In 698 Kapgan Khan, whom the Chinese call Mochuo, asked the Tang court for seed and farm tools.[1] The Xin Tang Shu adds a third item: iron to the number of tens of thousands of jin.[2] The court refused. Kapgan seized its envoy, and the court gave way.[3]
The request
In the Xianheng period, which ran from 670 to 674, many Göktürk groups had submitted to the Tang.[1] The court had settled most of them in six prefectures, Feng, Sheng, Ling, Xia, Shuo and Dai, and called them the surrendered households.[1]
In the first year of Shengli, 698, Kapgan sent a memorial.[1] He asked to be the empress’s son and said he had a daughter, for whom he asked a marriage alliance.[1] Then he demanded the surrendered households, the land of the Shanyu protectorate, farm tools and seed.[1]
The Xin Tang Shu gives the size of the demand.[2] Kapgan asked for 100,000 hu of millet seed, 3,000 farm tools and tens of thousands of jin of iron.[2] It places the request after his campaign against the Khitan, for which the court had named him khan and given him a high rank.[2]
Refusal and seizure of the envoy
The empress did not grant the request at first.[1] In the Xin Tang Shu the chancellor Li Qiao also advised against it.[2] Kapgan was enraged. He spoke insolently and held the Tang envoy, Tian Guidao, the Director of Receptions. The Jiu Tang Shu adds that he meant to harm him.[1]
The concession
The court feared his force. The minister Yao Shu proposed to allow the marriage alliance, and the Jiu Tang Shu has Yang Zaisi, a vice-director of the chancellery, propose it with him.[4] The court then drove out the surrendered households of the six prefectures, several thousand tents. It handed over seed of more than 40,000 shi and 3,000 farm tools.[1] The Jiu Tang Shu closes the passage with the words that Kapgan grew gradually stronger from this.[4] The Xin Tang Shu says that the court returned grain, tools and several thousand tents of surrendered households, and that the Göktürks became strong from it.[2]
The iron
The iron appears only in the list of the request.[2] The list of what the court gave names grain, tools and households.[2] The Jiu Tang Shu and the Tongdian name seed and tools only.[1] Whether iron was handed over is therefore not stated.[2]
The two histories also differ on the seed. The Xin Tang Shu gives the 100,000 hu that Kapgan asked for, and the Jiu Tang Shu gives the more than 40,000 shi that the court delivered.[3] The two figures describe two moments, the demand and the delivery.
The texts give no reason for the iron and no use for it.[2] A request for seed, farm tools and iron together shows that the khaganate wanted goods of the sown fields and of the forge from China. The article on the Chinese bans on the export of iron tells what the Chinese courts forbade to sell to the nomads.
Outcome
The marriage alliance did not follow. The Tang sent Wu Yanxiu, a prince of the empress’s family, as bridegroom, and Kapgan put him in confinement.[3] He then attacked the Tang frontier garrisons with about a hundred thousand horse, by the count of the Xin Tang Shu.[2] The article on Kapgan Khan tells the course of that war.
References
Sources
- Jiu Tangshu (Old Book of Tang), juan 194
- Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 215 (after Jiu Tangshu)
- Tongdian, juan 198 (after Sui Shu and Zhou Shu)
What links here2
- Places
- Shanyu Protectorate
- Institutions and Titles
- Chinese Bans on the Export of Iron
Cite this article
Yavuz, Emre-E. “Kapgan's Request for Farm Tools and Iron (698).” Turkic Atlas, revised 7 November 2026. https://turkicatlas.org/events/request-for-farm-tools-and-iron-698/
Last revised: 7 November 2026
