The early Middle Ages: social change and the first states

The early Middle Ages cover the period after the Kangju state and the Kushan kingdom (roughly the 4th–8th centuries). Towns multiplied and became centres of crafts and trade. In the oases new canals were dug and devices such as the water mill and the noria were used, so harvests grew and the demand for farm produce rose. Part of the newly reclaimed land passed to tribal chiefs and village elders and became hereditary property, and in this way a class of large landowners, the dehqons, took shape. By controlling the distribution of water they increased their influence over the people around them. Free members of the village community were called kashovarzs; those who lost their land gradually became kadivars, dependent on the dehqons. Every large landowner had armed retainers called chokars. Even in the mid-5th century most irrigated land was still held by village communities.