300px|right|thumb|A map outlining historical sites in Pakistan.
The history of Pakistan preceding the country's independence in 1947 is shared with that of Afghanistan, India, and Iran. Spanning the western expanse of the Indian subcontinent and the eastern borderlands of the Iranian plateau, the region of present-day Pakistan served both as the fertile ground of a major civilization and as the gateway of South Asia to Central Asia and the Near East.
Situated on the first coastal migration route of Homo sapiens out of Africa, the region was inhabited early by modern humans. The 9,000-year history of village life in South Asia traces back to the Neolithic (7000–4300 BCE) site of Mehrgarh in Pakistan, and the 5,000-year history of urban life in South Asia to the various sites of the Indus Valley Civilization, including Mohenjo Daro and Harappa.
The ensuing millennia saw the region of present-day Pakistan absorb many influences—represented among others in the ancient, mainly Hindu-Buddhist, sites of Taxila, and Takht-i-Bahi, the 14th-century Islamic-Sindhi monuments of Thatta, and the 17th-century Mughal monuments of Lahore. Dynasties emerging from the region encompassing modern day Pakistan during this period included the Soomra dynasty, Samma dynasty, Sayyid dynasty, Kalhora dynasty, Talpurs, Langah Sultanate, Sultanate of Swat, Sial dynasty and the Shah Mir Dynasty. In the first half of the 19th century, the region was appropriated by the East India Company, followed, after 1857, by 90 years of direct British rule, and ending with the creation of Pakistan in 1947, through the efforts, among others, of its future national poet Allama Iqbal and its founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Since then, the country has experienced both civilian-democratic and military rule, resulting in periods of significant economic and military growth as well those of instability; significant during the latter, was the secession of East Pakistan as the new nation of Bangladesh.
Prehistory<!--'Ancient Pakistan' redirects here-->
Paleolithic period
The Soanian is an archaeological culture of the Lower Paleolithic, Acheulean. It is named after the Soan Valley in the Sivalik Hills, near modern-day Islamabad and is dated between c.774,000 and c.11,700 BCE.
Neolithic period
Mehrgarh is an important Neolithic site discovered in 1974, which shows early evidence of farming and herding, and dentistry. The site dates back to 7000–5500 BCE and is located on the Kachi Plain of Balochistan. The residents of Mehrgarh lived in mud brick houses, stored grain in granaries, fashioned tools from copper, cultivated barley, wheat, jujubes and dates, and herded sheep, goats and cattle. As the civilisation progressed (5500–2600 BCE) residents began to engage in crafts, including flint knapping, tanning, bead production, and metalworking. The site was occupied continuously until 2600 BCE, when climatic changes began to occur. Between 2600 and 2000 BCE, region became more arid and Mehrgarh was abandoned in favour of the Indus Valley, where a new civilisation was in the early stages of development.
Bronze Age
Indus Valley Civilisation
The Bronze Age in the Indus Valley began around 3300 BCE with the Indus Valley Civilization. Along with Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, it was one of three early civilisations of the Old World, and of the three the most widespread, covering an area of 1.25 million km<sup>2</sup>. It flourished in the basins of the Indus River, in what is today the Pakistani provinces of Sindh, Punjab and Balochistan, and along a system of perennial, mostly monsoon-fed, rivers that once coursed in the vicinity of the seasonal Ghaggar-Hakra River in parts of north-west India. At its peak, the civilisation hosted a population of approximately 5 million spread across hundreds of settlements extending as far as the Arabian Sea to present-day southern and eastern Afghanistan, and the Himalayas. Inhabitants of the ancient Indus river valley, the Harappans, developed new techniques in metallurgy and handicraft (carneol products, seal carving), and produced copper, bronze, lead, and tin.
The Mature Indus civilisation flourished from about 2600 to 1900 BCE, marking the beginning of urban civilisation in the Indus Valley. The civilisation included urban centres such as Harappa, Ganeriwala and Mohenjo-daro as well as an offshoot called the Kulli culture (2500–2000 BCE) in southern Balochistan and was noted for its cities built of brick, roadside drainage system, and multi-storeyed houses. It is thought to have had some kind of municipal organisation as well.
