Turkic migration
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The main migration (expansion) of Turkic peoples occurred between the 6th and 11th centuries (the Early Middle Ages), when they spread across most of Central Asia and into Europe and the Middle East.
By the 10th century, most of Central Asia, formerly dominated by Iranian peoples, was settled by Turkic tribes. The Seljuk Turks from the 11th century invaded Anatolia, ultimately resulting in permanent Turkic settlement there and the establishment of Turkey.
The population ancestral to the Turks is thought to be that of the Xiong Nu of Mongolia or along the upper Yenissei in Siberia (the areal of the contemporary Tuvan language), known from historical sources from ca. 200 BC (Holster, 1993). Around 50 BC, the Han Chinese expelled the Xiong Nu from their homeland resulting in the Hunnic migrations. The first reference to "Turks" (Tu Kiu) appears in Chinese sources of the 6th century, apparently referring to a sub-tribe of a successor kingdom to the Xiong Nu. Earliest evidence of Turkic languages as a separate group is from Orkhon inscriptions of the early 8th century.
The precise date of the initial expansion from the early homeland remains unknown. The first state known as "Turk", giving its name to the many states and peoples afterwards, was that of the Gokturks (gök = "blue" or "celestial") in the 6th century AD. The head of the Asena clan led his people from Li-jien (modern Zhelai Zhai) to the Rouran seeking inclusion in their confederacy and protection from China. His tribe were famed metal smiths and were granted land near a mountain quarry which looked like a helmet from which they got their name 突厥. A century later their power had increased such that they conquered the Rouruan and set about establishing their Gok Empire.
Later Turkic peoples include the Karluks (mainly 8th century), Uyghurs, Kirghiz, Oghuz (or Guz, Uz, Ghuzz, e.t.c.) Turks, and Turkmens. As these peoples were founding states in the area between Mongolia and Transoxiana, they came into contact with Muslims, and most gradually adopted Islam. However, there were also (and still are) small groups of Turkic people belonging to other religions, including Christians, Jews (see Khazars), Buddhists, and Zoroastrians.
Turkic soldiers in the army of the Abbasid caliphs emerged as the de facto rulers of much of the Muslim Middle East (apart from Syria and Egypt) from the 13th century. The Oghuz and other tribes captured and dominated various countries under the leadership of the Seljuk dynasty, and eventually captured the territories of the Abbasid dynasty and the Byzantine Empire.
Meanwhile, the Kyrghyz and Uyghurs were struggling with one another and with the Chinese Empire. The Kyrghyz people ultimately settled in the region now referred to as Kyrgyzstan. The Tatar peoples conquered the Volga Bulgars in what is today Tatarstan, following the westward sweep of the Mongols under Genghis Khan in the 13th century. Other Bulgars settled in Europe in the 7-8th centuries, but were assimilated by the Slavs, giving the name to the Bulgarians and the Slavic Bulgarian language.
[edit] References
- Findley, Carter Vaughnm, The Turks in World History, Oxford University Press: Oxford (2005).
- Holster, Charles Warren, The Turks of Central Asia Praeger: Westport, CT (1993).
