Ghaznavid Empire

State · 962–1209 CE · at its largest around 1028 CE

Mahmud of Ghazni's raids plundered Indian temples and filled Ghazni with mosques, libraries and scholars. Ferdowsi presented him the Shahnameh, and the polymath al-Biruni went to India in his wake, writing a remarkably careful study of its sciences and religions.

On its lands while it lasted

Silk Road (c. 130 BCE – c. 1450 CE): A network of overland caravan routes linking China with Central Asia, Persia and the Mediterranean, along which silk, spices, horses, religions, technologies and diseases travelled for more than 1,500 years.
Samanid Empire (819–999 CE): Persian dynasty ruling from Bukhara whose court fostered a revival of the Persian language and literature within the Islamic world.
Mahmud of Ghazni (971 CE – 1030 CE): Ghaznavid sultan who led repeated raids into northern India, including the sack of the Somnath temple, and made Ghazni a cultural capital.
Al-Biruni (c. 973 CE – 1050 CE): Scholar from Khwarazm who wrote on astronomy, mathematics and geography and produced a detailed study of India after travelling with Mahmud of Ghazni.
Avicenna (c. 980 CE – 1037 CE): A Persian physician and philosopher, author of The Canon of Medicine and The Book of Healing, one of the most influential thinkers of the Islamic Golden Age.
Shahnameh (1010 CE): Ferdowsi completed the Shahnameh ('Book of Kings'), an epic of about 50,000 couplets on the history and legends of Iran, a cornerstone of Persian literature.
The Canon of Medicine (1025 CE): Avicenna's five-volume medical encyclopedia, completed around 1025, became a standard textbook in the Islamic world and in European universities for centuries.
Nishapur (c. 1040 CE): Capital of Great Seljuk Empire (1040–1194).
Hamadan (c. 1040 CE): Capital of Great Seljuk Empire (1040–1194).
Omar Khayyam (1048 CE – 1131 CE): Persian mathematician, astronomer and poet who solved cubic equations geometrically, helped reform the calendar, and is famed for the quatrains of the Rubaiyat.
Khwarazmian Empire (1077–1231 CE): Turko-Persian empire centred on Gurganj in Khwarazm that dominated Central Asia and Iran before its destruction by the Mongols.
Prithviraj Chauhan (c. 1166 CE – 1192 CE): Chahamana king of Ajmer and Delhi who defeated the Ghurids in 1191 but was defeated and killed after the second battle of Tarain.
Second Battle of Tarain (1192 CE): Muhammad of Ghor defeated Prithviraj Chauhan, opening northern India to Ghurid rule and paving the way for the Delhi Sultanate.
Qutb Minar (c. 1199 CE): Victory tower in Delhi, about 73 m tall, begun by Qutb ud-Din Aibak and completed by Iltutmish.
Delhi Sultanate (1206–1526 CE): Series of Muslim dynasties ruling from Delhi, beginning with Qutb ud-Din Aibak in 1206 and ending with the Lodi defeat at Panipat in 1526.