Kurykan

The Kurykan are the Gulikan of the Tang histories. By the usual identification, they are also the Kurıkan of the Göktürk inscriptions.^[1] The Chinese place them north of the desert and the Uyghurs, in a land of lily grass and good horses that runs to the sea.^[2] The Göktürk inscriptions name them in two lists only. In one list they are among those who came to mourn the founders. In the other they are among the enemies of the restored khaganate.^[3]

In the Göktürk inscriptions

At the funeral of Bumin and Istemi, the Kül Tegin inscription says, mourners came from the sunrise. They were the Chinese, the Tibetans, the Avars, the Romans, the Kırgız, the Three Kurıkan, the Thirty Tatar, the Kıtañ and the Tatabı.^[3] The Bilge Khan inscription gives the same list.^[4]

The second list follows the fall and the restoration of the state. When Ilterish had gathered seven hundred men, the khan says, the Chinese were enemies in the south and the Nine Oguz in the north. “The Kırgız, the Kurıkan, the Thirty Tatar, the Kıtañ and the Tatabı — all of them were enemies.”^[3] Both lists name the peoples in the same order, with the Kurıkan between the Kırgız and the Tatar.^[3] The Bilge Khan inscription repeats the second list too.^[5] The Kül Tegin inscription records no campaign against the Kurykan.^[3]

In the Chinese record

The Zizhi Tongjian counts the Gulikan among fifteen Tiele tribes that lived north of the desert. It does so in a note on the earlier history of the Tiele under the year 627.^[6] The Xin Tangshu repeats the grouping.^[7] The Tongdian describes them as living north of the Hanhai, north of the Uyghurs. It gives them two irkins who lived together and 4,500 soldiers. The Xin Tangshu gives 5,000.^[8] Much of their grass was lily. Their country produced fine horses with heads like camels and strong bones, and the best of these ran several hundred li in a day.^[8] To the north the land reached the sea. Beyond it, the Chinese say, the day was long and the night short. When a sheep’s shoulder was set to cook at sunset, the east was already light before it was done.^[8]

In the eighth month of 647 the Gulikan sent an envoy to the Tang court with ten horses.^[9] Emperor Taizong thought the horses so remarkable that he gave each of the ten a name. The Xin Tangshu lists the names.^[10] The emperor sent the Yunhui general Kang Sumi to console the envoys. He made the Gulikan land the Xuanque prefecture.^[11] The Zizhi Tongjian adds that the irkin of the Gulikan became its prefect. It calls the Gulikan the farthest of the Tiele tribes.^[12] The Xin Tangshu says that the prefecture was renamed Yuwu in the years of Longshuo and placed under the Hanhai governor-generalate.^[7] The Gulikan came to court again in the first year of Yanzai, 694.^[13] In the same year of 647 the Dubo sent an envoy too. The Xin Tangshu says they did it on the occasion of the Gulikan’s visit.^[7]

Location

The Chinese text says that the Gulikan lived north of the Hanhai and farther from the capital than any other of the Tiele. It says that the Kirghiz country reached east as far as the Gulikan.^[11] Two translations of the Chinese place the land differently. In one it lies north of Lake Baikal as far as the Arctic Ocean. In the other it lies north of the desert and south of Lake Baikal.^[14] The reference literature puts them north of Lake Baikal.^[15] Rashīd ad-Dīn names a people Quri among the tribes near the lake. A later Chinese history puts a Guli near the Angara, the river that leaves the lake.^[16]

The name

KurıkanOld TurkicKül Tegin inscription
骨利幹ChineseXin Tangshu 217
QuriqanPersian

Three explanations of the name stand. One derives it from a Mongolic word qurigan, “lamb”, though no other evidence of Mongolic speech exists among them.^[15] The argument rests on the form of the word. One scholar analyses korıkan as Mongolic kori, “lamb”, with a Mongolic suffix -kan. The Turkic counterpart would then be kuzu. The scholar cites tribal names such as Ak Koyunlu and Kara Koyunlu in support.^[17] A second explanation notes that the Oghuz tradition has a word quriqan, “tent”. It leaves open whether this word is connected with the tribal name, since the first vowel of the name is uncertain.^[16] A third explanation counts them among the ancestors of the Yakuts. The same literature calls this by no means clear.^[15] The Muslim sources write a name Fūrī or Qūrī. The Furi article sets out their account of a forest people east of the Kirghiz and the argument whether it concerns the Kurykan.

