The Hou Han Shu describes the sacrifices of the Southern Xiongnu after they had submitted to the Han.[1] By Xiongnu custom there were three yearly sacrifices, held on a wu day of the first, the fifth and the ninth month, and offered to the spirit of heaven.[1] The tribes gathered, discussed the affairs of the state, and ran horses and camels for pleasure.[1] This one sentence is the Xiongnu racing of the Chinese histories.[1] One English translation renders it as: the southern Xiongnu amused themselves on the same occasion by racing horses and camels.[2]

The sacrifices

The Hou Han Shu sets the line in the survey of Southern Xiongnu custom that follows the submission of the southern chanyu in AD 48.[1] Each sacrifice fell on the wu day, which the Shiji already names among the days that the Xiongnu held highest.[3] After the chanyu had submitted to the Han, he sacrificed to the Han emperor as well.[1] The months are those of the assemblies that the Shiji describes for the earlier Xiongnu, in the first and the fifth month and in autumn.[3] The assemblies are told in a separate article.

The sacrifices were also the time for gathering the tribes. In AD 47 two of the chanyu’s marquises denounced the prince Bi, the Yujian Rizhu king, to the chanyu at the dragon sacrifice of the fifth month.[1] In AD 88 the southern chanyu Tuntuhe wrote to the Han that he had ordered the tribes to ready their men and horses and to assemble on the river by the dragon sacrifice of the ninth month.[1] Both passages treat the sacrifice as a fixed point of the year at which the nobles and their forces were together.[1]

The races

The sentence reads 走馬及駱駝為樂. It follows the line on the council: the tribes “ran horses and camels for pleasure”.[1] The verb 走 means to run, and the histories use 走馬 in several settings.[4] In the Zhou Shu the Göktürk mourners ride round the tent of the dead seven times.[5] In the Wei Shu the Gaoche ride in circles of hundreds at their sacrifice. The emperor Taiwu climbs his new terrace at Changchuan in 426 to watch running horses.[6] The Hou Han Shu does not say whether the Xiongnu ran their animals against one another, circled with them or showed them one by one.[1] It gives no course, no riders and no prizes, and it names no winner.[1]

Horses and camels were both Xiongnu stock. The Shiji lists the horse, the ox and the sheep as their commonest animals and the camel among their rare ones.[7] In AD 50 the southern chanyu sent the Han court two camels and ten patterned horses.[1]

The dragon sacrifice

The text of the Hou Han Shu used here reads 歲有三歲祠, three yearly sacrifices.[1] Sima Zhen, who wrote a commentary on the Shiji under the Tang, quotes the same line from the Hou Han Shu as 歲有三龍祠, three dragon sacrifices, and ends the quotation at the words “sacrifice to the spirit of heaven”.[7] His quotation does not contain the races.[7] The word 龍祠 itself stands in the chapter, in the account of AD 47 and in the letter of AD 88, as the name of the sacrifice of the fifth and the ninth month.[1] At the end of the chapter, its closing verdict says that the Han armies “broke the dragon sacrifice”, 遂破龍祠, in their pursuit of the northern Xiongnu.[1] The version with the dragon is the better attested of the two.[3] One study of the Xiongnu lands interprets the line as three Dragon Festivals, held in the first, fifth and ninth months. It regards the great gathering of the fifth month at Longcheng, which the Shiji describes, as the most important of them.[2] The same study holds that the Shiji and the Hou Han Shu describe one custom in different words.[2]

Other races

The Hou Han Shu names horse and camel running only for the Southern Xiongnu.[1] The Wei Shu uses the same words of the great sacrifice of five Gaoche tribes under the Wei emperor Wencheng. Tens of thousands gathered, ran horses, killed victims, circled and sang.[8] That sacrifice is told in gaoche-great-sacrifice. The Zhou Shu and the Sui Shu name no running of horses at the fifth-month sacrifice of the Göktürks.[9] The sentence on the Xiongnu is the only one of its kind for its people.[1]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Hou Han Shu, juan 89
  2. ^ a b c Kurakichi 1930, p. 25–26
  3. ^ a b c Hou Han Shu, juan 89; Shiji, juan 110
  4. ^ Zhou Shu (Book of Zhou), juan 50; Wei Shu, juan 103; Wei Shu, juan 4
  5. ^ Zhou Shu (Book of Zhou), juan 50
  6. ^ Wei Shu, juan 103; Wei Shu, juan 4
  7. ^ a b c Shiji, juan 110
  8. ^ Wei Shu, juan 103
  9. ^ Zhou Shu (Book of Zhou), juan 50; Sui Shu (Book of Sui), juan 84

Sources

Literature

  • Shiratori Kurakichi, On the Territory of the Hsiung-nu Prince Hsiu-t'u Wang and His Metal Statues for Heaven-worship (1930)

Related

What links here3

Institutions and Titles
Camels
Religions
Horse Sacrifice
Customs & Pastimes
Culture of the Turkic Peoples

Cite this article

Yavuz, Emre-E. “Horse and Camel Races at the Xiongnu Sacrifices.” Turkic Atlas, revised 8 November 2026. https://turkicatlas.org/customs/xiongnu-horse-and-camel-races/

Last revised: 8 November 2026