An Enigmatic Genealogical Chart of the Timurids: A Testimony to the Dynasty’s Claim to Yasavi-ʿAlid Legitimacy?*

This article discusses a genealogical chart drawn in the second half of the fifteenth century that presents a hitherto unknown genealogy as that of the Timurids. A close reading of the genealogy reveals that it presents a pattern of legitimation prevalent among the Yasavi Sufis of Central Asia. The genealogy is based on an Islamization narrative featuring holy warriors purportedly descended from Muḥammad b. al-Ḥanafiyya who supposedly ruled the area corresponding to the former domains of the historical Chaghatay Khanate, the body politic from which the Timurids emerged. The inventor of the genealogy, however, remains unknown.