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224
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[AUGUST, 1884.
90,000 Kankalis, under the command of Buji | bouring peasants of Vesht, who were greatly Pehluvan, a maternal uncle of Uzlak Sultan, enriched in consequence." Kujai Tikin, Ughul Hajib and Timur Malik, the intrepid defender of Khojend." These troops were no means favourable to Jelal-u'ddin. They were mostly Kankalis, and therefore favoured the pretensions of Uzlak Sulțân, whose mother was of their race, and whose claims they upheld; besides he was a boy of very ordinary intellect, and not likely to keep the tight hand over them that Jelal-u'd-din would, and they accordingly plotted to destroy him. The plot was disclosed to him by Inanj Khân, and the Sultan determined to leave the dangerous city, and accordingly set out with 300 companions headed by Timur Malik. The Mongole had placed a cordon of troops round the northern borders of Khorasan to prevent his escape in that direction. Jelal.u'd-din, however, sped on by way of Nissa to Shadbakh Shadyakh." At Shadyakh, near Astuseh Sabekan," he had to cut his way through a body of 700 Mongols who tried to stop him, and this, says Muhammad of Nissa, was the first success won by the Musalmâns over the Mongols. He managed to reach Shadyakh, where he delayed three days, and then went on to Ghazni. Hardly had he left Khuârezm when news arrived there that the Mongols were advancing upon the town. Uzlak Sultan and Ak Sultan hastened after their brother to recall him. Near Kharender, a strong fort close to Nissa, from which the historian, Muḥammad of Nissa, took his name, they were met by the same body of Mongols who had tried to stop their brother, and who were making inquiries in which direction he had fled. The nephew of Muhammad of Nissa went out of the fortress to divert the Mongols' attention from the young princes, but having learnt who they were, the latter pursued, captured and put them to death. Their heads were put on lances, and exhibited publicly. It is said that the jewels which were found on the clothes of the two princes and the other Khuârezmians were bartered by the Mongols, who did not know their value, to the neigh
60
"Tabakat-i-Nasiri, p. 286 note; Erdmann, pp. 407
Erdmann, p. 408.
Raverty says Astawah, p. 285. (Ashabat, close to the Tejend river P).
Erdmann, pp. 407 and 408; Tabakat-i-Nasiri, Raverty's Notes, p. 286; D'Ohsson, pp. 263 and 264.
and 406.
rezm.
Let us turn once more to the Mongols. After the capture of Samarkand, and apparently when he heard that the sons of Muhammad had on his death retired to Khuârezm, Chinghiz determined to send a strong army there, and gave the command of it to his three eldest sons, Juchi, Chagatai, and Ogotai. The Mongols had already made a venture in that direction. After Juchi captured Yanghikent, the Ulus Bede, or Uighurs, who were with him, were allowed to return home to Mongolia, and he replaced them by a contingent of 10,000 Kankalis under Ainal Noyan, called Tainal by D'Ohsson, and sent them against Khuârezm. Ainal having gone on with the advance guard, left a Mongol officer in charge of these Turcomans, They speedily killed him, whereupon Ainal having returned, put many of them to death. The rest fled to Merv and Amuyeh." Kurkanj, or Urgenj, was the capital of KhuâIts ruins are still known as Kunis Urgenj, The Arabs called it Al Jorjania, and it is described by Mokadessi as a town of some importance." Like the other towns of Khuârezm it was situated on the Oxus, which corresponds to the Nile in watering a green strip of fertile land bounded on either side by sandy wastes. We have seen how Jelal-a'd-din and his brothers withdrew from the district. Abulghazi tells us that Khumar Tikin, a Kankali chief, and brother of the virago Turkhan Khatun, had been appointed governor, and was assisted by Mogol Hajib and Feridun, and a great number of naukars and other officers." Erdmann, apparently from Juveni, adds the names of Buka Pehlavan and the Sepehsilar Ali Murghainí. Khumar put the place in a condition for a long defence. Before the siege fairly began, the garrison had a foretaste of disaster. A body of Mongols who were scouring the neighbourhood for provisions having approached the town, and carried off some horses and asses, were pursued by the Khuârezmians as far as Bagh-iKhurram, where they fell into an ambush,
66
61 D'Ohsson, loc. cit.; De la Croix, p. 246. Erdmann, p. 374; D'Ohsson, vol. I, pp. 223 and 224. es See Howorth, History of the Mongols, vol. II, p. 965,
&c.
Op. cit., pp. 117 and 118. Op. cit., p. 409.
ses.e., the Garden of Delights.
