Samanid Empire

The Samanid Empire (Pers. سامانیان, Latinised: Sāmāniyān), also known as the Samanid Empire, the Samanid Dynasty, the Samanid Amirate or simply the Samanids, was a Persian Sunni Muslim empire of Iranian dehkan origin. The empire was concentrated in Khorasan and Transoxiana; between 819 and 999 its greatest extent covered Persia and Central Asia. The ruling dynasty was the Samanids. The capital of the state was Samarkard and later Bukhara.

Four brothers - Nuh, Ahmad, Yahya and Ilyas - founded the Samanid state. Each of them ruled a territory under Abbasid suzerainty. In 892, Ismail Samani united the Samanid state under one ruler. It was under him that the Samanids became independent of Abbasid rule.

The Samanid state is part of the Iranian intermezzo in which a Persian culture and identity was created which brought Iranian speech and tradition into the fold of the Islamic world.