History of Karluks, a important Turkic people. (First Part)
The Karluks were a prominent nomadic Turkic tribal confederacy residing in the regions of Kara-Irtysh (Black Irtysh) and the Tarbagatai Mountains west of the Altay Mountains in Central Asia.
The majority of Uzbeks and Uyghurs indeed descend from Karluk tribes, and their languages are part of the Karluk subgroup, making them linguistically and historically distinct from other Turkic peoples like Kazakhs (Kipchak) or Turkmens (Oghuz). A section of the Hazara people are considered to be descended from the Karluks.
Karluks were known as a coherent ethnic group (with autonomous status within the Göktürk khaganate and an independent one in their subsequent states of the Karluk yabghu, Karakhanids and Qarlughids) before being absorbed in the Chagatai Khanate of the Mongol Empire.
• Early history :
The first Chinese reference to the Karluks (644) labels them with a Manichaean attribute: Lion Karluks ("Shi-Geluolu", "shi" stands for Sogdian "lion"). The "lion" (Turkish: arslan) Karluks persisted up to the time of the Mongols.
In the Early Middle Ages, three member tribes of the Göktürk Khaganate formed the Uch-Karluk (Three Karluks) union; initially, the union's leader bore the title Elteber, later elevated to Yabgu. After the split of the khaganate around 600 into the Western and Eastern khaganates, the Uch-Karluks (三姓葛邏祿), along with Chuyue (處月; later as Shatuo 沙陀), Chumi (處蜜), Gusu (姑蘇), and Beishi (卑失) became subordinate to the Western Turkic Khaganate. After the Göktürks' downfall, the Karluk confederation would later incorporate other Turkic tribes like the Chigils, Tuhsi, Azkishi, Türgesh, Khalaj, Čaruk, Barsqan, as well as Iranian Sogdians and West Asian and Central Asian migrants.
In 630, Ashina Helu, the Ishbara Qaghan of the Eastern Turkic Khaganate, was captured by the Chinese. His heir apparent, the "lesser Khan" Hubo, escaped to Altai with a major part of the people and 30,000 soldiers. He conquered the Karluks in the west, the Kyrgyz in the north, and took the title Yizhuchebi Khagan.
The Karluks allied with the Tiele and their leaders the Uyghurs against the Turkic Khaganate, and participated in enthroning the victorious head of the Uyghurs (Toquz Oghuz). After that, a smaller part of the Karluks joined the Uyghurs and settled in the Bogdo-Ola mountains in Mongolia, the larger part settled in the area between Altai and the eastern Tian Shan.
In 650, at the time of their submission to the Chinese, the Karluks had three tribes: Mouluo 謀落/Moula 謀剌 (*Bulaq), Chisi 熾俟 or Suofu 娑匐 (*Sebeg), and Tashili 踏實力 (*Taşlïq). On paper, the Karluk divisions received Chinese names as Chinese provinces, and their leaders received Chinese state titles. Later, the Karluks spread from the valley of the river Kerlyk along the Irtysh River in the western part of the Altai to beyond the Black Irtysh, Tarbagatai, and towards the Tian Shan.
By the year 665 the Karluk union was led by a chief known as Uch-Karluk bey (lit. 'King of the Three Karluk Tribes'). The Karluk leaders held the title Kül-Erkin as vassals of Göktürks, a rank of medium importance in the First Turkic Khaganate. The Karluk vanguard left the Altai region and at the beginning of the 8th century reached the banks of the Amu Darya.
In 742, the Uyghurs, Karluks, and Basmyls rebelled against the Second Turkic Khaganate. During the year 742, the Karluk chief were named “Saɣ Yabghu” (Right Yabghu) by Basmyl khagan Ashina Shi. Like the Basmyls, they were ruled by a branch of the Ashina tribe. In 744, the Basmyls captured the Turkic capital of Ötüken and killed the reigning Özmiş Khagan. However the reign of Basmyl was cut short. Later that year, a Uyghur-Karluk alliance formed against the Basmyls and defeated them. Their khagan was killed, and the Basmyls ceased to exist as a people. Uyghur Khagan gave the Saɣ Yabghu a new and higher title: “Sol Yabghu” (Left Yabghu). Hostilities between the Uyghurs and Karluks then forced the Karluks to migrate west into Zhetysu and conflict with the Türgesh, whom they defeated and conquered in 766.
