Mahmud of Ghazni (998 to 1030)

[balti]

Mahmud of Ghazni (Persian: محمود غزنوی‎; 2 November 971 – 30 April 1030) was the first independent ruler of the Ghaznavid dynasty, ruling from 998 to 1030. At the time of his death, his kingdom had been transformed into an extensive military empire, which extended from northwestern Iran proper to the Punjab in the Indian subcontinent, Khwarazm in Transoxiana, and Makran.

Highly Persianized, Mahmud continued the bureaucratic, political, and cultural customs of his predecessors, the Samanids, which proved to establish the groundwork for a Persianate state in northern India.

His capital of Ghazni evolved into a significant cultural, commercial, and intellectual center in the Islamic world, almost rivaling the important city of Baghdad. The capital appealed to many prominent figures, such as al-Biruni and Ferdowsi.

He was the first ruler to hold the title Sultan ("authority"), signifying the extent of his power while at the same time preserving an ideological link to the suzerainty of the Abbasid Caliphate. During his rule, he invaded and plundered parts of the Indian subcontinent (east of the Indus River) seventeen times.


Mahmud was born in the town of Ghazni in the region of Zabulistan (now present-day Afghanistan) on 2 November 971. His father, Sabuktigin, was a Turkic slave commander (ghilman) who laid foundations to the Ghaznavid dynasty in Ghazni in 977, which he ruled as a subordinate of the Samanids, who ruled Khorasan and Transoxiana. Mahmud's mother was the daughter of an Iranian aristocrat from Zabulistan, and is therefore known in some sources as Mahmud-i Zavuli ("Mahmud from Zabulistan").

Not much about Mahmud's early life is known, he was a school-fellow of Ahmad Maymandi, a Persian native of Zabulistan and foster brother of his.

Family

Mahmud married a woman named Kausari Jahan, and they had twin sons Mohammad and Ma'sud, who succeeded him one after the other; his grandson by Mas'ud, Maw'dud Ghaznavi, also later became ruler of the empire. His sister, Sitr-e-Mu'alla, was married to Dawood bin Ataullah Alavi, also known as Ghazi Salar Sahu, whose son was Ghazi Saiyyad Salar Masud.

Mahmud's companion was a Georgian slave Malik Ayaz, and his love for him inspired poems and stories.