EASTERN ARYAN NOMADS

(300 BCE - 539 CE)

 

Yuezhi (300 - 156 BCE)

Yuzhi/Niuzhi/Yuezhi (Pinyin Chinese, “Moon-clans”)

Early Kushans (155 BCE - 29 CE)

Guishuang (Pinyin), Kusan (Sanskrit), Gusana (Buddhist Sanskrit),

Kushano (Bactrian), Kossanoi (Greek)

Kushan Empire (30 - 267 CE)

Gusana-vamsa (Buddhist Sanskrit), Kusan Rajavaṃsa (Sanskrit)

Kingdom of Kushana (268 - 350 CE)

Kossanoi Basiliei (Greek)

 

Early Wusun (ca. 200 BCE - 159 CE)

Later Wusun (ca. 160-487 CE)

Wusun (Pinyin Chinese, “Grandchildren of the Raven”)

Yueban Kingdom (160 - 490 CE)

 

     This gallery and these notes are devoted to the Yuezhi from the time of their emergence as a distinct group living in Zungharia (modern northern Xinjiang, western China)(ca. 300 BCE), until they were forced out of western China by the Mongolic Xiongnu (ca. 162 BCE). It also covers the period of the Yuezhi migration (ca. 162-155 BCE) westwards through the Tarim Basin (southern Xinjiang) and the Zhetysu region of eastern Kazakhstan into the Ferghana Valley (western Kyrgyzstan) and Transoxania (western Tajikistan and eastern Uzbekistan), where they assimilated with some groups of the Saka and Massagetae (northern Aryan nomads)(ca. 155-124 BCE) and drove others into migrating into Afghanistan, Pakistan, eastern Iran, and western India (the Saka), and northwestern Kazakhstan (the Massagetae). Once in Transoxania-Ferghana, the Yuezhi are usually called the Kushans by historians because of the emergence of a ruling tribe of that name (see below). This gallery also includes the Kushan expansion into Bactria (northern Afghanistan) and Arachosia (southern Afghanistan)(ca. 124-20 BCE), then Pakistan and northern India (ca. 20 BCE-30 CE), thus leading to the formation of the Kushan Empire (30-267 CE) and its successor states—the Kingdom of Kushana (268-350 CE) and the Kidarite Kingdom (350-525 CE)(the Kidarites are covered under my Hunnic gallery).

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This gallery is also devoted to the Wusun from the time of their emergence as the easternmost vassals of the Yuezhi (they probably originated as a sub-group of the Yuezhi), living in Dunhuang (modern western Gansu, western China)(ca. 200 BCE). The Wusun allied with the Xiongnu against the Yuezhi (ca. 162 BCE), were rewarded by the Xiongnu by being allowed to expand into the former territories of the Yuezhi (Zungharia), but eventually fell out with the Xiongnu and formed an alliance with the Han Dynasty of Imperial China that helped the Han to break the Xiongnu Empire and expand into the Tarim Basin (ca. 125 BCE-80 CE). However, the collapse of the Xiongnu state paved the way for the rise of the Xianbei on the Mongolian Plateau, and remnants of the Xiongnu were driven westwards (ca. 93-380 CE), some tribes settling in the Zhetysu region of southeastern Kazakhstan (recently vacated by the Saka), where they founded the Yueban Kingdom (160-487 CE). The Wusun remained in western China until the fifth century before also being driven westwards by the Xianbei (ca. 402-438 CE), settling to the east of the Yueban Kingdom on the plains in-between the Tian Shan Mountains and Lake Balkhash. The Wusun are believed to have become vassals of the Yueban Xiongnu at that time. The Wusun are last mentioned as a distinct group in the Chinese historical text, the Wei Shu, in 436 CE, although the Yueban Kingdom did not fall to the Tiele Turks until 487, so they probably survived as a distinct group until at least that date. Thereafter, the Tiele Turks were defeated by the Hephthalite Huns, and it is believed that whatever may have been left of the Yueban Xiongnu and Wusun were assimilated into the Hephthalite hordes.

