Kidarites
The Kidarites, or Kidara Huns, were a dynasty that ruled Bactria and adjoining parts of Central Asia and India in the 4th and 5th centuries. The Kidarites belonged to a complex group of peoples known collectively in India as the Huna, and in Europe as the Chionites, 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". Chinese annals referred to them as the Ta Yüeh-chih, or Lesser Yüeh-chih. The Huna/Xionite tribes are often linked, albeit controversially, to the Huns who invaded Eastern Europe around the same period. They are entirely different from the Hephthalites, who replaced them about a century later.
The Kidarites were named after Kidara one of their main rulers. The Kidarites appear to have been a part of a Huna horde known in Latin sources as the "Kermichiones" or "Red Huna". The Kidarites established the first of four major Xionite/Huna states in Central Asia, followed by the Alchon, the Hephthalites and the Nezak.
In 360–370 CE, a Kidarite kingdom was established in Central Asian regions previously ruled by the Sasanian Empire, replacing the Kushano-Sasanians in Bactria. Thereafter, the Sasanian Empire was limited to Merv. Next, circa 390-410 CE, the Kidarites invaded northwestern India, where they replaced the remnants of the Kushan Empire in the area of Punjab.
Origins
A nomadic people, the Kidarites appear to have originated in the Altai Mountains region. The terms Huns/Chionites seem to reflect the general ethnic appellation of these people, whereas Kidarites should be understood as a dynastic designation derived from the name of their king, Kidara. On Kidarite coins their rulers are depicted as beardless or clean-shaven – a feature of Altaic cultures at the time. They may have been Oghuric speakers originally, as may have been the Chionites and the Hephthalites, before adopting the Bactrian language. The Kidarites were depicted as mounted archers on the reverse of coins. They were also known to practice artificial cranial deformation.The Kidarites appear to have been synonymous with the Karmir Xyon, – a major subdivision of the Chionites, alongside the Spet Xyon. In a recently discovered seal with the image of a ruler similar to those of the Kidarite coins, the ruler named himself in Bactrian "King of the Huns and Great Kushan Shah" zarko. The discovery was reportedly made in Swat.
The name of their eponymous ruler Kidara may be cognate with the Turkic word Kidirti meaning "west", suggesting that the Kidarites were originally the westernmost of the Xionites, and the first to migrate from Inner Asia. Chinese sources suggest that when the Uar were driven westward by the Later Zhao state, circa 320, from the area around Pingyang, it put pressure on Xionite-affiliated peoples, such as the Kidarites, to migrate. Another theory is that climate change in the Altai during the 4th century caused various tribes to migrate westward and southward.
Contemporary Chinese and Roman sources suggest that, during the 4th century, the Kidarites began to encroach on the territory of Greater Khorasan and the Kushan Empire – migrating through Transoxiana into Bactria, where they were initially vassals of the Kushans and adopted many elements of Kushano-Bactrian culture. The Kidarites also initially put pressure on the Sasanian Empire, but later served as mercenaries in the Sassanian army, under which they fought the Romans in Mesopotamia, led by a chief named Grumbates. Some of the Kidarites apparently became a ruling dynasty of the Kushan Empire, leading to the epithet "Little Kushans".
Kidarite kingdom
First appearance in literary sources
The first evidence are gold coins discovered in Balkh dating from the mid-4th century. The Kushano-Sasanian ruler Varahran during the second phase of his reign, had to introduce the Kidarite tamga in his coinage minted at Balkh in Bactria, circa 340-345. The tamgha replaced the nandipada symbol which had been in use since Vasudeva I, suggesting that the Kidarites had now taken control, first under their ruler Kirada. Then ram horns were added to the effigy of Varahran on his coinage for a brief period under the Kidarite ruler Peroz, and raised ribbons were added around the crown ball under the Kidarite ruler Kidara. In effect, Varahran has been described as a "puppet" of the Kidarites. By 365, the Kidarite ruler Kidara I was placing his name on the coinage of the region, and assumed the title of Kushanshah. In Gandhara too, the Kidarites minted silver coins in the name of Varahran, until Kidara also introduced his own name there.Archaeological, numismatic, and sigillographic evidence demonstrates the Kidarites ruled a realm just as refined as that of the Sasanians. They swiftly adopted Iranian imperial symbolism and titulature, as demonstrated by a seal; "Lord Ularg, the king of the Huns, the great Kushan-shah, the Samarkandian, of the Afrigan family."
