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Khushnavaz

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Akhshunwar (Sogdian: əxšōnδār, Middle Persian: Xašnawāz) was a ruling title used by the Hephthalite kings in the 5th and 6th-centuries.

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Within Vinony's link graph, Khushnavaz is referenced by 12 other articles, and connects out to International Standard Book Number, Shahnameh and Ferdowsi.

It sits within the topics Hephthalites, History of Khorasan and Royal titles.

Its subject is documented across 8 Wikipedia language editions.

Wikidata facts

Instance of
human
Gender
male
Occupation
monarch
Position held
king
Noble title
king

via Wikidata · CC0

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Akhshunwar (Sogdian: əxšōnδār, Middle Persian: Xašnawāz) was a ruling title used by the Hephthalite kings in the 5th and 6th-centuries.

The title is of Eastern Iranian origin; according W.B. Henning, its original form was ʾxšʾwndʾr (axšōndār), meaning "king", "ruler." G. Widengren, however, suggests that the original form was the Sogdian ʾxšʾwnwʾr, "power bearer." In the New Persian epic Shahnameh ("The Book of Kings") of the medieval Persian poet Ferdowsi, it was transformed into Khushnawaz (meaning "the beautiful player, musician"), and was used as a name instead. Some scholars support the theory that the name of the Kidarite king Kunkhas shared the same origin as Akhshunwar, which has in turn led to the suggestion that Akhshunwar was initially a title used by Kidarites, later to be adopted by Hephthalites when they supplanted them.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Khushnavaz” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.

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