Ogurs

Rouran epoch Göktürk epoch Uyghur epoch Kirghiz epoch

Rouran First Göktürk Tang rule Second Göktürk Uyghur Kirghiz Huns Western Göktürk Türgesh Karluk Khazar

Rouran 400–554
First Göktürk 552–630
Tang rule 630–682
Second Göktürk 682–744
Uyghur 744–840
Kirghiz 840–924
Huns 370–469
Western Göktürk 552–659
Türgesh 699–766
Karluk 766–800
Khazar 650–969

The Ogurs were a steppe people of the Pontic–Caspian country. The sources name them first about 463 and last in the accounts of the Avar and Göktürk conquests of the later sixth century.^[1] On his way home from Istemi’s court, the Roman envoy Zemarchos came to the chief of the Ugurs. This chief “maintained there the power of Dizaboulos”, that is, of Istemi.^[2]

Name and first appearance

ΟὔρωγοιGreekPriscus
ΟὐγοῦροιGreekMenander Protector
ʾwgrSyriac
ὈγώρGreekTheophylact Simocatta

About 463 the Saragurs, the Ogurs and the Onogurs sent envoys to the eastern Romans.^[3] Priscus records the embassy. He says that these peoples had been driven from their seats in a fight with the Sabirs, whom the Abares had expelled in turn.^[4] The Greek text writes the name Οὔρωγοι, which is understood as Ogurs.^[3] The Syriac list of peoples in the chronicle of Pseudo-Zacharias counts the Ogurs separately from the Onogurs, the Sabirs and the Bulgars.^[5]

Language

Modern accounts hold that the Ogurs spoke a form of Turkic that differed markedly from the language of the runic inscriptions.^[6] The Oguric languages survive today only in Chuvash and in the scattered fragments of Volga and Danubian Bulgar.^[6] The name Ogur answers to Oguz under the regular correspondence of r and z between the two branches of Turkic. The two peoples are not thereby one.^[7] One conjecture places the Oguric tribes in the western wing of the Tiele before they came west.^[8]

Under the Göktürks

By the 560s the Göktürks had established their hegemony over the nomads of the western steppe, the Ogurs among them.^[9] Zemarchos returned from his embassy to Istemi. He crossed the Ikh, the Daikh and the Attila, and then came “again to the Ugurs”.^[2] The three rivers are identified as the Emba, the Ural and the Volga.^[10] The Ugurs told the envoys that four thousand Persians lay in ambush in the thickets by the river Kophen.^[2] Their chief filled skins with water and gave them to the Romans for the waterless crossing.^[2]

The manuscript has Οὐγοῦροι at this point, and an old emendation reads Utigurs. The text itself does not settle it.^[11] Some scholars identify these Ugurs as Ogurs west of the Volga and their ruler as the khagan’s principal deputy in that region.^[12] Others place them between the Volga and the Kuma, which Menander calls the Kophen. They hold them apart from the Utigurs of the Sea of Azov.^[13] Modern accounts also distinguish the Ugurs of the Volga from the Uyghurs of the Mongolian steppe. The identification had been proposed and was withdrawn by its author.^[14]

In 598 a Göktürk khagan wrote to the emperor Maurice that he had subdued all the Ogor.^[15] They lived toward the east, on the river Til, which the Göktürks called the Black. Their oldest chiefs were called Var and Chunni.^[15] Theophylact preserves the letter. He is the second Greek witness to the Ogurs after Menander.^[1] Some scholars identify the Til with the Volga and the Ogor with the Ogurs. They allow that the name may be a garbling of Uyghur.^[16] Others identify the Til with the Tola in Mongolia.^[17]

The Ogurs thus appear twice in the sources. In 463 they appear as refugees from the east. A century later they appear as the Göktürks’ deputies beyond the Volga.

References

^ a b Golden 1992, p. 100
^ a b c d Menander Protector
^ a b Golden 1992, p. 92
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 30, p. 104
^ Golden 1992, p. 97
^ a b Golden 1992, p. 95
^ Golden 1992, p. 96
^ Golden 1992, p. 93
^ Golden 1992, p. 128
^ Golden 1992, p. 129-130
^ Menander Protector; Dindorf 1871, p. 55
^ Golden 1992, p. 130
^ Marquart 1903, p. 504-505
^ Marquart 1903, p. 45-46
^ a b Theophylact Simocatta; Chavannes 1903, p. 247
^ Golden 1992, p. 101-102
^ Chavannes 1903, p. 250

Sources

Literature

Peter B. Golden, An Introduction to the History of the Turkic Peoples (1992)
Josef Marquart, Osteuropäische und ostasiatische Streifzüge (1903)
Édouard Chavannes, Documents sur les Tou-Kiue (Turcs) occidentaux (1903)
Karl Müller (ed.), Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, Bd. IV (darin: Menandri Protectoris fragmenta, griechisch mit lateinischer Übersetzung) (1851)
Ludwig Dindorf (ed.), Historici Graeci minores, Bd. II: Menander Protector et Agathias (1871)
anonymous, Chronicle of Pseudo-Zachariah Rhetor (ca. 568/569)