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By the time they enter the historical record, the Han shu (“Book of Han”) states that the Yuezhi inhabited Zungharia (ca. 300-156 BCE) and had established themselves as regional overlords over their eastern kin, the Wusun (who inhabited Dunhuang), and the proto-Mongolic Xiongnu peoples that inhabited present-day Mongolia. As the story goes, a Xiongnu prince named Modu was sent as a hostage to the Yuezhi court (ca. 210-200 BCE) by his father, Touman, king of the Xiongnu. However, Touman had decided to pass over Modu as his intended successor in favor of one of his sons by another wife. Touman led an attack on the Yuezhi in the hopes that his betrayal would lead to the execution of Modu. Modu escaped the Yuezhi, however, fled back to Mongolia, raised an army of 10,000 horsemen, and overthrew his father. He declared himself Chengli Gutu Chanyu (“Awesome Child of Heaven”), a title that his successors shortened to Chanyu, which came to simply mean “emperor” (it is the etymological precursor of the later Turko-Mongol imperial title, kha’an/khagan). Modu Chanyu then attacked his former captors, and drove the Yuezhi (ca. 176-162 BCE) from Zungharia. The Wusun sided with the Xiongnu, and were rewarded by Modu by being allowed to expand into the former territories of the Yuezhi. Some Yuezhi fled south to the Qiang tribes that inhabited the regions around the Kunlun Mountains (modern Qinghai province, China), while the bulk of the Yuezhi migrated through the Tarim Basin and the Zhetysu/Semirechye (“Seven Rivers”) region of eastern Kazakhstan and into the Ferghana Valley and Transoxania (ca. 162-155 BCE) in southern Central Asia. The Sakas that inhabited the Zhetysu region were driven south into Bactria, Arachosia, and eastern Iran—destabilizing the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom—and then continued to migrate southeastwards into Pakistan and western India, where they established a number of small federated states (the Indo-Saka Kingdoms). The Massagetae that inhabited Transoxania were forced to migrate northwestwards, eventually settling between the Volga and Ural rivers in northwestern Kazakhstan (they later became known as the Alans). Some groups of Saka and Massagetae probably joined the Yuezhi. During the migration, the Yuezhi had been divided into five primary tribes, each with its own chief (yabgyu)—the tribes were the Xiumi, Guishuang, Shuangmi, Xidun, and Dumi. Of the five chiefs, one could be elected as war-leader (sanev) of all the tribes. While in the Transoxania-Ferghana region (ca. 155-124 BCE), the chiefs of the Guishuang tribe managed to secure a hereditary claim to the title of war-leader. Guishuang is the etymological root form of “Kushan,” and the Yuezhi are generally known as Kushans from this period. The early Kushan rulers styled themselves zaoou (pronounced, ZOW) on their minted coins. This is often rendered in Chinese as xihou/sihou, meaning “prince,” although in the Kushan context it seems to have simply meant “ruler.”  