They remained in the Chinese sphere of influence and an active participant in fighting the Muslim expansion into the area, up until their split from the Tang in 751. Chinese intervention in the affairs of Western Turkestan ceased after their defeat at the Battle of Talas in 751 by the Arab general Ziyad ibn Salih. The Arabs dislodged the Karluks from Fergana.
In 766, after they overran the Türgesh in Jetisu, the Karluk tribes formed a Khanate under the rule of a Yabghu, occupied Suyab and transferred their capital there. By that time the bulk of the tribe had left the Altai, and the supremacy in Jetisu passed to the Karluks. Their ruler with the title Yabghu is often mentioned in the Orkhon inscriptions. In Pahlavi texts one of the Karluk rulers of Tocharistan was called Yabbu-Hakan (Yabghu-Khagan). The fall of the Western Turkic Kaganate left Jetisu in the possession of Turkic peoples, independent of either Arabs or Chinese.
• Peoples and Culture under the Karluk Yabgu State :
The Karluks were hunters, nomadic herdsmen, and agriculturists. They settled in the countryside and in the cities, which were centered on trading posts along the caravan roads. The Karluks inherited a vast multi-ethnic region, whose diverse population was not much different from its rulers. The region of Jetisu was populated by several tribes: the Azes (mentioned in the Orkhon inscriptions) and the Tuhsi, remnants of the Türgesh; as well as the Shatuo Turks (沙陀突厥) (lit. "Sandy Slope Turks", i.e. "Desert Turks") of Western Turkic origins, and the interspersing Sogdian colonies. The southern part of Jetisu was occupied by the Yagma people, who also held Kashgar. In the north and west lived the Kangly. Chigils, who had joined and been a significant division of the Three-Karluks, then detached and resided around Issyk Kul.
The diverse population adhered to a spectrum of religious beliefs. The Karluks and the majority of the Turkic population professed Tengrianism, considered as shamanism and heathen by the Christians and Muslims. The Karluks converted to Nestorian Christianity at the end of the 8th century CE, about 15 years after they established themselves in the Jetisu region. This was the first time the Church of the East received such major sponsorship by an eastern power. Particularly, the Chigil tribe were Christians of the Nestorian denomination. The majority of the Toquz Oghuz, with their khan, were Manicheans, but there were also Christians, Buddhists, and Muslims among them.
The peaceful penetration of Muslim culture through commercial relations played a far more important role in their conversion than Muslim arms. The merchants were followed by missionaries of various creeds, including Nestorian Christians. Many Turkestan towns had Christian churches. The Turks held sacred the Qastek pass mountains, believing to be an abode of the deity. Each creed carried its script, resulting in a variety of used scripts, including Turkic runiform, Sogdian, Syriac, and later the Uygur. The Karluks had adopted and developed the Turkic literary language of Khwarazm, established in Bukhara and Samarkand, which after the Mongol conquest became known as the Chagatai language.
Of all Turkic peoples, the Karluks were most open to the influence of Muslim culture. Yaqubi reported the conversion of the Karluk-yabghu to Islam under Caliph Mahdi (775–785), and by the 10th century, several places to the east of Talas had mosques. Muslim culture had affected the general way of life of the Karluks.
During the next three centuries, the Karluk Yabgu state (later Kara-Khanid Khanate) occupied a key position on the international trade route, fighting off mostly Turkic competitors to retain their prime position. Their biggest adversaries were Kangly in the northwest and Toquz Oghuz in the southeast, with a period of Samanid raids to Jetisu in 840–894. But even in the heyday of the Karluk Yabgu state, parts of its domains were in the hands of the Toquz Oghuz, and later under Kyrgyz and Khitan control, increasing the ethnical, religious, and political diversity.