During the late period of this civilisation, signs of a gradual decline began to emerge, and by around 1700 BCE, most of the cities were abandoned. However, the Indus Valley Civilisation did not disappear suddenly, and some elements of the Indus Civilisation may have survived. Aridification of this region during the 3rd millennium BCE may have been the initial spur for the urbanisation associated with the civilisation, but eventually also reduced the water supply enough to cause the civilisation's demise, and to scatter its population eastward. The civilisation collapsed around 1700 BCE, though the reasons behind its fall are still unknown. Through the excavation of the Indus cities and analysis of town planning and seals, it has been inferred that the Civilization had high level of sophistication in its town planning, arts, crafts, and trade.
Early history – Iron Age
Vedic period
left|thumb|Cremation urn, [[Gandhara grave culture, Swat Valley, ]]
The Vedic Period () is postulated to have formed during the 1500 BCE to 800 BCE. As Indo-Aryans migrated and settled into the Indus Valley, along with them came their distinctive religious traditions and practices which fused with local culture. The Indo-Aryans religious beliefs and practices from the Bactria–Margiana Culture and the native Harappan Indus beliefs of the former Indus Valley Civilisation eventually gave rise to Vedic culture and tribes. Early Indo-Aryans were a Late Bronze Age society centred in the Punjab, organised into tribes rather than kingdoms, and primarily sustained by a pastoral way of life. During this period the Vedas, the oldest scriptures of Hinduism, were composed.
Ancient history
Achaemenid Empire
thumb|Much of the area corresponding to modern-day Pakistan was subordinated to the Achaemenid Empire and forced to pay tributes to Persia.|left
The main Vedic tribes remaining in the Indus Valley by 550 BCE were the Kamboja, Sindhu, Taksas of Gandhara, the Madras and Kathas of the River Chenab, Mallas of the River Ravi and Tugras of the River Sutlej. These several tribes and principalities fought against one another to such an extent that the Indus Valley no longer had one powerful Vedic tribal kingdom to defend against outsiders and to wield the warring tribes into one organised kingdom. King Pushkarasarin of Gandhara was engaged in power struggles against his local rivals and as such the Khyber Pass remained poorly defended. King Darius I of the Achaemenid Empire took advantage of the opportunity and planned for an invasion. The Indus Valley was fabled in Persia for its gold and fertile soil and conquering it had been a major objective of his predecessor Cyrus the Great. In 542 BCE, Cyrus had led his army and conquered the Makran coast in southern Balochistan. However, he is known to have campaigned beyond Makran (in the regions of Kalat, Khuzdar and Panjgur) and lost most of his army in the Gedrosian Desert (speculated today as the Kharan Desert).
In 518 BCE, Darius led his army through the Khyber Pass and southwards in stages, eventually reaching the Arabian Sea coast in Sindh by 516 BCE. Under Persian rule, a system of centralised administration, with a bureaucratic system, was introduced into the Indus Valley for the first time, establishing several satrapies: Gandāra around the general region of Gandhara, Hindush around Punjab and Sindh, Arachosia, encompassing parts of present-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and Balochistan, Sattagydia around the Bannu basin,
What is known about the easternmost satraps and borderlands of the Achaemenid Empire is alluded to in the Darius inscriptions and from Greek sources such as the Histories of Herodotus and the later Alexander Chronicles (Arrian, Strabo et al.). These sources list three Indus Valley tributaries or conquered territories that were subordinated to the Persian Empire and made to pay tributes to the Persian Kings.
Macedonian Empire
thumb|Alexander's campaigns in modern-day Pakistan|left
thumb|[[Porus, with Alexander the Great]]
By spring of 326 BCE, Alexander began on his Indus expedition from Bactria, leaving behind 3500 horses and 10,000 soldiers. He divided his army into two groups. The larger force would enter the Indus Valley through the Khyber Pass, just as Darius had done 200 years earlier, while a smaller force under the personal command of Alexander entered through a northern route, possibly through Broghol or Dorah Pass near Chitral. Alexander was commanding a group of shield-bearing guards, foot-companions, archers, Agrianians, and horse-javelin-men and led them against the tribes of the former Gandhara satrapy.