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According to the Shiji (a Han Dynasty history written by Sima Qian), the Kushans first attempted to invade Chorasmia (western Uzbekistan) and northeastern Iran—at that time both were part of the Parthian Empire—and the Parthian emperors Phraates II (132-126 BCE) and Artabanus II (126-122 BCE) were both killed fighting the Kushans. However, the Parthians recovered under Mithridates II (121-91 BCE), and the Kushans were driven from Parthia. But the Kushans then perceived the weakness of the Greco-Bactrian kings (the House of Eucratides) following the Saka invasion/migration, and they decided to invade Bactria and Arachosia (ca. 130 BCE). The Greco-Bactrian king Heliocles I (140-130 BCE) was defeated and killed in battle and Bactria was conquered, although a number of minor Greek rulers continued to govern petty states in northern Pakistan/northwestern India (the Indo-Greek States). The Kushans continued to push into Arachosia, which was at that time part of the Indo-Parthian Kingdom (a.k.a., the Gondopharid Kingdom)—a Parthian breakaway state that spanned Drangiana, Gedrosia, and Sakastan in southeastern Iran, Arachosia (southern Afghanistan), and western Pakistan (Gandhara and Hindush). The conquest of Bactria and Arachosia by the Kushans was completed by about 20 BCE. By that time, the Kushan court seems to have become heavily influenced both by the Parthians and the Greco-Bactrians—numismatic studies indicate that the Kushan rulers (Sapadbizes, 20-1 BCE, and Heraios, 1-30 CE) took Greek names and began to style themselves both as zaoou (Kushan, “ruler”) and basilios (Greek, “king”). From this period onward, coins and other artistic representations portray Kushan warriors and rulers very similarly to contemporary representations of Parthian rulers/warriors (the Parthians were southern Aryans/Iranians and the Kushans were eastern Aryans). Heraios also styled himself tyrranos (Greek, “usurper”), while all the early Kushan rulers also continued to style themselves as sanev (Kushan, “war-leader”). What this may indicate is that some sort of dual administration prevailed in which the Kushan kings ruled over their own people as traditional war-leader and ruler (sanev and zaoou), while they ruled their Greek subjects as a Hellenistic king (basilios). Heraios’ use of tyrannos could be an attempt to convey the idea that he was a conquerer (the subtle distinction between usurping and conquering being lost in translation). The Bactrians, a native Iranian nomadic people that had dominated the high plains of Afghanistan and northeastern Iran since the sixth century BCE, and who had made up the majority of the population of the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom (the Greeks and Macedonians lived mostly in the cities/colonies, the Bactrians on the plains), disappear as a distinct group at this time, although they are believed to be the ancestors of the Tajiks and Dards. If this is accurate, they must have retreated into the surrounding mountains when the Kushans took over Afghanistan (the Tajiks and Dards later emerge in the historical record among the mountain tribes of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Tajikistan).

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Kujula Kadaphises (Kushan, Kujula Kasasa), is considered to be the first emperor (30-80 CE) of the Kushan Empire (30-267 CE). Kujula led an army across the southern Paropamisadae Mountains and again defeated the Indo-Parthians in southern Pakistan, which led to the fragmentation of the Indo-Parthians into a number of petty rulers in various parts of eastern Iran (Sakastan, Gedrosia, and Drangiana) and Gandhara (northern Pakistan). Kujula and his immediate successors—Vima Takto (80-90 CE) and Vima Kadaphises (90-127 CE)—went on to conquer the remaining Indo-Parthian and Indo-Greek states in southern and eastern Afghanistan, as well as northern Pakistan. Kujula Kadaphises is the first Kushan ruler to style himself basileu basileon sotir megas (Greek, “king of kings and great saviour”), the Greco-Bactrian version of the Iranian imperial title (shahanshah, “king-of-kings”), although his successors used the Iranian word and adapted it to the Kushan language (shaonanoshao). The conquest of northern India (the Gangetic Plains), as far east as Pataliputra (the capital of the Magadha Empire), was completed by Kanishka I (127-163 CE), who also expanded Kushan dominion onto the northern Deccan Plateau (encompassing most of central India) and into western India (Gujarat). In the south of India, only the Satavahana Empire (southern Deccan) and the Tamil tribes (southeastern India and Sri Lanka) remained unconquered. Kanishka presided over a flowering of Kushan civilization that saw a fusion of Greek, Iranian, Tokharian, and Indo-Aryan elements. Goods, men, and ideas flowed across Central Asia, linking China, Persia, Rome, and India as the Kushans and the Han Dynasty of China developed the overland trade routes through the Tarim Basin, Ferghana, and Transoxania. The great urban oasis city-states that were founded by the Tokharians, Medes, and Greco-Bactrians were expanded under Kushan and Han hegemony and have become places of legend, the names themselves conjuring visions of storied wealth, exotic luxuries, and repositories of esoteric wisdom (e.g., Kashgar, Samarkand, Bukhara, Yarkand, Tashkent, and Khotan). The Kushans created their own written language (based on Greek and Sanskrit characters), issued some of the finest coinage produced in the ancient or Medieval periods (in my opinion), fostered the spread of Buddhism to Central Asia and China, and built highly decorated monuments, palaces, shrines, and Buddhist monasteries that combined Greek, Iranian, Indo-Aryan, Tibetan, and Chinese techniques and motifs. Kanishka I (Kushan, Kaneshki) may have converted to Buddhism, although the Kushan pantheon recognized a number of Aryan deities (e.g., Mithra, Mazda, Nana, and Ormozd), Greek deities (e.g., Helios, Hephaistos, and Herakles), and proto-Hindu Indo-Aryan deities (e.g., Shiva, Ganesha, and Rudra). Vashishka I (140-160 CE), Huvishka (160-190 CE), and Vasudeva I (190-230 CE) were all strong rulers in the mold of Kanishka I, but to the west the Arsakid Dynasty of Persia (i.e., the Parthians) had been overthrown by Ardashir I (224-242 CE), founder of the Sassanid Dynasty of Persia. Ardashir was known as Ardashir the Unifier, and one of the hallmarks of Sassanian rule was a desire to reestablish the strong centralized monarchy of the Achaemenid kings of ancient Persia (or at least the Sassanids’ idealized beliefs about their storied ancestors), including the conquest of territories once belonging to that empire, and the unification of all the Aryan/Iranian peoples in Eran-i Wuzurg (Middle Persian, “Greater Iran”). This, of course, set them on a collision course with the Kushans, who dominated significant and prosperous former areas of the Achaemenid Empire (it seems likely the Sassanids were also casting covetous eyes on the prosperity of the Kushans).