The Heroic Khan
History of Karluks, a important Turkic people. (First Part)
The Karluks were a prominent nomadic Turkic tribal confederacy residing in the regions of Kara-Irtysh (Black Irtysh) and the Tarbagatai Mountains west of the Altay Mountains in Central Asia.
The majority of Uzbeks and Uyghurs indeed descend from Karluk tribes, and their languages are part of the Karluk subgroup, making them linguistically and historically distinct from other Turkic peoples like Kazakhs (Kipchak) or Turkmens (Oghuz). A section of the Hazara people are considered to be descended from the Karluks.
Karluks were known as a coherent ethnic group (with autonomous status within the Göktürk khaganate and an independent one in their subsequent states of the Karluk yabghu, Karakhanids and Qarlughids) before being absorbed in the Chagatai Khanate of the Mongol Empire.
• Early history :
The first Chinese reference to the Karluks (644) labels them with a Manichaean attribute: Lion Karluks ("Shi-Geluolu", "shi" stands for Sogdian "lion"). The "lion" (Turkish: arslan) Karluks persisted up to the time of the Mongols.
In the Early Middle Ages, three member tribes of the Göktürk Khaganate formed the Uch-Karluk (Three Karluks) union; initially, the union's leader bore the title Elteber, later elevated to Yabgu. After the split of the khaganate around 600 into the Western and Eastern khaganates, the Uch-Karluks (三姓葛邏祿), along with Chuyue (處月; later as Shatuo 沙陀), Chumi (處蜜), Gusu (姑蘇), and Beishi (卑失) became subordinate to the Western Turkic Khaganate. After the Göktürks' downfall, the Karluk confederation would later incorporate other Turkic tribes like the Chigils, Tuhsi, Azkishi, Türgesh, Khalaj, Čaruk, Barsqan, as well as Iranian Sogdians and West Asian and Central Asian migrants.
In 630, Ashina Helu, the Ishbara Qaghan of the Eastern Turkic Khaganate, was captured by the Chinese. His heir apparent, the "lesser Khan" Hubo, escaped to Altai with a major part of the people and 30,000 soldiers. He conquered the Karluks in the west, the Kyrgyz in the north, and took the title Yizhuchebi Khagan.
The Karluks allied with the Tiele and their leaders the Uyghurs against the Turkic Khaganate, and participated in enthroning the victorious head of the Uyghurs (Toquz Oghuz). After that, a smaller part of the Karluks joined the Uyghurs and settled in the Bogdo-Ola mountains in Mongolia, the larger part settled in the area between Altai and the eastern Tian Shan.
In 650, at the time of their submission to the Chinese, the Karluks had three tribes: Mouluo 謀落/Moula 謀剌 (*Bulaq), Chisi 熾俟 or Suofu 娑匐 (*Sebeg), and Tashili 踏實力 (*Taşlïq). On paper, the Karluk divisions received Chinese names as Chinese provinces, and their leaders received Chinese state titles. Later, the Karluks spread from the valley of the river Kerlyk along the Irtysh River in the western part of the Altai to beyond the Black Irtysh, Tarbagatai, and towards the Tian Shan.
By the year 665 the Karluk union was led by a chief known as Uch-Karluk bey (lit. 'King of the Three Karluk Tribes'). The Karluk leaders held the title Kül-Erkin as vassals of Göktürks, a rank of medium importance in the First Turkic Khaganate. The Karluk vanguard left the Altai region and at the beginning of the 8th century reached the banks of the Amu Darya.
In 742, the Uyghurs, Karluks, and Basmyls rebelled against the Second Turkic Khaganate. During the year 742, the Karluk chief were named “Saɣ Yabghu” (Right Yabghu) by Basmyl khagan Ashina Shi. Like the Basmyls, they were ruled by a branch of the Ashina tribe. In 744, the Basmyls captured the Turkic capital of Ötüken and killed the reigning Özmiş Khagan. However the reign of Basmyl was cut short. Later that year, a Uyghur-Karluk alliance formed against the Basmyls and defeated them. Their khagan was killed, and the Basmyls ceased to exist as a people. Uyghur Khagan gave the Saɣ Yabghu a new and higher title: “Sol Yabghu” (Left Yabghu). Hostilities between the Uyghurs and Karluks then forced the Karluks to migrate west into Zhetysu and conflict with the Türgesh, whom they defeated and conquered in 766.
