7. In the later period, there appears also the fragments of a tradition of which Nasr b. Sayyār is the hero.
Some, if not all, of these traditions developed in some detail, and where they are not balanced by other versions they present a distorted narrative of events, verging in some cases on the fictitious. The most noteworthy examples of this are the Khātūn legend (see below [p. 18]) and the typical story of the exploits of Mūsā b. Khāzim in Transoxania in a style not unworthy of Bedouin romance[19]. It is therefore most important to disentangle these variant traditions and assign its proper value to each. The Bāhilite accounts of Qutayba’s conquests, for instance, contain wild exaggerations of fact, which, nevertheless, have sometimes been utilised in all seriousness by modern historians, amongst other purposes to establish synchronisms with the Turkish inscriptions[20].
With these precautions, it is possible to follow up and reconstruct, with comparative certainty and completeness, that progress of the Arab arms in Central Asia whose vicissitudes are outlined in the following pages.
Notes
(Full Titles in Bibliography)
[1] Franke, Beiträge 41 ff., 67. Cordier, Chine I, 225.
[2] If Marquart’s identification (Ērānshahr, 201 f.) is correct.
[3] Cordier I. 229: Ērānshahr 50 ff.
[4] Yuan Chwang I. 103. Prof. Barthold suggests that the connection between the Ephthalites and the Huns may have been political only, not racial.
[5] Chavannes, Documents 155: Ērānshahr 89.
[6] Tab. I. 2885. 13 and 2886. 3: Yaʿqūbī, History, II, 193: Yāqūt (ed. Wüstenfeld) I. 492: Balādhurī 403: Ērānshahr 65 f., 77 f., and 150. Bādghīs was still a nomad pasture-ground in the XIVth century: Ibn Battūta, III, 67 f.