Yunus Khan , was Khan of Moghulistan

Moghulistan

Moghulistan or Mughalistan is a historical geographic unit in Central Asia that included parts of modern-day Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and the Chinese Autonomous Region of Xinjiang...

 from 1462 until his death. He is identified by many historians with Ḥājjī `Ali ' onMouseout='HidePop("88486")' href="/topics/Pinyin">Pinyin

Pinyin

Pinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...

: Hazhi Ali) , of the contemporary Chinese records.

Background and Family

Yunus Ali was the eldest son of Vais Khan of Moghulistan. When Vais Khan was killed in 1428, the Moghuls were split as to who should succeed him. Although Yunus Khan was his eldest son, the majority favored Yunus' younger brother, Esen Buqa

Esen Buqa II

Esen Buqa II was Khan of Moghulistan from 1429 until his death. He was the younger son of Uwais Khan.When Uwais Khan was killed in 1428 the Moghuls were thrown into a state of confusion. Some of them supported Esen Buqa, while others supported his older brother, Yunus Khan...

. As a result he and his supporters fled to Ulugh Beg

Ulugh Beg

Ulugh Bek was a Timurid ruler as well as an astronomer, mathematician and sultan. His commonly-known name is not truly a personal name, but rather a moniker, which can be loosely translated as "Great Ruler" or "Patriarch Ruler" and was the Turkic equivalent of Timur's Perso-Arabic title Amīr-e...

, the Timurid ruler of Transoxiana

Transoxiana

Transoxiana is the ancient name used for the portion of Central Asia corresponding approximately with modern-day Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, southern Kyrgystan and southwest Kazakhstan. Geographically, it is the region between the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers...

, who however imprisoned the group. He gave Yunus Khan to his father, Shah Rukh, who treated him well, and who sent him to learn under Maulana

Maulana

Mawlānā is an Arabic word literally meaning "our lord" or "our master" ....

 Sharaf ud-Din Yazdi. Yunus Khan spent several years learning under the Maulana in Yazd

Yazd

Yazd is the capital of Yazd Province in Iran, and a centre of Zoroastrian culture. The city is located some 175 miles southeast of Isfahan. At the 2006 census, the population was 423,006, in 114,716 families....

, in the process becoming one of the most educated Moghuls. After the Maulana died he wandered for some time before settling on Shiraz

Shiraz

Shiraz may refer to:* Shiraz, Iran, a city in Iran* Shiraz County, an administrative subdivision of Iran* Vosketap, Armenia, formerly called ShirazPeople:* Hovhannes Shiraz, Armenian poet* Ara Shiraz, Armenian sculptor...

 as a home.

Early Career

In 1456 Abu Sa'id

Abu Sa'id (Timurid dynasty)

Abū Saʿīd b. Muḥammad b. Mīrānshāh b. Timūr , was a Timurid Empire ruler in what is today parts of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Iran and Afghanistan and member of the Timurid dynasty....

, who had become the ruler of Transoxiana, sent for Yunus Khan. Abu Sa'id had become annoyed with the frequent raids that the Moghuls under Esen Buqa made into his territory. He raised Yunus to the khanship and sent him with an army to Moghulistan to oppose his brother. Yunus Khan quickly gained the support of several amirs and married the daughter one of those amirs, Mir Pir Haji Kunji. Her name was Isan Daulat Begum. But when he moved to take the town of Kashgar

Kashgar

Kashgar or Kashi is an oasis city with approximately 350,000 residents in the western part of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China. Kashgar is the administrative centre of Kashgar Prefecture which has an area of 162,000 km² and a population of approximately...

 he was met by the joined army of Amir Sayyid Ali of Kashgar and Esen Buqa, and in the ensuing battle 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. After a while Yunus Khan again entered Moghulistan and gained the support of the amirs, but was unable to make any substantial gains in the country against Esen Buqa.

In 1457 dughlat

Dughlats

The Dughlat clan was a Mongol clan that served the Chagatai khans as hereditary vassal rulers of the several cities of the western Tarim Basin from the 14th century until the 16th century...

