Turco-Afghan

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In the historiography of the Indian subcontinent, the term Turco-Afghan refers to the successive Islamic dynasties of the Ghaznavids, and the Delhi Sultanate, all of which had their origin in Turkic speakers from Central Asia. The Turco-Afghan period begins with the Ghaznavid campaigns in India in 1000 AD. [1]

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Jabir Raza is an Indian historian, and a researcher in the history stream. Presently, he is retired, used to work as a professor at the department of history and prior to that was working as a lecturer at Department of History in Women's College of Aligarh Muslim University. He is from Nalanda, Bihar.

Turkic peoples have historically been associated as one of the non-native peoples to have ruled areas of the Indian subcontinent. Various dynasties of the later medieval era and early modern era in India were of Turkic and mixed Indian or Afghan descent. Two of the dynasties of the Delhi Sultanate, viz. the Tughlaqs and Khaljis, for instance, were of mixed Turkic origin, with Indian and Afghan ancestry respectively. The terms Indo-Turkic or Turco-Indian is used to refer to people and dynasties of mixed Turkic and Indian descent, as well as the fusion culture formed as a result.

References

  1. Burjor Avari, Islamic Civilization in South Asia: A History of Muslim Power and Presence in the Indian Subcontinent (Routledge, 2013), pp. 9, 37–38.