The first tribe they encountered were the Aspasioi tribe of the Kunar Valley, who initiated a fierce battle against Alexander, in which he himself was wounded in the shoulder by a dart. However, the Aspasioi eventually lost and 40,000 people were enslaved. Alexander then continued in a southwestern direction where he encountered the Assakenoi tribe of the Swat and Buner valleys in April 326 BCE. The Assakenoi fought bravely and offered stubborn resistance to Alexander and his army in the cities of Ora, Bazira (Barikot) and Massaga. So enraged was Alexander about the resistance put up by the Assakenoi that he killed the entire population of Massaga and reduced its buildings to rubble – similar slaughters followed in Ora. A similar slaughter then followed at Ora, another stronghold of the Assakenoi. The stories of these slaughters reached numerous Assakenians, who began fleeing to Aornos, a hill-fort located between Shangla and Kohistan. Alexander followed close behind their heels and besieged the strategic hill-fort, eventually capturing and destroying the fort and killing everyone inside. The remaining smaller tribes either surrendered or like the Astanenoi tribe of Pushkalavati (Charsadda) were quickly neutralised where 38,000 soldiers and 230,000 oxen were captured by Alexander. Eventually Alexander's smaller force would meet with the larger force which had come through the Khyber Pass met at Attock. With the conquest of Gandhara complete, Alexander switched to strengthening his military supply line, which by now stretched dangerously vulnerable over the Hindu Kush back to Balkh in Bactria.
After conquering Gandhara and solidifying his supply line back to Bactria, Alexander combined his forces with the King Ambhi of Taxila and crossed the River Indus in July 326 BCE to begin the Archosia (Punjab) campaign. His first resistance would come at the River Jhelum near Bhera against King Porus of the Paurava tribe. The famous Battle of the Hydaspes (Jhelum) between Alexander (with Ambhi) and Porus would be the last major battle fought by him. After defeating Porus, his battle weary troops refused to advance into India to engage the army of Nanda Dynasty and its vanguard of trampling elephants. Alexander, therefore proceeded south-west along the Indus Valley. Along the way, he engaged in several battles with smaller kingdoms in Multan and Sindh, before marching his army westward across the Makran desert towards what is now Iran. In crossing the desert, Alexander's army took enormous casualties from hunger and thirst, but fought no human enemy. They encountered the "Fish Eaters", or Ichthyophagi, primitive people who lived on the Makran coast, who had matted hair, no fire, no metal, no clothes, lived in huts made of whale bones, and ate raw seafood.
Mauryan Empire
left|thumb|[[Mansehra Rock Edicts, one of the edicts of the Mauryan emperor Ashoka]]
The Maurya Empire was a geographically extensive Iron Age historical power in South Asia based in Magadha, having been founded by Chandragupta Maurya in 322 BCE, and existing in loose-knit fashion until 185 BCE. The Maurya Empire was centralised by the conquest of the Indo-Gangetic Plain, and its capital city was located at Pataliputra (modern Patna). Outside this imperial centre, the empire's geographical extent was dependent on the loyalty of military commanders who controlled the armed cities sprinkling it. During Ashoka's rule (ca. 268–232 BCE) the empire briefly controlled the major urban hubs and arteries of the Indian subcontinent excepting the deep south.
Under the Mauryas, internal and external trade, agriculture, and economic activities thrived and expanded across South Asia due to the creation of a single and efficient system of finance, administration, and security. The Maurya dynasty built a precursor of the Grand Trunk Road from Patliputra to Taxila. After the Kalinga War, the Empire experienced nearly half a century of centralised rule under Ashoka. Ashoka's embrace of Buddhism and sponsorship of Buddhist missionaries allowed for the expansion of that faith into Sri Lanka, northwest India, and Central Asia.
The population of South Asia during the Mauryan period has been estimated to be between 15 and 30 million.
The empire's period of dominion was marked by exceptional creativity in art, architecture, inscriptions and produced texts.
Classical history
Indo-Greek Kingdom
thumb|Greco-Buddhist representation of the Buddha, seated to the left of a depiction of [[Vajrapani in the guise of the Hellenic god Heracles]]
The Indo-Greek Menander I (reigned 155–130 BCE) drove the Greco-Bactrians out of Gandhara and beyond the Hindu Kush, becoming king shortly after his victory. His territories covered Panjshir and Kapisa in modern Afghanistan and extended to the Punjab region, with many tributaries to the south and east, possibly as far as Mathura. The capital Sagala (modern Sialkot) prospered greatly under Menander's rule and Menander is one of the few Bactrian kings mentioned by Greek authors.
The classical Buddhist text Milinda Pañha praises Menander, saying there was "none equal to Milinda in all India". His empire survived him in a fragmented manner until the last independent Greek king, Strato II, disappeared around 10 CE. Around 125 BCE, the Greco-Bactrian king Heliocles, son of Eucratides, fled from the Yuezhi invasion of Bactria and relocated to Gandhara, pushing the Indo-Greeks east of the Jhelum River. The last known Indo-Greek ruler was Theodamas, from the Bajaur area of Gandhara, mentioned on a 1st-century CE signet ring, bearing the Kharoṣṭhī inscription "Su Theodamasa" ("Su" was the Greek transliteration of the Kushan royal title "Shau" ("Shah" or "King")). Various petty kings ruled into the early 1st century CE, until the conquests by the Scythians, Parthians and the Yuezhi, who founded the Kushan dynasty.
