Saman Khuda (Saman Khoda, Saman-khudat) was the founder of the Samanid dynasty – The House of Saman. He was a landowner from the village of Saman in Balkh province in northern Afghanistan, who arrived in the early 8th century in Merv to the court of the Caliphal governor of Khorasan, Asad ibn ‘Abd Allah al-Qasri (723-727), adopted Islam under his patronage, and named his son Asad in his honor. Caliph al-Mamun (786-833) subsequently appointed Asad's four sons – Saman Khuda's grandsons – to be rulers of Samarqand, Ferghana, Shash and Ustrushana, and Herat in recognition of their role in the suppression of a revolt against the Caliph. The Samanid dynasty was thus started, rising to its peak of glory during the rule of Saman Khuda's great-grandson Ismail Samani (892-907).
Saman was also a descendant of the Sasanian general Bahram Chobin in 4th or 5th generation, a noble of the ancient Iranian Mehran clan, who played an important role in the history of the later Sasanians. Saman was originally a Zoroastrian noble from Balkh province, who became so impressed with the piety of Asad ibn 'Abd-Allah al-Qasri, the Caliphal governor of Khorasan, that he converted to Islam.