Today is Friday; 6th of the Iranian month of Bahman 1396 solar hijri; corresponding to 8th of the Islamic month of Jamadi al-Awwal 1439 lunar hijri; and January 26, 2018, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

1613 solar years ago, on this day in the year 405 AD, Attila the Hun was born. He united the various Hun tribes of the Tatar race and attacked Europe. He ravaged both the Western and Eastern Roman Empires and advanced into Gaul (France), until he was defeated. He died in 453, while planning another attack on the remnants of the Roman Empire. Attila was a ruthless barbarian who destroyed cities and massacred people. He is often called the Scourge of God upon Europe.

1294 solar years ago, on this day in 724 AD, Yazid II, the 9th self-styled caliph of the usurper Omayyad regime, died of tuberculosis at the age of 37 after a 4-year reign that witnessed civil wars from Spain and North Africa in the west to Khorasan in the east – where the Abbasids were building a power base to topple the regime. Son of Abdul-Malik ibn Marwan, his mother Atika was the daughter of the Godless tyrant Yazid ibn Mu’waiyya the perpetrator of the heartrending tragedy of Karbala. Yazid II was succeeded by his half-brother, the bloodthirsty Hisham.

487 solar years ago, on this day in 1531 AD, Lisbon and its surrounding regions in Portugal were hit by a terrible earthquake resulting in the death of over 30,000 people.

454 solar years ago, on this day in 1564 AD, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania defeated the Tsardom of Russia in the Battle of Ula, a tributary of the River Daugava during the Livonian War. Led by Mikołaj "the Red" Radziwiłł, the Lithuanian army of only 6,000 vanquished the numerically superior Russian army that was five times larger.

453 solar years ago, on this day in 1565 AD, the decisive Battle of Talikota in the Deccan (south India) resulted in the defeat and end of the Vijaynagar Empire by the united armies of the successor sultanates of the Bahmani Empire (of Iranian origin) in alliance with the Marathas and some other Hindu rulers. To check the growing power of Ramraya and his encroachment upon their lands, Ali Adel Shah I of Bijapur, Ibrahim Quli Qutb Shah of Golkanda, Hussain Nizam Shah of Ahmadnagar, along with the smaller Bareed Shahi and Imad Shahi kingdoms of Bidar and Berar respectively, as well as the Maratha chief Raja Ghorpade, decided to confront the aggressor. For several days battles raged on the banks of the Krishna River with the Vijaynagar forces, aided by Muslim mercenaries, including Iranian elite corps, having the upper hand, when the superior artillery power of the united army of the sultanates, also assisted by elite Iranian and Turkic auxiliaries, dealt the final blow, defeating the 150,000 strong army of Ramraya. The Sultanates of Bijapur and Golkandah divided up the Vijaynagar territories between them and advanced Indo-Persian culture and architecture, including Persian language in the southernmost parts of the Deccan.

319 solar years ago, on this day in 1699 AD, the Treaty of Karlowitz was signed in what is now the municipality of Sremski Karlovci in Serbia, ending the 14-year long war between the Hapsburg Empire of Austria and the Ottoman Turkish Empire, following the decisive defeat of the Turks in the Battle of Zenta. It marked the end of Ottoman control of much of Central Europe and the beginning of the empire's phase of decline, with their first major territorial losses after centuries of expansion. The treaty was the result of a two-month long congress between the Ottoman Empire of Sultan Mustafa II on one side, while the other side was made up of the Austrian Empire, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Republic of Venice and Tsar Peter the Great of Russia. The Habsburgs pressured the Ottomans to cede much of today’s Hungary, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Slovenia, while the Principality of Transylvania in what is now Romania, remained nominally independent but subject to the direct rule of Austrian governors. Poland took Podolia from the Turks as well as the dismantled fortress at Kamanice. Venice obtained most of Dalmatia along with parts of the Peloponnese peninsula of southern Greece. The next year, Russia forced Mustafa to sign the Treaty of Constantinople to cede Azov region on the Black Sea.