It is during this period that the fusion of Hellenistic and Asiatic mythological, artistic and religious elements becomes most apparent, especially in the region of Gandhara, straddling western Pakistan and southern Afghanistan. Detailed, humanistic representations of the Buddha begin to emerge, depicting the figure with a close resemblance to the Hellenic god Apollo; Greek mythological motifs such as centaurs, Bacchanalian scenes, Nereids and deities such as Tyche and Heracles are prominent in the Buddhistic art of ancient Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Indo-Scythian Kingdom
thumb|A [[stone palette of the type found in the Early Saka layer at Sirkap, Punjab]]
The Indo-Scythians were descended from the Sakas (Scythians) who migrated from southern Central Asia into Pakistan and Arachosia from the middle of the 2nd century BCE to the 1st century BCE. They displaced the Indo-Greeks and ruled a kingdom that stretched from Gandhara to Mathura. The power of the Saka rulers started to decline in the 2nd century CE after the Scythians were defeated by the south Indian Emperor Gautamiputra Satakarni of the Satavahana dynasty. Later the Saka kingdom was completely destroyed by Chandragupta II of the Gupta Empire from eastern India in the 4th century.
Indo-Parthian Kingdom
thumb|Ancient [[Buddhist monastery Takht-i-Bahi (a UNESCO World Heritage Site) constructed by the Indo-Parthians|left]]
The Indo-Parthian Kingdom was ruled by the Gondopharid dynasty, named after its eponymous first ruler Gondophares. They ruled parts of present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, and northwestern India, during or slightly before the 1st century CE. For most of their history, the leading Gondopharid kings held Taxila (in the present Punjab province of Pakistan) as their residence, but during their last few years of existence the capital shifted between Kabul and Peshawar. These kings have traditionally been referred to as Indo-Parthians, as their coinage was often inspired by the Arsacid dynasty, but they probably belonged to a wider groups of Iranic tribes who lived east of Parthia proper, and there is no evidence that all the kings who assumed the title Gondophares, which means "Holder of Glory", were even related. Christian writings claim<!-- Ref. WP Article on St. Thomas --> that the Apostle Saint Thomas – an architect and skilled carpenter – had a long sojourn in the court of king Gondophares, had built a palace for the king at Taxila and had also ordained leaders for the Church before leaving for Indus Valley in a chariot, for sailing out to eventually reach Malabar Coast.
Kushan Empire
thumb|225x225px|[[Peshawar's Kanishka stupa once kept sacred Buddhist relics in the Kanishka casket.]]
The Kushan Empire expanded out of what is now Afghanistan into the northwest of the subcontinent under the leadership of their first emperor, Kujula Kadphises, about the middle of the 1st century CE. They were descended from an Indo-European, Central Asian people called the Yuezhi, a branch of which was known as the Kushans. By the time of his grandson, Kanishka the Great, the empire spread to encompass much of Afghanistan and the northern parts of the Indian subcontinent at least as far as Saketa and Sarnath near Varanasi (Benares).
Emperor Kanishka was a great patron of Buddhism; however, as Kushans expanded southward, the deities of their later coinage came to reflect its new Hindu majority. The monumental Kanishka stupa is believed to have been established by the king near the outskirts of modern-day Peshawar, Pakistan.
The Kushan dynasty played an important role in the establishment of Buddhism in India and its spread to Central Asia and China. Historian Vincent Smith said about Kanishka in particular:
The empire linked the Indian Ocean maritime trade with the commerce of the Silk Road through the Indus valley, encouraging long-distance trade, particularly between China and Rome. The Kushans brought new trends to the budding and blossoming Gandharan Art, which reached its peak during Kushan Rule.
H.G. Rowlinson commented:
By the 3rd century, their empire in India was disintegrating and their last known great emperor was Vasudeva I.
