10. Hephthalites in Bactria | Digitaler Ausstellungskatalog

After the Sasanian king Peroz had forced the Kidarites out of Bactria in 467 CE (showcase 3), he was soon threatened by a new danger, another Hunnic group, the Hephthalites. In 474 CE the Persian army under the personal command of Peroz suffered its first defeat against the Hephthalites. Peroz was taken prisoner and had to purchase his own freedom with a ransom of 30 mule-loads of silver drahms (approx. 1500 kg). Following his release the king again began against all warning to mount for war. In 484 CE the decisive battle took place during which Peroz perished. Bactria finally fell to the Hephthalites, who began to strike their own coins in the capital Balkh.

Prior to this event in the first half of the 5th century, probably under the Kidarites (showcase 3), a ruler had come to power in a part of Bactria who labelled himself on his coins "King Tobazini" (Nos. 1, 2). He imitated the coins of the Sasanian king Wahram IV (388–399 CE) and used a clan symbol found among both the Alkhan in Kabulistan and Gandhara (showcase 6) and later the Hephthalites in Bactria (Nos. 5, 6). The drachms of Peroz, which the Hephthalites had received in such great numbers as ransom and tribute and which they countermarked to legitimize circulation in their territory (No. 3), finally served as the model for the Hephthalite's own coinage in Bactria.

At first, the Hephthalite imitations struck in Balkh (Nos. 4, 5) are so deceptively similar to the Sasanian originals that one can assume that they were made by Sasanian die-cutters who had fallen into the hands of the Hephthalites with their victory over Peroz.

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Unlike the Alkhan in Gandhara, the Hephthalites in Bactria kept the chosen coin type more-or-less unchanged. Also here the name of the ruler does not appear on the coins. The four balls on the obverse are characteristic, as is the Bactrian inscription "Ebo", an abbreviation of the name of the Hephthalites (ēbodalo). In addition, the mint Balkh (bachlo) is given on the reverse (Nos. 4, 5). The image of a Hephthalite prince depicted with a drinking cup (No. 6 and Fig. D) is an exception to this pattern. Together with the Peroz drachms struck in mass quantities, the Hephthalite imitations traveled along the trading routes of the Silk Road to Mesopotamia and China.

The dominance of the Hephthalites over Central Asia ended around 560 CE when they were defeated in a war on two fronts against the Sasanian king Khusro I (531–579 CE) and the Western Turks. Bactria south of the Oxus River (Amu Darya) came again under Sasanian sovereignty (No. 7), while in North Bactria, such as around Termez (South Uzbekistan) or in the Vakhsh Vallay (Tajikistan), smaller principalities formed that would continue the tradition of Hephthalite coins based on the Peroz drachm into the 7th/8th century (No. 8–10).

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