Sogdiana
Sogdiana is a historical region in Central Asia located between the Upper Oxus (Amu Darya) and Upper Jaxartes (Syr) rivers, encompassing parts of modern-day Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The region is named after the Sogd River, which flows near significant cities like Samarkand and Bokhara. Sogdiana has a rich prehistory, evidenced by the extensive ruins of its capital, Maracanda (now Samarkand), which thrived during the early first millennium BC. It was once a satrapy under the Achaemenid Persian King Darius I and later fell to Alexander the Great in 328/7 BC, who ended local resistance and established the city of Alexandria Eschate.
Sogdiana was strategically important due to its control of trade routes to China, which contributed to its prosperity. After its incorporation into the Seleucid Empire, the region underwent political changes, including a revolt that led to the formation of an independent Bactrian state. By the early reign of the Greek monarch Strato I, Sogdiana was occupied by the Yüeh-Chih, leading to its division into five principalities. Although it became more alienated from the Greek world, Sogdiana remained a vibrant cultural center, reaching its zenith under Islamic rule a millennium later.
Subject Terms
Sogdiana
A region of Central Asia between the Upper Oxus (Amu Darya) and Upper Jaxartes (Syr), taking its name from the river Sogd which, passing near Samarkand and Bokhara, loses itself in sand before approaching the Oxus
Sogdiana comprised parts of the present Soviet Republics of Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The extensive ruins of the capital Maracanda (Samarkand) in the fertile valley of the Polytimetus (Zeravshan) testify to an important prehistory during the early first millennium BC. The Sogdian language has only left slender remains (notably in documents of the seventh century AD).
A satrapy of the Achaemenid Persian King Darius I (521–486 BC), Sogdiana was conquered in 328/7 by Alexander the Great, who, after capturing its fortresses including the chieftain Oxyartes' supposedly impregnable `Sogdian Rock’ (or Rock of Oxus or Ariamazes), married Oxyartes' daughter, Roxane, at the fortress of another leader Chorienes, thus bringing Sogdian resistance to an end; whereupon Alexander founded Alexandria Eschate (`the farthest’) on the Jaxartes (qv).
Sogdiana, which controlled an important trade route to China, was subsequently incorporated into the Seleucid empire, and probably formed part of the territory of its governor Diodotus I Soter when he revolted (c 256/5) and created a virtually (later wholly) independent Bactrian state. Early in the reign of the Greek monarch Strato I (c 130–75), however, the central Asian Yüeh-Chih (Tochari) occupied and annexed Sogdiana and divided it into five principalities. This alienation from the Greek world proved to be permanent, although the country remained a prosperous center of population, and indeed only attained its cultural zenith a millennium later, under Islamic rule.