Alchon Huns
The Alchon Empire was the third of four major Huna states established in Central and South Asia. The Alchon were preceded by the Kidarites and succeeded by the Hephthalites in Bactria and the Nezak Huns in the Hindu Kush. The names of the Alchon kings are known from their extensive coinage, Buddhist accounts, and a number of commemorative inscriptions throughout the Indian subcontinent. Toramana's son Mihirakula, a Saivite Hindu, moved up to near Pataliputra to the east and Gwalior to central India. Hiuen Tsiang narrates Mihirakula's merciless persecution of Buddhists and destruction of monasteries, though the description is disputed as far as the authenticity is concerned. The Alchons have long been considered as a part or a sub-division of the Hephthalites, or as their eastern branch, but now tend to be considered as a separate entity. The Huns were defeated by the alliance of Indian rulers, Maharaja (Great King) Yasodharman of Malwa and Gupta Emperor Narasimhagupta in the 6th century. Some of them were driven out of India and others were assimilated in the Indian society.
Medieval period
Arab Caliphate
right|thumb|300x250px|The expansion of the [[Arab Caliphate. ]]
After conquering the Middle East from the Byzantine Empire and the Sasanian Empire, the Rashidun Caliphate reached the coastal region of Makran in present-day Balochistan. In 643, the second caliph Umar () ordered an invasion of Makran against the Rai dynasty. Following the Rashidun capture of Makran, Umar restricted the army to not pass beyond and consolidated his position in Makran. During the reign of the fourth caliph Ali (), the Rashidun army conquered the town of Kalat in the heart of Balochistan.
During the reign of the sixth Umayyad caliph al-Walid I (), the Arab military general Muhammad ibn al-Qasim commanded the Umayyad incursion into Sindh. In 712, he defeated the army of the Hindu maharaja Dahir of Aror () and established the caliphal province of Sind. The historic town of al-Mansura was administered as the capital of the province. Afterward, Ibn al-Qasim proceeded to conquer Multan, which subsequently became a prominent centre of Islamic culture and trading. In 747, the anti-Umayyad rebel Mansur ibn Jumhur al-Kalbi seized Sind and was defeated by Musa ibn Ka'b al-Tamimi of the succeeding Abbasid Caliphate. In the 9th-century, Abbasid authority gradually declined in Sind and Multan. The tenth Abbasid caliph al-Mutawakkil () assigned the governorship of Sind to Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz al-Habbari, who founded the hereditary Habbarid dynasty and became the autonomous ruler of Sind in 854. Around the same time, the Banu Munnabih established the Emirate of Multan while Ma'danids reigned over Sultanate of Makran. There was gradual conversion to Islam in the south, especially amongst the native Hindu and Buddhist majority, but in areas north of Multan, Hindus and Buddhists remained numerous. By the end of the 10th century CE, the region was ruled by several Hindu kings.
Odi Shahis
thumb|[[Amb Temples, built by the Hindu Shahi dynasty between the 7th and 9th centuries CE]]
The Turk Shahis ruled Gandhara from the decline of the Kushan Empire in the 3rd century until 870, when they were overthrown by the Hindu Shahis. The Hindu Shahis are believed to belong to the Uḍi/Oḍi tribe, namely the people of Oddiyana in Gandhara.
The first king Kallar had moved the capital into Udabandhapura from Kabul, in the modern village of Hund for its new capital. At its zenith, the kingdom stretched over the Kabul Valley, Gandhara and western Punjab under Jayapala. Jayapala saw a danger in the consolidation of the Ghaznavids and invaded their capital city of Ghazni both in the reign of Sebuktigin and in that of his son Mahmud, which initiated the Muslim Ghaznavid and Hindu Shahi struggles. Sebuk Tigin, however, defeated him, and he was forced to pay an indemnity.
However, the army was defeated in battle against the western forces, particularly against the Mahmud of Ghazni. In the west, Ghurid territory extended to Nishapur and Merv, while Ghurid troops reached as far as Gorgan on the shores of the Caspian Sea. Eastward, the Ghurids invaded as far as Bengal.]]
The Ghaznavids under either Khusrau Shah or his son Khusrau Malik lost their control over Ghazni to the Ghuzz Turks along with some other territories. In the 1170s, Ghurid prince Muhammad of Ghor raided their territory and captured Ghazni from them and was crowned there by his brother Ghiyath al-Din Muhammad in 1173. Muhammad of Ghor marched from Gomal Pass into Pakistan and captured Multan and Uch before being rebuffed by Gujarat's Hindu Chaulukya (Solanki) rulers, which forced him to press upon the trumbling Ghaznavids. By 1186–87, he deposed the last Ghaznavid ruler Khusrau Malik, bringing the last of Ghaznevid territory under his control and ending the Ghaznavid empire. The Ghurids were overthrown in 1215, although their conquests in the Indian Subcontinent survived for several centuries under the Delhi Sultanate established by the Ghurid Mamluk Qutb ud-Din Aibak.
