Wesgird

Wesgird, also called Washjird, stood among the hills of the Ilyak valley east of Hissar, a border town of Tokharistan lying between mountains and steppe. Sogdian documents from the Mount Mugh fortress, written in the early eighth century, name it, and so does the Hudud al-Alam.

In the ninth century al-Yaʻqubi described it as the greatest Muslim frontier town, with a wide district holding some seven hundred fortresses, whose people were constantly at war with the Turks. By the tenth century it was as large as Termez. Amethyst was dug in the Ramit valley, and in the twelfth century al-Samʻani wrote of its famous ribats, where scholars and poets gathered. The walled ruins of Qalʻai Sangin on the Ilyak, with a citadel and a large medieval cemetery beside them, are usually identified with it.