Most other data we currently have on the Kidarite kingdom are from Chinese and Byzantine sources from the middle of the 5th century. The Kidarites were the first Huna to bother India. Indian records note that the Hūna had established themselves in modern Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier Province by the first half of the 5th century, and the Gupta emperor Skandagupta had repelled a Hūna invasion in 455. The Kidarites are the last dynasty to regard themselves as the inheritors of the Kushan empire, which had disappeared as an independent entity two centuries earlier.
Migration into Bactria
Around 350, the Sasanian Emperor Shapur II had to interrupt his conflict with the Romans, and abandon the siege of Nisibis, in order to face nomadic threats in the east: he was attacked in the east by Scythian Massagetae and other Central Asian tribes. Around this time, Xionite/Huna tribes, most likely the Kidarites, whose king was Grumbates, make an appearance as an encroaching threat upon Sasanian territory as well as a menace to the Gupta Empire.After a prolonged struggle they were forced to conclude an alliance, and their king Grumbates accompanied Shapur II in the war against the Romans, agreeing to enlist his light cavalrymen into the Persian army and accompanying Shapur II. The presence of "Grumbates, king of the Chionitae" and his Xionites with Shapur II during campaigns in the Western Caspian lands, in the area of Corduene, is described by the contemporary eyewitness Ammianus Marcellinus:
The presence of Grumbates alongside Shapur II is also recorded at the successful Siege of Amida in 359, in which Grumbates lost his son:
Later the alliance fell apart, and by the time of Bahram IV the Sasanians had lost numerous battles against the Kidarites. The migrating Kidarites then settled in Bactria, where they replaced the Kushano-Sasanids, a branch of the Sasanids that had displaced the weakening Kushans in the area two centuries before. It is thought that they were in firm possession of the region of Bactria by 360. Since this area corresponds roughly to Kushanshahr, the former western territories of the Kushans, Kidarite ruler Kidara called himself "Kidara King of the Kushans" on his coins.
According to Priscus, the Sasanian Empire was forced to pay tribute to the Kidarites, until the rule of Yazdgird II, who refused payment.
The Kidarites based their capital in Samarkand, where they were at the center of Central Asian trade networks, in close relation with the Sogdians. The Kidarites had a powerful administration and raised taxes, rather efficiently managing their territories, in contrast to the image of barbarians bent on destruction given by Persian accounts.
Fortresses
is an ancient fortress 12 kilometers south of the city center of Samarkand in Uzbekistan, protecting the southern border of the Samarkand oasis. It consists in a central citadel built in mud-bricks and measuring 75 × 75 meters at its base has six towers and is surrounded by a moat, still visible today. Living quarters were located outside the citadel. The citadel was first occupied by the Kidarites in the 4th-5th century, whose coinage and bullae have been found.Expansion to northwest India
The Kidarites consolidated their power in Northern Afghanistan before conquering Peshawar and parts of northwest India including Gandhara probably sometime between 390 and 410, around the end of the rule of Gupta Emperor Chandragupta II or beginning of the rule of Kumaragupta I. It is probably the rise of the Hephthalites and the defeats against the Sasanians which pushed the Kidarites into northern India.Economy
The Kidarites issued gold coins on the model of Kushan coinage, inscribing their own names but still claiming the Kushan heritage by using the title "Kushan". The volume of Kidarite gold coinage was nevertheless much smaller than that of the Great Kushans, probably owing to a decline of commerce and the loss of major international trade routes.Coins with the title or name Gadahara seem to be the first coins issued by the invading Kidarites in the Kushan realm in India. The additional presence of the names of foreign rulers such as the Kushano-Sassanian Piroz or the Gupta Empire Samudragupta on the coins may suggest some kind of suzerainty at a time when the remnants of Kushan power were torn between these two powers. The "Gadahara" issues seem to come chronologically just before the issues of the famous Kidarite ruler Kidara.
Religion
It seems Buddhism was rather unaffected by Kidarite rule, as the religion continued to prosper. The Chinese pilgrim Fa-hsien visited the region, and described a wealthy Buddhist culture. Some aspects of the Buddhist art of Gandhara seem to have incorporated Zoroastrian elements conveyed by the Kidarites at that time, such as the depiction of fire altars on the bases of numerous Buddhist sculptures.It has been argued that the spread of Indian culture and religions as far as Sogdia corresponded to the rule of the Kidarites over the regions from Sogdia to Gandhara.
Some Buddhist works of art, in a style marking some evolution compared to the art of Gandhara, have been suggested as belonging to the Kidarite period, such as the sculptures of Paitava.
File:Kushan or Kidarite devotees around Maitreya.jpg|thumb|upright=2|center|Devotees around Maitreya, the Buddha of the future. Paitava. The sculptures of Paitava may belong to the period of the Kidarites.