Delhi Sultanate
thumb|[[Tomb of Shah Rukn-e-Alam, built by Ghiyath al-Din Tughluq in 1324 CE]]
The Turkic origin Mamluk Dynasty, seized the throne of the Sultanate in 1211. Several dynasties ruled their empires from Delhi: the Mamluk (1211–90), the Khalji (1290–1320), the Tughlaq (1320–1413), the Sayyid (1414–1451) and the Lodhi (1451–1526). Although some kingdoms remained independent of Delhi, almost all of the Indus plain came under the rule of these large sultanates.
The sultans (emperors) of Delhi enjoyed cordial relations with rulers in the Near East but owed them no allegiance. While the sultans ruled from urban centres, their military camps and trading posts provided the nuclei for many towns that sprang up in the countryside. Close interaction with local populations led to cultural exchange and the resulting "Indo-Islamic" fusion has left a lasting imprint and legacy in South Asian architecture, music, literature, life style and religious customs. In addition, the language of Urdu (literally meaning "horde" or "camp" in various Turkic dialects, but more likely "city" in the South Asian context) was born during the Delhi Sultanate period, as a result of the mingling of speakers of native Prakrits, Persian, Turkish and Arabic languages.
Perhaps the greatest contribution of the Sultanate was its temporary success in insulating South Asia from the Mongol invasion from Central Asia in the 13th century; nonetheless the sultans eventually lost western Pakistan to the Mongols (see the Ilkhanate dynasty). The Sultanate declined after the invasion of Emperor Timur, who founded the Timurid Empire, and was eventually conquered in 1526 by the Mughal Emperor Babar.
The Delhi Sultanate and later Mughal Empire attracted Muslim refugees, nobles, technocrats, bureaucrats, soldiers, traders, scientists, architects, artisans, teachers, poets, artists, theologians and Sufis from the rest of the Muslim world and they migrated and settled in the South Asia. During the reign of Sultan Ghyasuddin Balban (1266–1286) thousands of Central Asian Muslims sought asylum including more than 15 sovereigns and their nobles due to the Mongol invasion of Khwarezmia and Eastern Iran. At the court of Sultan Iltemish in Delhi the first wave of these Muslim refugees escaping from the Central Asian genocide by the Mongol armies of Genghis Khan, brought administrators from Iran, painters from China, theologians from Samarkand, Nishapur and Bukhara, divines and saints from the rest of Muslim world, craftsmen and men and maidens from every region, notably doctors adept in Greek medicine and philosophers from everywhere.
Kingdom of Sindh
Soomra dynasty
The Soomra dynasty was a local Sindhi Muslim dynasty that ruled between the early 11th century and the 14th century.
Later chroniclers like Ali ibn al-Athir (c. late 12th c.) and Ibn Khaldun (c. late 14th c.) attributed the fall of Habbarids to Mahmud of Ghazni, lending credence to the argument of Hafif being the last Habbarid. The Soomras appear to have established themselves as a regional power in this power vacuum.
The Ghurids and Ghaznavids continued to rule parts of Sindh, across the eleventh and early twelfth centuries, alongside the Soomrus.
Samma dynasty
The Samma dynasty was a Sindhi dynasty that ruled in Sindh, and parts of Kutch, Punjab and Balochistan from 1351 to 1524 CE, with their capital at Thatta.
The Sammas overthrew the Soomra dynasty soon after 1335 and the last Soomra ruler took shelter with the governor of Gujarat, under the protection of Muhammad bin Tughluq, the sultan of Delhi. Mohammad bin Tughlaq made an expedition against Sindh in 1351 and died at Sondha, possibly in an attempt to restore the Soomras. With this, the Sammas became independent. The next sultan, Firuz Shah Tughlaq attacked Sindh in 1365 and 1367, unsuccessfully, but with reinforcements from Delhi he later obtained Banbhiniyo's surrender. For a period the Sammas were therefore subject to Delhi again. Later, as the Sultanate of Delhi collapsed they became fully independent. Jam Unar was the founder of Samma dynasty mentioned by Ibn Battuta. It has left its mark in Sindh with magnificent structures including the Makli Necropolis of its royals in Thatta.