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With the resurgence of Persian power under the Sassanids, the star of the Kushans began to wane. Ardashir launched an invasion of western Afghanistan (ca. 220-230 CE), and his son and successor Shapur I extended these conquests, incorporating Transoxania, Bactria, and Arachosia into the Persian Empire (ca. 230-275 CE). With the successful conquest of Afghanistan and Transoxania by the Sassanid Persians, the city-states of Ferghana and the Tarim Basin became functionally independent (eventually being conquered by the Xionite and Hephthalite Huns). As if this weren’t bad enough for the Kushans, the Guptas—an Indo-Aryan dynasty of former vassal kings that ruled in Kosala (modern Uttar Pradesh)—campaigned to overthrow Kushan rule in northern India (ca. 250-267 CE), and the Kushan imperial court was eventually left in control of a small rump state in the Kabul Valley of eastern Afghanistan (where the imperial capital of Bagram was located) and the Peshawar Valley of northwestern Pakistan (at that time known as Gandhara). These valleys were linked by the Khyber Pass, one of the main mountain passes that led from Afghanistan into Pakistan through the Paropomisadae/Hind Mountains, which was a strategically important location, but the Kingdom of Kushana (“Little Kushan”)(268-350 CE) was a pale shadow of former Kushan glory. This was probably all the more galling to the last of the Kushan emperors because the collapse had come about relatively quickly in historical terms (ca. 220-267 CE). Indeed, the Kushan rulers of Kushana still used the title of emperor (shaonanoshao) and seem to have believed they would eventually reconquer the empire (the name, Kushana, is an invention of historians intended to represent the geographical diminutiveness of the later Kushan state). It is likely from this time that the Paropamisidae Mountains (the Greek name for the mountains that divide Afghanistan and Pakistan) began to be called the “Hindu Kush,” combining the Indian name for the mountains—the Hind—and the name of the Kushans. However, in 320 CE the Kushan emperor, Shaka (305-335 CE), made an alliance with the Xionite Huns, a people who at that time controlled much of Central Asia, and a joint invasion of the Kushanshahr by the Xionites and Kushans temporarily liberated Afghanistan from the Sassanians. If Shaka thought he could use the Xionites to help him reestablish Kushan hegemony, however, he was sadly mistaken. The Sassanids pushed back, retaking western Afghanistan by 335 CE (Shaka may have been killed fighting the Sassanids), although the Xionite hordes remained in eastern Afghanistan. Shaka’s successor, Kipunada (335-350 CE), continued the policy of alliance with the Xionites until he was overthrown by a Xionite warlord named Kidara, who established the Kidarite Kingdom (360-477 CE) in eastern Afghanistan (see my Huns, Avars, Bulgars gallery).