The Kurykan and the Kirghiz

Some Kyrgyz scholars count the Kurykan among the peoples that the Kirghiz state took in. Their view rests on three points: the Chinese notice that the Kirghiz border reached them, a likeness between runiform inscriptions on the Lena and finds in the Kurykan country, and an epitaph from the Uibat valley.^[18] One editor understands the epitaph as a lament for a beg named Tirig. This beg took the league of the Üč Kurıkan and “was like a tusked boar” when he did. Another editor interprets the epitaph differently and identifies the enemy in the passage as an Uyghur khan.^[19] The same editor puts the stone in the first half of the eighth century. He concludes that the Kirghiz took the Kurykan in the time of their first khan, Bars Beg, a century before the later period of their power.^[19] A later Chinese history is cited for two statements. The Kurykan tribes “submit to the Jilizisi”, meaning the Kirghiz. Their language differs greatly from the language of the Jilizisi.^[20] The Yenisei inscriptions article treats the stone.

References

^ Golden 1992, p. 143–144
^ Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217; Tongdian, juan 200
^ a b c d e Kül Tegin inscription
^ Bilge Khan inscription; Ross 1930, p. 864
^ Bilge Khan inscription; Ross 1930, p. 865
^ Zizhi tongjian (Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance), juan 192
^ a b c Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217
^ a b c Tongdian, juan 200; Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217
^ Jiu Tangshu (Old Book of Tang), juan 3; Cefu yuangui, juan 970
^ Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217; Cefu yuangui, juan 970
^ a b Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217; Zizhi tongjian (Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance), juan 198
^ Zizhi tongjian (Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance), juan 198
^ Cefu yuangui, juan 970; Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217
^ Barthold 1927, p. 14
^ a b c Golden 1992, p. 144
^ a b Minorsky 1970, p. 284
^ Ercilasun 1990, p. 37
^ Kocobekov 2015, p. 18–19
^ a b Butanaev 2015, p. 6–8
^ Butanaev 2015, p. 7–8

Sources

Kül Tegin inscription
Bilge Khan inscription
Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217 (after Jiu Tangshu)
Tongdian, juan 200 (after Sui Shu and Zhou Shu)
Zizhi tongjian (Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance), juan 192, 198 (after Wei Shu, Zhou Shu, Sui Shu and Bei Shi)
Jiu Tangshu (Old Book of Tang), juan 3
Cefu yuangui, juan 970 (after Tongdian and Jiu Tangshu)

Literature

Peter B. Golden, An Introduction to the History of the Turkic Peoples (1992)
V. V. Barthold, Kirgizy: istoričeskij očerk [Киргизы: исторический очерк] (1927)
V. Minorsky, Ḥudūd al-ʿĀlam, "The Regions of the World": A Persian Geography 372 A.H. – 982 A.D., translated and explained, with the preface by V. V. Barthold, 2nd ed. (1970)
E. Denison Ross (after Vilhelm Thomsen), The Orkhon Inscriptions; The Tonyukuk Inscription. Being a Translation of Professor Vilhelm Thomsen's Final Danish Rendering (1930)
V. Ja. Butanaev, Literaturnoe nasledstvo enisejskich kyrgyzov vremën drevnetjurkskich kaganatov [Литературное наследство енисейских кыргызов времён древнетюркских каганатов] (2015)
Muratbek Kocobekov, Kırgızların Sayan-Altay Bölgesi'ndeki Komşuları (2015)
Ahmet Bican Ercilasun, Köl Tigin Yazıtı Bir Nutuk Metni midir? (1990)