Ya'qub-i Laith Saffari

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Statue of Yaqub-e Layth by Master Sadighi in Central Square, Zabol.

Ya'qub-i Laith Saffari (?-879?) (Persian: یعقوب لیث صفاری‎ ) was the founder of the Saffarids dynasty, with its capital at Zaranj (modern-day western Afghanistan). Originally a coppersmith (saffar), he eventually rose to become the first leader to unite the Afghans under the banner of Sunni Islam. Dupree writes:

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...Arab armies carrying the banner of Islam came out of the west to defeat the Sasanians in 642 AD and then they marched with confidence to the east. On the western periphery of the Afghan area the princes of Herat and Seistan gave way to rule by Arab governors but in the east, in the mountains, cities submitted only to rise in revolt and the hastily converted returned to their old beliefs once the armies passed. The harshness and avariciousness of Arab rule produced such unrest, however, that once the waning power of the Caliphate became apparent, native rulers once again established themselves independent. Among these the Saffarids of Seistan shone briefly in the Afghan area. The fanatic founder of this dynasty, the coppersmith’s apprentice Yaqub ibn Layth Saffari, came forth from his capital at Zaranj in 870 AD and marched through Bost, Kandahar, Ghazni, Kabul, Bamiyan, Balkh and Herat, conquering in the name of Islam...^[1]

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