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The military system of the Yuezhi/Kushans can be divided into four distinct phases—that of the Yuezhi (ca. 300-156 BCE), the Early Kushans (ca. 155 BCE-29 CE), the Kushan Empire (ca. 30 BCE-267 CE), and the Kushan successor state of Kushana (ca. 267-350 CE). The Yuezhi phase includes the period of Yuezhi domination over the other nomadic peoples of western China and western Mongolia (ca. 300-176 BCE), the war with the Xiongnu and Wusun (ca. 175-162 BCE) that resulted in the expulsion of the Yuezhi from western China, and the migration of the Yuezhi through the Tarim Basin into Ferghana and Transoxania (ca. 165-156 BCE). During this phase, the Yuezhi army was divided between armored noble cavalrymen and unarmored commoners—both carried bows and arrows, and there is no evidence that the Yuezhi nobles had adopted a heavy lance or shock cavalry tactics, so both nobles and commoners probably fought in a skirmishing style, with repeated attacks and retreats meant to wear an opponent down, and when it was deemed tactically expedient for a charge into close combat (using some combination of spear, sword, axe, pick, and/or dagger), the nobles probably led the charge with the commoners supporting them. Unlike the western Eurasian steppes, where scale armor was king, in the eastern steppes where the Yuezhi, Wusun, and early Mongolic peoples dwelt, lamellar was the primary type of armor for man and horse—body armor for men would have consisted of a sleeveless lamellar vest or hardened leather cuirass (sometimes with a lamellar neck-guard), with separate lamellar pieces for the upper arms and forearms (usually joined by a padded leather cap for the elbow), and long lamellar skirts (one for each side) intended to protect the entirety of each leg (i.e., from hip to ankle) while riding. Among the nomad peoples of east Asia, lamellae would most often have been made from hardened leather or horn (the Yuezhi herded cattle as well as horses), although the wealthiest and most powerful individuals (clan chiefs or kings) may have had bronze or iron. Helmets would have been made from hardened leather—although once again, the wealthiest and most powerful warriors could have had one-piece caste bronze or iron helmets—or lamellar (the lamellae usually being sewn onto a padded cap). The mounts of the nobles were probably mostly unarmored, but horse armor was first developed by the Skythians in what is today Russia and western Kazakhstan sometime around 300 BCE, and its use had spread as far as East Asia by about 200 BCE, so there were probably clan chiefs, kings, and other nobles among the Yuezhi that rode armored mounts (hardened leather, bronze, or iron chamfron for the head; hardened leather or horn lamellar crinets for the neck, pectral for the chest, and cruppers for the flanks). During the Yuezhi period, there would have been few infantrymen, mostly skirmishers (javelinmen/spearmen and bowmen) drawn from minor subject tribes in neighboring hill or forest country (these would have been proto-Tibetan peoples like the Tokharians and Chiang/Qiang, or Mongolic peoples). Chiefs of these peoples would have worn lamellar and had helmets (and carried large roughly rectangular shields of hide stretched over a framework of wood), but most of their warriors would have been unarmored.

