Yunus Khan

 ( 1487 Deaths ) 

The following observation was made by a religious dignitary called Mauláná Muhammad Kázi:

As expected, Yunus Khan's ties of kinship and claim to tribal leadership proved great advantages. He quickly gained the support of several amirs (nobles) and married the daughter one of them, Mir Pir Haji Kunji. Her name was Aisan Daulat Begum, and she is believed to have been his first wife, although Yunus was already about 40 years old by this time. She would bear Yunus three daughters:

1. Mihr Nigar Khanim (b. 1457), wife of Sultan Ahmed Mirza, eldest son of Yunus Khan's mentor Abu Sa'id.
2. Qutlugh Nigar Khanum (b. 1459), wife of Umar Shaikh Mirza II, fourth son of Abu Sa'id and younger brother of Sultan Ahmed. Their only son, Babur, would become the founder of the Mughal empire.
3. Khub Nigar Khanim (b. 1463). After her father died, her half-brother (see below) gave her in marriage to Muhammad Husain Mirza Dughlat. She became the mother of Mirza Muhammad Haidar Dughlat, famous historian and future ruler of Kashmir.

Despite his success in making allies, Yunus did not succeed in his project of displacing Esen Buqa, perhaps because he had no experience of war. When Yunus moved to take the town of Kashgar, he was faced by the joined armies of Amir Sayyid Ali of Kashgar and Esen Buqa, and in the ensuing battle, he was defeated. Soon afterwards, he retreated from Moghulistan and returned to the court of Abu Sa'id, who gave him territory around Lake Issyk-Kul as a fiefdom (in appanage). After a while, Yunus Khan again entered Moghulistan and again gained the support of the amirs, but was again unable to make any substantial gains in the country against Esen Buqa.

In 1457, Dughlats Amir Sayyid Ali of Kashgar (Esen Buqa's ally the previous year) died and his son Saniz Mirza sought Yunus Khan's assistance to gain power in Kashgar. Yunus Khan came into Kashgar after receiving this invitation. Shortly afterwards, he sent one of the most respectable of Kashgar, Amir Zia-ud-Din, to Badakhshan to meet Shah Sultan Muhammad Badakhshi and seek one of his six daughters in marriage. Shah Sultan Muhammad Badakhshi (also known as "Prince Lali") was believed to be a direct descendant of Iskandar Zulkarnain (Alexander the Great), son of Filikus Rumi (Philip II of Macedon), who according to (dubious) legend left one of his sons in the isolated mountain country out of reach of rivals in hope that his progeny would continue his dynasty in the East. Prince Lali agreed to give a daughter to Yunus Khan in marriage. He entrusted his fourth daughter, Shah Begum, to Sayyid Zia-ud-Din, who brought her back with him to Kashgar and delivered her over to Yunus Khan, and the wedding was celebrated with due ceremony. Note that Yunus Khan entered into his second marriage just around one year after his first marriage, and he was already around 40 years old by this time. This would indicate that because of his poverty and lack of prospects, he had been unable to secure wives of respectable rank until this time. His consciousness of his high birth would have prevented him from accepting wives of inferior birth, but his recent rise had removed all obstacles and provided him with two suitable wives. He was soon blessed with progeny by both wives and became the father of a numerous family. Yunus Khan begat two sons and two daughters by Shah Begum:

1. Sultan Mahmud Khan, eldest child by Shah Begum, born in 1462.
2. Ahmad Alaq, second son, known later as Alacha (Slayer) Khan for his brutal attempts to usurp absolute power in the Eurasian Steppe by slaughtering the Jungars.
3. Sultan Nigar Khanim, wife of Sultan Mahmud Mirza, third son of Yunus Khan's mentor Abu Sa'id
4. Daulat Sultan Khanim, daughter

Ruling from Aksu as Khan, Yunus Khan maintained good relations with the Timurids and with Janybek Khan and Karai Khan, the founders of the Kazakh Horde (in 1465-1466). As a consequence of his alliance with the Kazakhs, he made an enemy out of the rival Uzbeks. In 1468, the Uzbeks under Shaikh Haidar came into conflict with the Moghuls; they were defeated and Shaikh Haidar was killed, breaking Uzbek power until the rise of Muhammad Shaibani by the end of the century.

