Divashtich

Divashtich (also spelled Devashtich, Dewashtich, and Divasti), was a medieval Sogdian ruler in Transoxiana during the period of the Muslim conquest of Transoxiana. He was the ruler of Panjikant and its surroundings from ca. 706 until his downfall and execution in the autumn of 722. Divashtich was the son of a certain Yodkhsetak, who belonged to a noble Sogdian dehqan family from Samarkand, which could trace its descent back to the Sasanian king Bahram V Gur (r. 420–438). The family bore the title of sur and began ruling parts of Sogdia during the 6th century. There were five members of the family bearing the title of sur, Divashtich being the last of them. Muslim conquest of Transoxiana In ca. 706, Divashtich was elected as king of Panjikant, succeeding the Turkic prince Chukin Chur Bilga as the ruler of city. However, Divashtich did not hold absolute power, and shared his power with other princes. Although Divashtich only ruled Panjikant, he claimed the title of "Sogdian king", and "ruler of Samarkand". Some of Divashtich's coins included the name of a certain Nana, which either was the goddess Nanaya, or Chukin Chur Bilga's daughter, whom Divashtich may have been married to. In 709/710, Tarkhun, the Sogdian ruler of Samarkand, was overthrown by a rebellion because of his pro-Muslim policy, and was succeeded by another Sogdian prince named Gurak. After the fall of Tarkhun, his two sons fled to the court of Divashtich, where they were treated honorably. This made Divashtich's claim to Samarkand much stronger. In ca. 712, Divashtich, including other local Sogdian rulers such as Gurak, acknowledged the authority of the Umayyad Caliphate after an invasion by the Arab general Qutayba ibn Muslim. While Gurak tried to break from Umayyad suzerainty and request aid from the Tang dynasty, Divashtich remained loyal to the Arabs, and his relations seems to have been so great with them that he was even considered a Muslim. In 719, he was forced to send the two sons of Tarkhun to al-Jarrah ibn Abdallah, the Umayyad governor of Khorasan.