Karakhanid Khanate

Timeline

1. c. 840–960Kashgar · XinjiangThe Karakhanid Turkic tribes established a khanate on both sides of the Tianshan; around the mid-tenth century the ruling house converted to Islam, becoming Central Asia's first Turkic Islamic polity.
2. c. 960–1040Samarkand · TransoxianaThe Karakhanid armies defeated the Samanid dynasty and took control of the Transoxiana oases of Samarkand and Bukhara; the khanate's territory reached Khurasan to the west and controlled the southern rim of the Tarim Basin to the east, forming a joint rule of Turkic military nobles and Persian-speaking civil officials.
3. 1041–1050Samarkand · Karakhanid KhanateAround 1040 the khanate split internally into eastern and western halves; the western khanal court was based along the Samarkand–Bukhara line, the eastern centered on Kashgar, and both maintained a shared Turkic-Islamic cultural identity and jointly guarded Silk Road interests.
4. 1051–1212Kashgar · XinjiangThereafter the eastern and western halves alternately united and divided, facing in turn the westward migration of the Khitans and the challenge of Khwarazm; the eastern Karakhanid Khanate was destroyed in 1212 by Khwarazm Shah Muhammad, and Central Asia's political landscape entered a new phase.