Yunus' dealings with the Timurids were far more complex. The Timurid ruler Abu Sa'id had been Yunus Khan's great mentor in life, who had called him from obscurity and exile in Iran and bestowed lands and an army upon him. After Abu Sa'id Mirza was killed by the White Sheep Turkmen in 1468, his realm was split between his sons. The eldest son, Sultan Ahmad, ruled over Samarkand & Bukhara, the third son, Sultan Mahmud Mirza took Balkh & Badakhshan, and the fourth son, Umar Shaikh Mirza II, became the ruler of Ferghana. All three of these princes were to eventually marry three daughters of Yunus Khan, but his relationship with them began on a discordant note.

By the time Abu Sa'id Mirza was killed in 1468, Yunus Khan had been overlord of the Mughals for about six years. During this time, his support among his principal amirs (noblemen) had eroded. The amirs were apparently upset over Yunus Khan's desire to reside in towns and abandon the traditional nomadic way of life. Since Yunus Khan had spent much of his early life in the towns of Yazd and Shiraz as a student, he had developed a taste for settled life in towns and a certain discomfort with the nomadic lifestyle of his community, the Mughals. This was a major issue in that milieu, and the amirs invited Sultan Ahmad's governor of Tashkent, Shaikh Jamal Khan, to displace Yunus Khan and usurp power. This duly happened; the Moghuls submitted to Shaikh Jamal Khan, who took over power and also imprisoned Yunus Khan for a year. However, the amirs soon had cause to regret the choice they had made, for Shaikh Jamal Khan was not a wise and moderate man; he was given to over-reach and excess. He demonstrated these qualities strikingly when he gave Yunus Khan's first wife, Isan Daulat Begum, maternal grandmother of Babur, as a present (or booty of war) to his officer Khoja Kalan. When Khoja Kalan entered Isan Daulat Begum's apartments to claim her for himself, he was trapped inside and killed there by female attendants of Isan Daulat Begum, and thus the lady managed to preserve her honour. Khoja Kalan lost his life, and Shaikh Jamal Khan who lost his honour in the eyes of the amirs for having been so cavalier and insensitive in handing over a married woman to someone as booty of war. Some time after this event, Shaikh Jamal himself was killed by Moghul amirs and Yunus Khan was restored, after promising not to live in towns but follow the nomadic way of life. This happened in 1472. Shortly afterwards, after learning that Kebek Sultan (the young son of Dost Mohammad) had been killed by his followers, Yunus Khan to take control of Eastern Moghulistan (Uyghurstan). This happened in the same year, 1472.

After Shaikh Jamal was killed, Yunus Khan began actively participating (or intervening) in the affairs of the Timurids. He forged ties of kinship with most of the prominent Timurids; three of Yunus Khan's daughters were given in marriage to three sons of his former mentor Abu Sa'id. Mihr Nigar Khanim was married to Sultan Ahmad Mirza; Qutlugh Nigar Khanum was married to Umar Shaikh Mirza II in 1475 (their son was Babur, founder of the Great Moghul Empire in India), and finally, Sultan Nigar Khanum was given in marriage to Sultan Mahmud Mirza (their son, Sultan Vais Mirza, better known as Mirza Khan, would become king of Badakhshan). Yunus Khan kept on especially friendly terms with his second son-in-law, Umar Shaikh Mirza II, and it was Umar Shaikh who usually gave his father-in-law territory to reside in during the winters (the Timurids were settled in towns and ruled the attached provinces; Yunus Khan, after having promised his amirs to maintain the nomadic lifestyle, kept his word). Being of a rather unworldly and poetic temperament, Umar Shaikh II often needed the help of his father-in-law to deal with his own elder brother, Ahmad Mirza, with whom his relations had been bad since childhood for no particular reason. Yunus Khan often intervened to iron out the issues between his two sons-in-law.

Yunus Khan died in Taskhent in 1487 after a long illness. He was succeeded in Tashkent by his eldest son, Sultan Mahmud Khan, while the Moghuls in the east followed Ahmad Alaq.

In Babr Nama written by Babur, Page 19, Chapter 1; described genealogy of his maternal grandfather Yunas Khan as:The Babur Nama in English, Zahiru'd-din Mubammad Babur Padshah Ghdzt, ANNETTE SUSANNAH BEVERIDGE

In the Tarikh-i Rashidi by Mirza Muhammad Haidar Dughlat:

• Mirza Muhammad Haidar. The Tarih-i-Rashidi ( A History of the Moghuls of Central Asia). Translated by Edward Denison Ross, edited by N.Elias. London, 1895
• M.Kutlukov. About emergence of the Yarkant County state. Almaty,1990