 Amir Sayyid Ali of Kashgar had died and his son Saniz Mirza had sought the assistance of Yunus Khan to gain power in Kashgar. When Yunus Khan came to Kashgar he sent one of the most respectful Sayyid

Sayyid

Sayyid is an honorific title, it denotes males accepted as descendants of the Islamic prophet Muhammad through his grandsons, Hasan ibn Ali and Husain ibn Ali, sons of the prophet's daughter Fatima Zahra and his son-in-law Ali ibn Abi Talib.Daughters of sayyids are given the titles Sayyida,...

s of Kashgar, Amir Zia-ud-Din, to Shah Sultan Muhammad Badakhshi, in Badakhshan

Badakhshan

Badakhshan is an historic region comprising parts of what is now northeastern Afghanistan and southeastern Tajikistan. The name is retained in Badakhshan Province which is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, in the far northeast of Afghanistan, and contains the Wakhan Corridor...

, to ask one of his six daughters in marriage. Shah Sultan Muhammad Badakhshi or prince Lali was believed to have been the direct descendant of Iskandar Zulkarnain (Alexander the Great), son of Filikus Rumi (Phillip II of Macedon), who according legend left one of his sons in isolated mountain country out of reach of rivals in hope he will continue his affair in the East. Prince Lali gave his fourth daughter Shah Begum to Sayyid Zia-ud-Din who brought her back with him to Kashgar and delivered over to the Yunus Khan. Yunus Khan had two sons and two daughters by Shah Begum. The eldest of all was Sultan Mahmud Khan

Mahmud Khan (Moghul Khan)

Sultan Mahmud Khan , was Khan of Tashkent and of the Moghuls of western Moghulistan . He was the eldest son of Yunus Khan...

. He was born in 1462. Next to him came Sultan Ahmad Khan

Ahmad Alaq

Ahmad Alaq , was Khan of eastern Moghulistan from 1487 to 1503. He was the second son of Yunus Khan. His mother was Shah Begum, fourth daughter of Badakhshan prince Lali, who was considered to be the descendant of Alexander the Great....

, known later as Alacha (Slayer) Khan for his attempts to usurp absolute power in the Steppe and slaughtering of Kalmaks. The two daughters were Sultan Nigar Khanim and Daulat Sultan Khanim.

In 1462 Esen Buqa died, and the Moghuls were divided over whether to support Yunus or Esen Buqa's son, Dost Muhammad

Dost Muhammad (Moghul Khan)

Dost Muhammad Khan was Khan of eastern Moghulistan from 1462 until his death. He was the son of Esen Buqa II.When Esen Buqa died in 1462, the Dughlat amirs were divided over whether they should follow his son Dost Muhammad, who was then seventeen, or his brother Yunus Khan...

, who took up residence in Aksu, denying thus the nomad style of life and becoming the ruler of all settled lands in Eastern Moghulistan, known at the time as Uyghurstan

East Turkestan

East Turkestan is a controversial political term with multiple meanings depending on context and usage...

. The dughlat amir of Kashgar Muhammad Haidar Mirza supported Dost Muhammad, but his brother the amir of Yarkand Saniz Mirza supported Yunus Khan, and expelled the former from Kashgar, but he died after only a few years, in 1464, and Dost Muhammad plundered Kashgar. In 1468 or 1469, however, Dost Muhammad died and Yunus Khan seized Aksu. Dost Muhammad's son, Kebek Sultan

Kebek Sultan

Kebek Sultan Oghlan was Khan of eastern Moghulistan from 1468 or 1469 until his death. He was the only son of Dost Muhammad....

, was whisked away to Turpan (Uyghurstan

East Turkestan

East Turkestan is a controversial political term with multiple meanings depending on context and usage...

), where he ruled for a few years.

Khanship

Yunus Khan maintained relations with the Khazak Horde founders (in 1465-1466), Janybek Khan

Janybek Khan

----Janybek Khan was a co-leader of a new Kazakh Khanate, following a successful rebellion against the Uzbek Khan Abu'l-Khayr Khan in 1465 and 1466. Janybek's father was Baraq who was poisoned by emirs of the former White Horde...

 and Karai Khan, and the Timurids. As a consequence of his alliance with the Khazaks, he made an enemy out of the rival Uzbeks

Uzbeks

The Uzbeks are a Turkic ethnic group in Central Asia. They comprise the majority population of Uzbekistan, and large populations can also be found in Afghanistan, Tajikstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Pakistan, Mongolia and the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China...

. 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.

