Alchon HunsThe Alchon Huns, (Bactrian: αλχον(ν)ο Alchon(n)o) also known as the Alchono, Alxon, Alkhon, Alkhan, Alakhana, and Walxon, were a nomadic people who established states in Central Asia and South Asia during the 4th and 6th centuries CE. They were first mentioned as being located in Paropamisus, and later expanded south-east, into the Punjab and Central India, as far as Eran and Kausambi. The Alchon invasion of the Indian subcontinent eradicated the Kidarite Huns who had preceded them by about a century, and contributed to the fall of the Gupta Empire, in a sense bringing an end to Classical India.
Turk ShahisThe Turk Shahis or Kabul Shahis were a dynasty of Western Turk, or mixed Turko-Hephthalite, origin, that ruled from Kabul and Kapisa to Gandhara in the 7th to 9th centuries AD. They may have been of Khalaj ethnicity. The Gandhara territory may have been bordering the Kashmir kingdom and the Kanauj kingdom to the east. From the 560s, the Western Turks had gradually expanded southeasterward from Transoxonia, and occupied Bactria and the Hindu-Kush region, forming largely independent polities.
ZabulistanZabulistan (زابلستان, Zābulistān, Zābolistān, Zāwulistān or simply زابل Zābul, زابل Zābəl), was a historical region in southern Afghanistan roughly corresponding to the modern provinces of Zabul and Ghazni. Following the Ghaznavid rule (977–1186), "Zabul" became largely synonymous with the name of its capital and main city, Ghazni. By the tenth century, Islamic sources mention Zabulistan as part of the Khorasan marches, a frontier region between Khorasan and India.
XionitesXionites, Chionites, or Chionitae (Middle Persian: Xiyōn or Hiyōn; Avestan: Xiiaona; Sogdian xwn; Pahlavi Xyon) were a nomadic people in the Central Asian regions of Transoxiana and Bactria. The Xionites appear to be synonymous with the Huna peoples of the South Asian regions of classical/medieval India, and possibly also the Huns of European late antiquity, who were in turn connected onomastically to the Xiongnu in Chinese history.
TokharistanTokharistan (formed from "Tokhara" and the suffix -stan meaning "place of" in Persian) is an ancient Early Middle Ages name given to the area which was known as Bactria in Ancient Greek sources. In the 7th and 8th century CE, Tokharistan came under the rule of the Chinese Empire, administered by the Protectorate General to Pacify the West. Today, Tokharistan is fragmented between Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan.
KidaritesThe Kidarites, or Kidara Huns, were a dynasty that ruled Bactria and adjoining parts of Central Asia and South Asia in the 4th and 5th centuries. The Kidarites belonged to a complex of peoples known collectively in India as the Huna, and in Europe as the Chionites (from the Iranian names Xwn/Xyon), and may even be considered as identical to the Chionites. The 5th century Byzantine historian Priscus called them Kidarite Huns, or "Huns who are Kidarites".
Huna peopleHunas or Huna (Middle Brahmi script: Hūṇā) was the name given by the ancient Indians to a group of Central Asian tribes who, via the Khyber Pass, entered the Indian subcontinent at the end of the 5th or early 6th century. The Hunas occupied areas as far south as Eran and Kausambi, greatly weakening the Gupta Empire. The Hunas were ultimately defeated by a coalition of Indian princes that included an Indian king Yasodharman and the Gupta emperor, Narasimhagupta. They defeated a Huna army and their ruler Mihirakula in 528 CE and drove them out of India.
HephthalitesThe Hephthalites (ηβοδαλο), sometimes called the White Huns (also known as the White Hunas, in Iranian as the Spet Xyon and in Sanskrit as the Sveta-huna), were a people who lived in Central Asia during the 5th to 8th centuries CE. They formed an empire, the Imperial Hephthalites, and were militarily important from 450 CE, when they defeated the Kidarites, to 560 CE, when combined forces from the First Turkic Khaganate and the Sasanian Empire defeated them.
Bactrian languageBactrian (Bactrian: Αριαο, , [arjaː], meaning "Iranian") is an extinct Eastern Iranian language formerly spoken in the Central Asian region of Bactria (in present-day Afghanistan) and used as the official language of the Kushan and the Hephthalite empires. It was long thought that Avestan represented "Old Bactrian", but this notion had "rightly fallen into discredit by the end of the 19th century". Bactrian, which was written predominantly in an alphabet based on the Greek script, was known natively as αριαο [arjaː] ("Arya"; an endonym common amongst Indo-Iranian peoples).
