Assassination of Nader Shah

June 20, 1747

The Persian conqueror, by then paranoid, half-blind, and cruel beyond his own men's endurance, was cut down in his tent by his own guards. His empire collapsed within days. One of his Afghan commanders, Ahmad Shah Abdali, marched south and founded the Durrani dynasty, the origin of modern Afghanistan. Nader's plundered treasures, including the Koh-i-Noor diamond, scattered across a dozen successor courts.