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The Küli Čor inscription is a runiform stele from Ikhe Khushotu in central Mongolia. It was put up for Küli Čor, a lord of the Tardush in the time of the Second Khaganate.[1] Kotwicz found the stele, and Samoylovich translated it into French. Both published in 1928.[2] According to Orkun they printed photographs and no text.[2] Orkun then printed the photographs again with his own reading and a Turkish translation. Tekin’s transliteration of 2003 restores more words in the broken places.[3] The latest edition named in a catalogue of the runiform texts of Mongolia is that of Clauson and Tryjarski of 1971.[4]

The stele has twenty-nine lines: twelve on the west face, thirteen on the east face and four on the north face.[2]

The name

  • Ikhe Khushotu inscriptionEnglish
  • Kül İç Čor inscriptionEnglish

Orkun and Tekin read the name Küli Čor. Orkun notes that the same name is recorded as Kül Čor and Külüg Čor.[2] The catalogue of 1983 and a study of 2023 read Kül İç Čor.[5] The text gives the dead man the style Ishbara Bilge Küli Čor.[6] Tekin’s glossary has čor as a high title.[7]

The Bilge Khan inscription names a Kül Čor at the head of the western Tardush begs.[8] Samoylovich took the Kül Čor who headed the Tardush in 716 for the owner of this stele.[2] Küli Čor ruled the Tardush people, according to the text.[6] The two names are therefore usually taken to be one man.

The text

The first two lines are broken. Orkun and Tekin both read there the name Tonyukuk, the word çıkan and a phrase for giving a name. In the second line they read that Küli Čor became Ishbara Çıkan Küli Čor.[9] Tekin glosses çıkan as “cousin” and restores the title Apa Tarkan before Çıkan Tonyukuk. Orkun has no such title.[10] Tekin’s glossary lists Apa Tarkan as the title of the man whom the Chinese call Ashide Yuanzhen, and Tonyukuk as Buyla Baga Tarkan.[11] The restoration is Tekin’s, and he does not say whether the words name one man or two.

The dead man grew old in the realm of a khan whose name is partly lost. Orkun reads Ilterish, and Tekin restores Kapgan. He lived to eighty.[9] The text says that when there was battle he organised the army.[6]

Four battles were fought at a place called Beš Balık, and Küli Čor charged the enemy in them.[6] He fought many battles against the Chinese, and the text says that his heroic virtue kept his fame.[6] Then he went on, crossed the Pearl River and campaigned as far as the Iron Gate and the Tezik.[12] Orkun translates the first word of that clause as “west”.[13] He fought seven battles against the Toquz Oghuz. He fought five against the Kitan and the Tatabı. Tekin reads that in them Küli Čor was the counsellor and commander, and Orkun’s translation has him as a hero and brave man.[14] The Karluks became his enemies, and he rode against them.[14]

Tekin reads in his edition of 2003 that at the age of seven Küli Čor killed a gazelle, and at nine a wild boar. Orkun’s translation leaves a gap at this place.[15] A study of the hunt understands the two ages as the first hunts of a youth who is proving himself, and sees in the deed the one by which a man won his name. The stone does not use the words er at.[16] See also Er at, the man’s name won by a deed.

The passage has been read otherwise. In his first edition of 1968 Tekin read the word azıglıg as “ferocious”, and he took the object of the killing for nine men, not a boar.[17] Clauson and Tryjarski, Hayashi and Ōsawa, Erdal and Berta read a boar, as Tekin does later.[18] Hayashi and Ōsawa and Berta take the first animal for a young wild goat in place of a gazelle.[19] A study of 2007 takes azıglıg, here and in an epitaph from the Uibat valley, for “wild, ferocious” and not for “tusked”.[20]

He died in battle. He charged the enemy alone and was soon dead.[21] The verb is the idiom kärgäk bol-, which stands in the Kül Tegin inscription too.[22]

The khan’s younger brother came, and four tegins came after him. The funeral of Küli Čor was held, and a bädiz was made for him. Tekin’s glossary gives bädiz as “decoration, picture, statue”, and Orkun translates “statue”.[23] Tekin reads the khan’s brother as El Čor Tegin. Orkun’s text has a gap before čor tegin.[21] The son, Yigän Čor, came, and many people gathered and mourned.[24]

The writer then speaks. Tekin reads Bän Tärbän män, “I am Tärbän”.[25] Orkun prints bentez ben at that place and does not translate it.[26] The catalogue of 1983 names Bantır, with a query, as the man who had the stone put up.[27] The last line says that the writer had as much written as he knew and understood.[28] A study of the writer’s task quotes the clause as bilmäz biligin biltökümün ödökümün bunça bitig bitidim and takes it as a statement that he wrote so much text from what he knew and remembered.[29]

The Tezik

Samoylovich took the Tezik for the Muslim Arabs, and Orkun agrees.[30] Tekin’s glossary has the word as the name of the Tajiks.[31] The march to the Iron Gate and the Tezik suits either interpretation.

