Khaydhar ibn Kawus al-Afshin
Ḥaydar ibn Kāwūs, better known by his hereditary title of al-Afshīn, was a senior general of Sogdian Iranian descent at the court of the Abbasid caliphs and a vassal prince of Oshrusana. He played a leading role in the campaigns of Caliph al-Mu'tasim, and was responsible for the suppression of the rebellion of Babak Khorramdin and for his battlefield victory over the Byzantine emperor Theophilos during the Amorium campaign. Eventually he was suspected of disloyalty and was arrested, tried and then executed in June 841.
Afshin, upon the camel, parades Babak, upon the elephant, into Samarra. Persian miniature created in 16th-century Safavid Iran, from a copy of Abu Ali Bal'ami's 10th-century Tarikhnama
Babak parleys with the Afshin Haydar, the Caliph al-Mu'tasim's general
Miniature from the Madrid Skylitzes manuscript depicting the Arab siege of Amorium
Osrušana or Ustrushana was a former Iranian region in Transoxiana, home to the Principality of Ushrusana, an important pre-Islamic polity of Central Asia. Oshrusana lay to the south of the great, southernmost bend of the Syr Darya and extended roughly from Samarkand to Khujand. The capital city of Oshrusana was Bunjikat. The exact form of the Iranian name Osrušana is not clear from the sources, but the forms given in Hudud al-'alam, indicate an original *Sorušna.
Bunjikat, ancient capital of Osrushana
Bunjikat wall painting of goddess Nana, 8th-9th century.
Fighting figure with bow and spear, Osrushana.
