Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/247

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 225 of Persia one thousand years after the birth of Chi'ist. His father Sebectagi was the slave of the slave of the slave of the [subuktigin] commander of the faithful. But in this descent of servitude, the first degree was merely titular, since it was filled by the sovereign of Transoxiana and Chorasan, who still paid a nominal allegiance to the caliph of Bagdad. The second rank was that of a minister of state, a lieutenant of the Samanides,^ who broke, by his revolt, the bonds of political slavery. But the third step was a state of real and domestic servitude in the family of that rebel ; from which Sebectagi, by his courage and dexterity, ascended to the supreme command of the city and province of Gazna,^ as the son-in-law and successor of his grateful master. The falling dynasty of the Samanides was at first protected, and at last overthrown, by their servants ; and, in the public dis- orders, the fortune of Mahmud continually increased. For him, the title of sultan * was first invented ; and his kingdom was enlarged from Transoxiana to the neighbourhood of Ispahan, from the shores of the Caspian to the mouth of the Indus. But the principal source of his fame and riches was the holy war which he waged against the Gentoos of Hindostan. In this foreign narrative I may not consume a page ; and a volume would scarcely suffice to recapitulate the battles and sieges of His twelve ex- ,., 1.. ikT ix»i T-j- peditions into his twelve expeditions. Never was the Musulman hero clis- Hindostan 2 The dynasty of the Samanides continued 125 3'ears, A.n. 874-999, under ten princes. See their succession and ruin, in the Tables of M. de Guignes (Hist, des Huns, torn. i. p. 404-406). They were followed [south of the Oxus] by the Gaznevides, A.D. 999-1183. (See torn. i. p. 239, 240.) His division of nations often disturbs the series of time and place. ^ Gaznah hortos non habet ; est emporium et domicilium mercaturae Indicae. Abulfedpe Geograph. Reiske, tab. xxiii. p. 349; d'Herbelot, p. 364. It has not been visited by any modern traveller. [Subuktigin conquered Bust and Kusdar in A.D. 978. For the story of his rise, cp. Nizam al-Mulk, Siasset Nameh, tr. Schefer, p. 140 sqqj] ■* By the ambassador of the caliph of Bagdad, who employed an Arabian or Chaldaic word that signifies !ord and master (d'Herbelot, p. 825). It is interpreted AiiTo -panip. Ba(ri,ev9 Bao-iAeojr, by the Byzantine writers of the eleventh century ; and the name (SouArarn?, Soldanus) is familiarly employed in the Greek and Latin languages, after it had passed from the Gaznevides to the Seljukides, and other emirs of Asia and Eg^'pt. Ducange (Dissertation xvi. sur Joinville, p. 238-240, Gloss. Graec. et Latin.) labours to find the title of sultan in the ancient kingdom of Persia ; but his proofs are mere shadows ; a proper name in the Themes of Constantine (ii. 11), an anticipation of Zonaras, &c. and a medal of Kai Khosrou, not (as he believes) the Sassanide of the vith, but the Seljukide of Iconium of the xiiith, century (de Guignes, Hist, des Huns, tom. i. p. 246). [The title sultan, for the captain of the bodyguard, was introduced at least as early as the reign of Mutawakkil, in the middle of the 9th century. It has been conjectured (by Vam- b^ry) that the name of one of the sons of the Hungarian chief Arpad, ZaAros-, is really sultan. The old Vienna chronicle gives his name as Zoltan, and the scribe of King B<^la, as Zulin.'] VOL. VI. 15