The date

The text names the khan under whom the dead man grew old, and the editors read that name differently. Orkun has Ilterish and concludes only that the stone belongs to the eighth century.[2] Tekin restores Kapgan.[32] Kapgan was the younger brother of Ilterish and khan from 691 to 716.[33] The two proposals therefore set the old age of the dead man in one of two reigns, Ilterish’s or Kapgan’s.

Tekin dates the stone 719 to 723 in 1998 and 722 to 723 in 2003.[34] A survey of the Turkic languages that he wrote with Ölmez has about 720 to 725.[35] The catalogue of 1983 has about 723 to 725.[27] The catalogue refers to a redating by Bazin as well.[4]

References

  1. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 135; 225–226; Tekin 2003, p. 135; 225–226
  2. ^ a b c d e f Orkun 1994, p. 135
  3. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 136–151; 225–226; Tekin 2003, p. 136–151; 225–226
  4. ^ a b Sertkaya 1983, p. 73
  5. ^ Sertkaya 1983, p. 72–73; 1127; Tuncel 2023, p. 72–73; 1127
  6. ^ a b c d e Orkun 1994, p. 137; 225; Tekin 2003, p. 137; 225
  7. ^ Tekin 2003, p. 242
  8. ^ Tekin o. J., p. 79
  9. ^ a b Orkun 1994, p. 136; 225; Tekin 2003, p. 136; 225
  10. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 136; 225, 242; Tekin 2003, p. 136; 225, 242
  11. ^ Tekin 2003, p. 238, 242
  12. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 138; 225–226; Tekin 2003, p. 138; 225–226
  13. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 138
  14. ^ a b Orkun 1994, p. 138; 226; Tekin 2003, p. 138; 226
  15. ^ Tekin 2003, p. 226; 138; 1127; Orkun 1994, p. 226; 138; 1127; Tuncel 2023, p. 226; 138; 1127
  16. ^ Tuncel 2023, p. 1127
  17. ^ Aydın 2007, p. 16
  18. ^ Aydın 2007, p. 17
  19. ^ Aydın 2007, p. 16–17
  20. ^ Aydın 2007, p. 15–18
  21. ^ a b Orkun 1994, p. 139; 226; Tekin 2003, p. 139; 226
  22. ^ Tekin 2003, p. 226, 247
  23. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 139; 226, 238; Tekin 2003, p. 139; 226, 238
  24. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 139–140; 226; Tekin 2003, p. 139–140; 226
  25. ^ Tekin 2003, p. 226, 254
  26. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 140
  27. ^ a b Sertkaya 1983, p. 72–73
  28. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 140; 226; Tekin 2003, p. 140; 226
  29. ^ Aydın 2013, p. 20
  30. ^ Orkun 1994, p. 141
  31. ^ Tekin 2003, p. 254
  32. ^ Tekin 2003, p. 225
  33. ^ Jiu Tangshu (Old Book of Tang), juan 194
  34. ^ Tekin o. J., p. 10–11; 225; Tekin 2003, p. 10–11; 225
  35. ^ Tekin 2003, p. 20

Sources

Literature

  • Hüseyin Namık Orkun, Eski Türk Yazıtları (1994)
  • Talât Tekin, Orhon Türkçesi Grameri (2003)
  • Talât Tekin, Orhon Yazıtları. Kül Tigin, Bilge Kağan, Tunyukuk (o. J.)
  • Talât Tekin; Mehmet Ölmez, Türk Dilleri: Giriş (2003)
  • Osman Fikri Sertkaya, Köl Tigin’in Ölümünün 1250. Yıl Dönümü Dolayısı ile Moğolistan Halk Cumhuriyeti’ndeki Köktürk Harfli Metinler Üzerinde Yapılan Arkeolojik ve Filolojik Çalışmalara Toplu Bir Bakış (1983)
  • Riza Tuncel, Eski Türk Avcılığının İnançsal ve Ritüelistik Boyutları (2023)
  • Erhan Aydın, Uybat VI (E98) Yazıtında Geçen Azıglıg Kelimesi Üzerine Bir Anlamlandırma Denemesi (2007)
  • Erhan Aydın, Tariat Yazıtı’nın kuzey yüzünün 5. satırı üzerine yeni okuma ve anlamlandırma önerileri (2013)

Related

What links here5

Religions
Stone Figures
Languages
Old Turkic
Customs & Pastimes
Er At
Sources
Kül Tegin inscription · Tonyukuk inscription

Cite this article

Yavuz, Emre-E. “Küli Čor inscription.” Turkic Atlas, revised 8 November 2026. https://turkicatlas.org/sources/kuli-chor-inscription/

Last revised: 8 November 2026