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During the Early Kushan Period (ca. 155-29 BCE), the Kushans developed a centralized monarchy (during the migration they divided into five semi-autonomous clans), and they absorbed elements of the Saka, Massagetae, and Bactrians, which seems to have increased their military potential (Chinese authors claim they could field 100-200,000 cavalry, which is probably an exaggeration, although the entire population might have numbered that many, which means it is likelier that their armies were somewhere in the vicinity of 30-60,000 men). They also had retained control of some of the oasis city states in the Tarim Basin, even after the Han moved into the region (ca. 125 BCE-80 CE)—the Kushans ruled in several of the western city-states like Kashgar, Yarkand, and Khotan, while the Han dominated the central and eastern city-states—and this gave the Kushans some better infantry options, which probably helped when they invaded the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom (ca. 124-20 BCE). The Greco-Bactrian Kingdom had several large urban centers with substantial fortifications—like Alexandria Eschate, which guarded the main pass from Ferghana into Bactria, the capital city of Bactra in Bactria, and the city of Demetrias in Arachosia—and infantry was generally better than cavalry at siege warfare, so the infantry from the western Tarim Basin would have been useful in subduing these Greco-Macedonian colonies. During this period, the Kushans first came into contact with the Parthians, as a result of the unsuccessful Kushan campaigns against Chorasmia and northeastern Iran (ca. 129-100 BCE). The Saka, Massagetae, Bactrians, and Parthians all fielded heavily armored cavalry lancers that utilized shock tactics—charging with a heavy two-handed lance, and using sword, axe, and/or club or mace as sidearms—although there were differences between the tactical stance of Saka, Massagetae, and Bactrian lancers, on the one hand, and Greco-Macedonian and Parthian cataphracts on the other hand. During this period, Kushan noble cavalrymen probably started to shift toward the mode of combat of the Saka, Massagetae, and Bactrian lancers, but by the time of the Kushan Empire (see below) their tactical stance seems to have evolved into that of the Greco-Macedonian and Parthian cataphracts. For a lengthy discussion of my use of these different terms and how they relate to differences in the tactical stance of ancient heavy cavalrymen, please see the button at the bottom of this page, but suffice it to say here that what this meant to the Early Kushans was that their nobles would have increasingly specialized as shock cavalry lancers (using bows only to hunt and as a prelude to charging into close combat, or to drive off enemy skirmishers), leaving the commoners as the sole horse archer skirmishers. The absorption of some of the Saka, Massagetae, and Bactrians into the Kushan hordes would have meant, however, that there would have been more of both types of cavalry—armored noble lancers and unarmored commoner horse archers. In addition, as mentioned above, the infantry from the Kushan city-states in the Tarim Basin gave Kushan armies an additional tactical dimension, with dense formations of spearmen and bowmen joining the infantry skirmishers. The infantry bowmen seem to have been the more prized of these levies, which means they were probably the primary garrison of the city-states prior to the arrival of the Kushans—their nobles may have been cavalrymen, but these would have been subsumed into the Kushan ruling clan that governed each city-state, and so disappear as a distinct class during the Early Kushan Period. These infantry bowmen would have been unarmored, as were the spearmen, although the latter carried large rectangular cane shields bound in leather. The bowmen probably could be deployed as skirmishers, but their primary role seems to have been massed archery—delivering successive volleys of arrows. The spearmen would have been what I class as rabble—a mass of men with little or no regimentation or even training as fighters.

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The army of the Kushan Empire (30 BCE-267 CE) was a different beast altogether—the completion of the conquest of the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom led to the inclusion of Greco-Macedonian pikemen (phalangites), spearmen (thyreophoroi/thureophoroi/thorakitai/thorakites), and elephantry (elefantai)(ca. 20 BCE-100 CE), and the expansion into Pakistan (ca. 20 BCE-80 CE) and northern India (ca. 80-127 CE) led to the inclusion of Indo-Aryan infantry guardsmen (antarvamsikasianya), warrior caste infantry (maula and bhrta/bhrita) and cavalry (ashva), elephantry (hasti), artillery (yantra), and lower-caste infantry levies (sreni)(ca. 127-375 CE)(please see my Early Classical Indian gallery for a complete discussion of these troop types). Kushan noble cavalry units seem to have developed fully into cataphracts as the Kushans gave up their nomadic lifestyle and settled down to rule an empire—this includes the Kushano-Tokharian elites of the western Tarim Basin city-states, the Kushano-Saka elites of the city-states that developed in Transoxania (e.g., Bukhara, Samarkand, and Kish) and Ferghana (e.g., Tashkent and Kashan), as well as the nobles of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India (the empire had two capitals between which the emperors seem to have divided their time—Bagram in Afghanistan and Mathura in northern India). The date or date range for this transformation is highly debatable, but I would suggest that it probably coincided with the period of consolidation over Bactria and Arachosia that also brought the Greco-Macedonian elements into the Kushan army (ca. 20 BCE-100 CE), as well as the period in which the Indo-Parthians were conquered (ca. 20 BCE-80 CE). Thus, for purposes of developing a wargaming model, I would suggest the year 100 CE as the line of demarcation, before which Kushan heavy cavalry should be classified as steppe lancers and after which they should be classified as cataphracts. Although the elites of the Kushan Empire became a landed gentry that adopted many of the ways of the Greeks, Parthians, and Indo-Aryans, there were still nomadic and semi-nomadic groups that inhabited the plains of Afghanistan, the Thar Desert region of eastern Pakistan and northwestern India, and the Ferghana Valley and plains of Transoxania in southern Central Asia. These peoples—a mix of Saka, Massagetae, Bactrians, Paktyans/Arachosians, and Kushans—continued to supply large numbers of horse archers, while the mountain tribes of Afghanistan (Paktyans and Kambojans) supplied skirmishing javelinmen and bowmen. The army of Kushana is really just a severely truncated extension of the imperial army—with the last of the Kushan emperors reduced to ruling the adjacent valleys of Kabul and Peshawar/Ghandara, their military resources had to have been extremely limited (probably some cataphract units composed of nobles that had managed to escape the collapse of Kushan rule elsewhere; some horse archers from the tribes living in the Kabul valley and Peshawar/Gandhara; urban militia infantrymen from the cities of Bagra, Peshawar, Charsadda, Mardan, and Taxila; and skirmisher infantry from the mountain tribes in the vicinity of the Kabul Valley and Gandhara). We have no numbers, but it seems likely that during the last 82 years of the empire (i.e., the Kushana period), the Kushan army could only have mustered a few thousand men on its own, which is probably why the last Kushan emperors decided to make the fateful alliance with the Xionites.

