Davlat universiteti

 
 

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Period of expansion
Timur spent the next 35 years in various wars and expeditions. He not only 
consolidated his rule at home by the subjugation of his foes, but sought extension of 
territory by encroachments upon the lands of foreign potentates. His conquests to the 
west and northwest led him among the Mongols of the Caspian Sea and to the banks 
of the Ural and the Volga. Conquests in the south and south-West encompassed almost 
every province in Persia, including Baghdad, Karbala and Kurdistan. 
One of the most formidable of his opponents was Tokhtamysh who, after having been 
a refugee at the court, became ruler both of the eastern Kipchak and the Golden Horde 
and quarreled with him over the possession of Khwarizm and Azerbaijan. Timur 
supported Tokhtamysh against Russians and Tokhtamysh, with armed support by 
Timur, invaded Russia and in 1382 captured Moscow. After the death of Abu Sa'id, 
ruler of the Ilkhanid Dynasty, in 1335, there was a power vacuum in the Persian 
Empire. In 1383 Timur started the military conquest of Persia. He captured Herat, 
Khorasan and all eastern Persia by 1385 and massacred almost all inhabitants of 
Neishapur and other Iranian cities. 
In the meantime, Tokhtamysh, now khan of the Golden Horde, turned against 
his patron and invaded Azerbaijan in 1385. It was not until 
1395, in the battle of 
Kur River, that Tokhtamysh's power was finally broken after a titanic struggle between 
the two monarchs. In this war, Timur first led an army of over 100,000 men north for 
more than 700 miles into the uninhabited steppe, then west about 1000 miles, 
advancing in a front more than 10 miles wide. The Timurid army almost starved, and 
Timur organized a great hunt where the army encircled vast areas of steppe to get food. 
Tokhtamysh's army finally was cornered against the Volga River in the Orenburg 
region and destroyed. During this march, Timur's army got far enough north to be in a 
region of very long summer days, causing complaints by his Muslim soldiers about 
keeping a long schedule of prayers in such northern regions. Timur led a second 
campaign against Tokhtamysh via an easier route through the Caucasus. Timur then 

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destroyed Sarai and Astrakhan, and wrecked the Golden Horde's economy based on 
Silk Road trade.