Yunus' dealings with the Timurids were more complex. After Abu Sa'id was killed by the White Sheep Turkmen in 1468, his realm was split between his sons. Sultan Ahmad

Sultan Ahmad

Sultan Ahmad ibn Abu Sa’id was the Timurid ruler of Samarkand from 1469 till 1494. During his rule he successfully repelled at least one invasion attempt by the Kara Koyunlu, and failed in an attempt to conquer Herat from the land of Khurasan from its ruler Husayn Bayqarah. He was succeeded by his...

 ruled over Samarkand

Samarkand

Although a Persian-speaking region, it was not united politically with Iran most of the times between the disintegration of the Seleucid Empire and the Arab conquest . In the 6th century it was within the domain of the Turkic kingdom of the Göktürks.At the start of the 8th century Samarkand came...

, Omar Shaikh became the ruler of Ferghana, and Sultan Mahmud took Badakhshan

Badakhshan

Badakhshan is an historic region comprising parts of what is now northeastern Afghanistan and southeastern Tajikistan. The name is retained in Badakhshan Province which is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, in the far northeast of Afghanistan, and contains the Wakhan Corridor...

. Sultan Ahmad's governor of Tashkent

Tashkent

Tashkent is the capital of Uzbekistan and of the Tashkent Province. The officially registered population of the city in 2008 was about 2.2 million. Unofficial sources estimate the actual population may be as much as 4.45 million.-Early Islamic History:...

, Shaikh Jamal Khar, was invited by the Moghul amirs to usurp power. The amirs were apparently upset over Yunus' desire to reside in the towns and abandon the traditional nomad style. Shaikh Jamal imprisoned the khan and for a year the Moghuls submitted to him. He gave Yunus Khan's first wife Isan Daulat Begum ( she was the mother of his daughters Mihr Nigar Khanim, born in 1457, Kutluk Nigar Khanim, born in 1459, and Khub Nigar Khanim, born in 1463) as present to his officer Khoja Kalan, but when the latter came to her house he was trapped inside and killed here by female attendants of Isan Daulat Begum. Soon after this event Shaikh Jamal was killed by Moghul amirs, in 1472, and Yunus Khan was restored , after promising not to live in the towns. Shortly afterwards, he learned that Kebek Sultan had been killed by his followers, allowing him to take control of Eastern Moghulistan (Uyghurstan) in the same 1472.

After Shaikh Jamal was killed, Yunus Khan actively participated in the affairs of the Timurids. He made most prominent of Timurid sultans his sons-in-law, having married off his daughters to Sultan Ahmad Mirza ( Mihr Nigar Khanim ), Omar Shaikh Mirza in 1475 ( Kutluk Nigar Khanim, their son was Babur

Babur

Babur was a Muslim conqueror from Central Asia who, following a series of setbacks, finally succeeded in laying the basis for the Mughal dynasty of South Asia. He was a direct descendant of Timur through his father, and a descendant also of Genghis Khan through his mother...

, founder of the Great Moghul Empire in India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

) and Sultan Mahmud Mirza ( Sultan Nigar Khanim, their son was Mirza Khan, King of Badakhshan ), and kept on friendly terms with Omar Shaikh, who frequently relied on him for assistance against Sultan Ahmad and gave him territory to reside in during the winters. In 1484 Yunus Khan took advantage of the conflict between Sultan Ahmad and Omar Shaikh and took Tashkent. His decision to live in the city upset the Moghuls, and many of them left for Moghulistan under Yunus' son Ahmad Alaq

Ahmad Alaq

Ahmad Alaq , was Khan of eastern Moghulistan from 1487 to 1503. He was the second son of Yunus Khan. His mother was Shah Begum, fourth daughter of Badakhshan prince Lali, who was considered to be the descendant of Alexander the Great....

. Yunus Khan was also unable to prevent the rise of the Dughlat Mirza Abu Bakr, who had earlier taken Yarkand, Khotan

Khotan

Hotan , or Hetian , also spelled Khotan, is the seat of the Hotan Prefecture in Xinjiang, China. It was previously known in Chinese as 于窴/於窴 and to 19th-century European explorers as Ilchi....

 and Kashgar from other members of his family, and defeated Yunus Khan's attempts to quell him.

During the Ming Turpan Border Wars he had taken Hami in 1473, but the Chinese evicted him into Turfan.

Yunus Khan died in Taskhent in 1487 after a long illness. He was succeeded in Tashkent by his eldest son, Sultan Mahmud

Mahmud Khan (Moghul Khan)

Sultan Mahmud Khan , was Khan of Tashkent and of the Moghuls of western Moghulistan . He was the eldest son of Yunus Khan...

, while the Moghuls in the east followed Ahmad Alaq.