230 solar years ago, on this day in 1788 AD, the British fleet led by Arthur Phillip and carrying 736 convicts landed at Port Jackson to establish the penal colony of Sydney, as the first permanent European settlement in Australia. The event is commemorated as Australia Day. In 2006 Thomas Keneally authored “The Commonwealth of Thieves: The Story of the Founding of Australia.”

195 solar years ago, on this day in 1823 AD, British physician Edward Jenner who discovered smallpox vaccination, died at the age of 74. During his stay in India, he discovered smallpox vaccination. In 1796 he injected smallpox vaccine for the first time to a patient. He believed that injection of smallpox vaccine leads to emergence of mild smallpox, which in turn immunizes the human body against this illness. By proving this method, he has saved millions of people from this fatal ailment.

133 solar years ago, on this day in 1885 AD, troops loyal to the self-styled Mahdi conquered Khartoum, killing the British Governor-General of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Charles George Gordon. Mohammad Ahmad, the leader of the Samaniyya Sufi Order of Sudan, wrongly declared himself to be the Mahdi, during a period of widespread resentment among the Sudanese people towards the oppressive policies of the Turko-Egyptian rulers. The Mahdiyya, as his movement was called, was influenced by earlier messianic trends in West Africa in reaction to the growing military and economic dominance of European powers. Until his sudden death at the age of 40 on 22nd June 1885, nearly six months after his capture of Khartoum, he led a successful military campaign against Sudan’s British-controlled Turko-Egyptian government. He claimed descent from Imam Hasan Mujtaba (AS), the elder grandson of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). His posthumous son, Abdur-Rahman al-Mahdi, became leader of the neo-Mahdist movement and later the Ummah Party, which was supported by the crafty British, who however, foiled his ambition to become King of Sudan when the country gained independence in 1956. In modern-day Sudan, Mohammad Ahmad is sometimes seen as a precursor of Sudanese nationalism. The present leader of the Ummah Party, former Sudanese prime minister, Sadeq al-Mahdi, is his great great-grandson as well as the self-styled Imam of the religious order, Ansar.

126 lunar years ago, on this day in 1313 AH, the scholar, Mirza Mohammad Baqer Zain al-Abedin Khwansari, passed away in Isfahan. An expert in hadith and biographies of ulema and scholars, he served as head of the Isfahan Seminary, and wrote many books, including the 8-volume biographical work “Rowzaat al-Jannaat”.

116 lunar years ago, on this day in 1323 AH, Egyptian revolutionary scholar, Shaikh Mohammad Abduh, passed away in Alexandria. A product of Cairo’s famous al-Azhar Academy, he attended the classes of Iran’s pan-Islamist activist, Seyyed Jamal od-Din Asadabadi in Cairo, benefiting from his thoughts and ideas. After Asadabadi’s departure from Egypt, Abduh took over the movement against British colonialist influence in Egypt, for which he was exiled to Syria, from where after a six-year stay, he went to Paris and joined Seyyed Jamal od-Din Asadabadi in publication of the newspaper, “al-Orwat al-Wosqa” or the Firmest Bond. Upon return to Egypt, he served as judge. Like Asadabadi, he called for the unity of the World of Islam and Islamic denominations. He urged Muslims must close ranks against disbelievers and colonialists. He made great efforts to preach harmony between Sunnis and Shi’ite Muslims, and was highly influenced by “Nahj al-Balagha”  the compilation of the sermons, letters and maxims of Imam Ali (AS), the 1st Infallible Heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). Abduh also wrote exegeses on the holy Qur’an and was introduced to the “Sahifat as-Sajjadiyya”, the eloquent collection of supplications from the Prophet’s 4th Infallible Heir, Imam Zain al-Abedin (AS).

113 solar years ago, on this day in 1905 AD, the world's largest diamond, called Cullinan after Thomas Cullinan, the owner of Premier Mine near Pretoria, South Africa, was discovered. The 3,106.75 carat stone was purchased by the Transvaal government and presented to Britain’s King Edward VII on his 66th birthday. When the rough diamond was cut, it produced nine large stones and nearly 100 smaller ones. All of these stones were flawless. Now part of the British crown jewels, the largest cut gem, named the Great Star of Africa, was set in the English sceptre; the second largest was added to the gems in the state crown.