They remained in the Chinese sphere of influence and an active participant in fighting the Muslim expansion into the area, up until their split from the Tang in 751. Chinese intervention in the affairs of Western Turkestan ceased after their defeat at the Battle of Talas in 751 by the Arab general Ziyad ibn Salih. The Arabs dislodged the Karluks from Fergana.
In 766, after they overran the Türgesh in Jetisu, the Karluk tribes formed a Khanate under the rule of a Yabghu, occupied Suyab and transferred their capital there. By that time the bulk of the tribe had left the Altai, and the supremacy in Jetisu passed to the Karluks. Their ruler with the title Yabghu is often mentioned in the Orkhon inscriptions. In Pahlavi texts one of the Karluk rulers of Tocharistan was called Yabbu-Hakan (Yabghu-Khagan). The fall of the Western Turkic Kaganate left Jetisu in the possession of Turkic peoples, independent of either Arabs or Chinese.
• Peoples and Culture under the Karluk Yabgu State :
The Karluks were hunters, nomadic herdsmen, and agriculturists. They settled in the countryside and in the cities, which were centered on trading posts along the caravan roads. The Karluks inherited a vast multi-ethnic region, whose diverse population was not much different from its rulers. The region of Jetisu was populated by several tribes: the Azes (mentioned in the Orkhon inscriptions) and the Tuhsi, remnants of the Türgesh; as well as the Shatuo Turks (沙陀突厥) (lit. "Sandy Slope Turks", i.e. "Desert Turks") of Western Turkic origins, and the interspersing Sogdian colonies. The southern part of Jetisu was occupied by the Yagma people, who also held Kashgar. In the north and west lived the Kangly. Chigils, who had joined and been a significant division of the Three-Karluks, then detached and resided around Issyk Kul.
The diverse population adhered to a spectrum of religious beliefs. The Karluks and the majority of the Turkic population professed Tengrianism, considered as shamanism and heathen by the Christians and Muslims. The Karluks converted to Nestorian Christianity at the end of the 8th century CE, about 15 years after they established themselves in the Jetisu region. This was the first time the Church of the East received such major sponsorship by an eastern power. Particularly, the Chigil tribe were Christians of the Nestorian denomination. The majority of the Toquz Oghuz, with their khan, were Manicheans, but there were also Christians, Buddhists, and Muslims among them.
The peaceful penetration of Muslim culture through commercial relations played a far more important role in their conversion than Muslim arms. The merchants were followed by missionaries of various creeds, including Nestorian Christians. Many Turkestan towns had Christian churches. The Turks held sacred the Qastek pass mountains, believing to be an abode of the deity. Each creed carried its script, resulting in a variety of used scripts, including Turkic runiform, Sogdian, Syriac, and later the Uygur. The Karluks had adopted and developed the Turkic literary language of Khwarazm, established in Bukhara and Samarkand, which after the Mongol conquest became known as the Chagatai language.
Of all Turkic peoples, the Karluks were most open to the influence of Muslim culture. Yaqubi reported the conversion of the Karluk-yabghu to Islam under Caliph Mahdi (775–785), and by the 10th century, several places to the east of Talas had mosques. Muslim culture had affected the general way of life of the Karluks.
During the next three centuries, the Karluk Yabgu state (later Kara-Khanid Khanate) occupied a key position on the international trade route, fighting off mostly Turkic competitors to retain their prime position. Their biggest adversaries were Kangly in the northwest and Toquz Oghuz in the southeast, with a period of Samanid raids to Jetisu in 840–894. But even in the heyday of the Karluk Yabgu state, parts of its domains were in the hands of the Toquz Oghuz, and later under Kyrgyz and Khitan control, increasing the ethnical, religious, and political diversity.
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