynasty
caption: Pranidhi scene, temple 9 (Cave 20) of the Bezeklik Thousand Buddha Caves, Turfan, Xinjiang, China, 9th century AD, with kneeling figures praying in front of the Buddha who Albert von Le Coq assumed were Persian people (German: "Perser"), noting their Caucasian features and green eyes, and comparing the hat of the man on the left (in the green coat) to headgear worn by Sasanian Persian princes.[140] However, modern scholarship has identified praṇidhi scenes of the same temple (No. 9) as depicting Sogdians,[75] who inhabited Turfan as an ethnic minority during the phases of Tang Chinese (7th–8th century) and Uyghur rule (9th–13th century).[76]
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