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The military system of the Wusun can be divided into two periods—the Early Wusun (ca. 200 BCE-159 CE) and the Later Wusun (ca. 160-487 CE). The military system of the Wusun during the Early Period is roughly analogous to that of the Yuezhi Period (ca. 300-156 BCE) discussed above—nobles and commoners fighting as horse archers, with the nobles being better equipped and being more eager to close into close combat when a tactical advantage for doing so was perceived. The Wusun were ethnically related to the Yuezhi and during the Early Period they have a virtually indistinguishable archeological record from that of the Yuezhi, so we may safely assume that their equipment was pretty much the same (for purposes of wargaming, the Yuezhi were “Moon-clans” and the Wusun were “Grandchildren of the Raven,” which suggests one could distinguish between them via iconography). However, after 162 BCE the two systems likely diverged as the Yuezhi began to be influenced by the Tokharians, Saka, and Massagetae, while the Wusun were influenced by the Xiongnu during their period of alliance (ca. 162-132 BCE), and then by the Han Dynasty of China during their period of alliance (ca. 125 BCE-93 CE). The primary difference would have been that while the nobles of the Yuezhi/Early Kushans were imbibing the lancer military doctrines of the northern Central Asian peoples (and the Greco-Bactrians and Parthians), the nobles of the Wusun were becoming more like those of the Xiongnu. The Wusun were governed by a hereditary king that held the title of “Great Kunmi.” The Wusun Kingdom was divided in half, each half having its own standing army of 10,000 men (sons of the Great Kunmi were usually appointed to command these armies). These armies were supplemented in times of outright war with a general levy of tribes under the hegemony of the Great Kunmi. The Great Kunmi was assisted by a council of elders, which limited his power to some degree, as did the wealth and power of the tribal nobles. The nobles would have increasingly specialized as close-combat cavalry, probably fighting in separate units from the commoners who continued to fight as horse archers, but it was not until about 300 CE that the steppe nomads of northern East Asia began to develop shock cavalry tactics, so the Wusun nobles during the latter half of the Early Period (i.e., after the mid-second century BCE) would have used bows and arrows at range or to drive off enemy skirmishers, but then would have charged into close combat with spear (single-handed), sword, axe, and/or pick. Lamellar armor for men and horses would have continued to predominate, although the increased wealth, power, and prestige of the kings and nobles after the Yuezhi were driven from western China, and after the alliance with the Han brought them trade contacts with China, likely led to an increase in the proportion of fighters capable of equipping themselves with a more-extensive panoply. Indeed, the military potential of the Wusun seems to have grown substantially by the latter half of the second century BCE—in 133-132 BCE, the Wusun launched an expedition into the Tarim Basin against the Yuezhi that is credited with driving the Yuezhi from all but the far western regions of the Tarim Basin; and in 125 BCE Emperor Wu of Han sent an emissary (Zhang Qian) to the court of the Wusun king, an event that marks the beginning of the rapprochement of the Han with the Wusun, and Zhang Qian reported that the Wusun kingdom had a population of 630,000 and could field 188,000 fighters. As with Chinese estimates of the strength of the Kushans, this is likely an exaggeration meant merely to impress upon the Han emperor that the Wusun were numerous and militarily powerful, and therefore worthy of an alliance—since the regular army of the Wusun numbered 20,000 fighters, it is likely that any general levy probably would only have been able to double that number (40,000 men), bringing the largest possible army size to about 60,000 men.