68 solar years ago, on this day in 1950 AD, two-and-a-half years after independence from British colonial rule in August 1947, India officially became a republic, as the constitution came into force. Rajendra Prasad became the first president and remained at this post for seven years. The presidency is a ceremonial post in India. The president doesn’t wield much power and is appointed through vote by the Legislature on the suggestion of the Prime Minister, who holds executive power. India is the largest and the most populous country of the Subcontinent and shares borders with Pakistan, China, Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Burma. Some 25 percent of its population is Muslim, and number almost 300 million.

53 solar years ago, on this day in 1965 AD, Hindi was imposed by the government as the official language of India, although at that time its speakers numbered hardly 20 percent. It was part of the move to undermine the status and widespread use of Urdu, the lingua franca of the Subcontinent that had been declared as the national language of Pakistan in 1947. Hindi emerged in the 19th century as a spoken dialect of northern India and began to be written by Hindu nationalists in the ancient Sanskrit script. It was called Hindustani in the beginning and was gradually purged of Persian and Urdu words, although the language still contains a great amount of Urdu, Persian and even Arabic words. For almost seven centuries, Persian was the official language of the Subcontinent until the British replaced it by English in the 19th century.

15 solar years ago, on this day in 2003 AD, prominent German Islamologist, Annemarie Schimmel, died in Bonn at the age of 81. Born in a cultured family, she developed a keen interest in orientalism and obtained her PhD in Islamic studies from Berlin University at the age of 19. The title of her thesis was “Die Stellung des Kalifen und der Qadis im spätmittelalterlichen Ägypten” (The Position of the Caliph and the Qadhi in Late Medieval Egypt). She wrote extensively on Islamic culture and became internationally renowned. She spent her life lecturing on history of religions and Islamic mysticism in German, American, and Turkish Universities. In addition to knowing German and English languages, she was fluent in Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Urdu, and Bengali. She was an authority on classical Persian poets such as the Iranians Mowlana Jalal od-Din Rumi, Khwajah Hafez Shirazi, and Sheikh Sa’di. In 1954 she was appointed Professor of the History of Religion at Ankara University, where she spent five years immersing herself in the culture and the mystical tradition of that country. She became a professor at the US Harvard University in 1967 and the same year she inaugurated the Indo-Muslim studies program at Harvard, where she remained for the next twenty-five years till 1992. Professor Schimmel received honorary degrees and prizes on several occasions from various countries. She authored over fifty books, in addition to hundreds of articles. Books written by her include “And Muhammad Is His Messenger: The Veneration of the Prophet in Islamic Piety”, “Islam and the Wonders of Creation: The Animal Kingdom”, “A Dance of Sparks: Imagery of Fire in Ghalib's Poetry”, “A Two-Coloured Brocade: The Imagery of Persian Poetry”, “Gabriel's Wing: Study into the Religious Ideas of Sir Muhammad Iqbal”, “I Am Wind, You Are Fire: The Life and Work of Rumi”, “Im Reich der Grossmoguls: Geschichte, Kunst, Kultur” (“The Empire of the Great Mughals: History, Art, and Culture”), “Classical Urdu Literature: From the Beginning to Iqbal”, “Islamic Literatures of India”, “Make a Shield from Wisdom: Selected Verses from Nasir-e Khosrow's Divan”, and “Pain and Grace: A Study of Two Mystical Writers of Eighteenth-Century Muslim India”,

12 solar years ago, on this day in 2006 AD, leading Pakistani Pashto political leader, Khan Abdul Wali Khan, died in Peshawar at the age of 90.  Son of the prominent Pashto Leader of British India, Khan Abdul-Ghaffar Khan, he was an activist in his father's non-violent movement against the British Raj. He was a member of the Indian National Congress Party, which opposed the creation of Pakistan on whose birth, he and his father became controversial figures in their homeland, the Khyber Province. A respected politician in his later years, Wali Khan as a social democrat, served as president of the National Awami Party of Pakistan. He contributed to Pakistan's third constitution and led protests for restoration of democracy in the 1960s and 1980s. In the 1970s, he served as opposition leader in Pakistan's first elected parliament.

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