Mirza Abu Bakr Dughlat

Mirza Abu Bakr Dughlat
Dughlat Kashgari
1494-Abubekr Duglat attempting unsuccessfully to take Uzgend
Reign	1465-1514
Died	1514 (1515)
Burial	North of Shahidulla
Religion	Sunni Islam

Mirza Abu Bakr Dughlat (also Ababakar or Abubekr; died shortly after AH Rajab 920^[1] / Aug-Sept 1514; exact date uncertain; year 1516 ^[2] indicated by some authors is wrong) was a ruler in South-Western part of present East Turkistan / Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China, an amir of the Dughlat tribe. In the middle of the fifteenth century, in 1465, he founded in Western Kashgaria a kingdom based at Yarkand, a fragment of Moghulistan. It included Khotan and Kashgar; he took Kashgar in 1480.^[3] He was the son of Saniz Mirza, son of Mir Sayyid Ali, the latter was amir in Kashgar who regained control of the city by Dughlat dynasty, having expelled Timurid local ruler in 1435.

He successfully resisted the attacks of Yunus Khan, against whom he had rebelled in 1479–80.^[4] Ahmad Alaq, son of Yunus Khan, took Kashgar from him in 1499, but could not hold it. Subsequent to retaking Kashgar, Abu Bakr took his forces and successfully conquered number of neighboring areas, including modern day Ladakh, Balur (around Gilgit), Badakhshan, and other fragments of Moghulistan.^[5]

In 1514, Sultan Said Khan took Kashgar from him. In danger of losing Yarkand and Khotan as well, he gave the government to his eldest son Jahangir Mirza, and attempted to flee to Ladakh.^[6] He was intercepted and killed by pursuers sent by Sultan Said Khan north of Shahidulla.^[1]

His deeds are recorded in the Tarikh-i-Rashidi, which was written by his nephew, Mirza Muhammad Haidar.

Family

Consorts

Abu Bakr had two wives:

• Husn Nigar Khanum, daughter of Esen Buqa II;
• Khanzada Begum, daughter of Sultan Mahmud Mirza;

Sons

Abu Bakr had three sons;

• Jahangir Mirza - with Husn Nigar Khanum;
• Turangir Mirza - with Khanzada Begum;
• Bustangir Mirza - with Khanzada Begum;

References

• Demetrius Charles Boulger, The Life of Yakoob Beg, Athalik Ghazi and Badaulet, Ameer of Kashgar, pp. 34–36.

Notes

1. Bellew, Henry Walter (1875). The history of Káshgharia. p. 62. [Sa'id] took possession of the city at end of Rajab 920H ... Ababakar fled before them from Khotan to Karangutagh. ... fled towards Tibet. ... He was intercepted, seized, and killed by a party of his many pursuers in the Karakash valley, where a mean tomb on the river bank, two stages from Shahidulla Khoja, now marks the site of his grave.
2. Christoph Baumer (18 April 2018). History of Central Asia, The: 4-volume set. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 50. ISBN 978-1-83860-867-5. Mir Abu Bakr Dughlat (r. in Yarkand ca. 1481-1516)
3. M. Th. Houtsma, E. J. Brill's First Encyclopaedia of Islam, 1913-1936, p. 788.
4. guide central asia - peoples - regions - languages - central asia
5. Dughlát Muhammad Haidar (1895). The Tarikh-i-rashidi: A History of the Moghuls of Central Asia; an English Version. S. Low, Marston and Company. pp. 253–254. After the above mentioned victory over Sultan Ahmad Khan, Mirza Aba Bakr begin to extend his conquest on all sides. ... subdued most of the districts of Tibet as far as the frontiers of Kashmir, ... He next sent armies in the direction of Balur, which gained decisive victories ... he sent a force into Badakhshan, where he subdued most of the Hazara of Badakhshan. ... He took Ush, Madu and Uzkand from the Uzbeg, and reduced the whole of Moghulistan to such a condition, that not a single Moghul was able to remain in the country
6. René Grousset, The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia (1970 translation), p. 497.