     The Yueban Kingdom is poorly documented, as is the later history of the Wusun. The Han (ca. 133 BCE-89 CE) and Wusun (ca. 125 BCE-89 CE) pressured the Xiongnu Empire, leading to a Xiongnu civil war (ca. 60-53 BCE) and the breakup of the Xiongnu Empire into northern (88-380 CE) and southern (ca. 48-216 CE) hordes. The northern horde continued to inhabit what the Chinese referred to as Outer Mongolia (i.e., Mongolia outside the Empire of China), but the southern horde inhabited Inner Mongolia (i.e., those parts of southern Mongolia that had been brought within the empire). The severely weakened northern horde was gradually driven west under pressure from the Xianbei (ca. 93-380 CE), a Mongolic people from what is today Manchuria. This westward migration was piecemeal, and various decimated groups of the Xiongnu seem to have dispersed throughout Central Asia to be assimilated into the Hunnic hordes, and they therefore probably also played a role in the ethnogenesis of the Turks. Four tribes of Xiongnu (the Chuyue, Chumi, Chumuhun, and Chuban) settled in the Zhetysu region of southeastern Kazakhstan (recently vacated by the Saka under pressure from the Yuezhi/Kushans) in 160 CE. There, they dominated some local tribes of Tokharians (the Azi and Tukhsi) and Ugrians (a branch of the Uar). This group of tribes was referred to as the Yueban or Urpen (Pinyin, “Weak Xiongnu”) by contemporary Chinese writers—it is unlikely they referred to themselves by this name, but history has not recorded any autonym. We also do not know for certain whether it was a kingdom or some sort of confederation, although many historians refer to it as the Yueban Kingdom for lack of a viable alternative (they do seem to have had some sort of centralized leadership). The Wusun were also driven west by the Xianbei, although not until the fifth century CE (probably between 402 and 436 CE), and settled to the east of the Yueban Kingdom, on the steppes between Lake Balkhash (in the north) and the Tian Shan Mountains (in the south). We do not know the exact relationship of the Wusun with the Yueban—the last historical mention of the Wusun is dated to 436 CE, when envoys from the Wusun arrived at the imperial court of China proposing an alliance against the Xianbei, but nothing came of this proposition, and no historical document mentions them again. Most historians assume that the Wusun were incorporated into the Yueban state soon after their arrival in Central Asia (early fifth century CE). Regardless, the Tiele Turks—vassals of the Xianbei—attacked the Yueban state in 487 CE and seem to have occupied the region until they were in turn ousted by the Hephthalite Huns (ca. 495-496 CE). The Hephthalites ruled the region until 547 CE, when the Hephthalites were incorporated into the Göktürk Khaganate. Sometime during this tumultuous period (ca. 436-547 CE) the Xiongnu and Wusun seem to have disappeared as distinct ethnic groups—those not killed were likely dispersed into the hordes of the conquerers (Huns and Turks).

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Unfortunately, the Kushans are little known in the west, largely due to the fact that they inhabited an area of the world that has seen the subsequent rise and fall of many kingdoms, empires, and states, all of whom sought to lay claim to part or all of the evolving Silk Road trade networks that first coalesced under the Kushans, and some of whom were/are the most iconoclastic regimes known to history (the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Taliban being just one of the more recent desecrations Kushan archeological sites have endured). I was overjoyed when Khurasan Miniatures came out with a Kushan line, featured here, although I’ve supplemented them with figures from Xyston Miniatures, whose Classical Indian figures are among their best offerings. Khurasan’s war elephants, however, are tough to beat (if you like them, take a look at my Classical Indian and Sassanid Persian galleries).