The Iron Oath

Mahmud al-Kashgari records an oath on iron in his dictionary of the Turkic languages, under the word tämür, iron.^[1] The entry gives the meaning of the word and then a proverb. After the proverb Kashgari says that the word has another meaning also, and he describes the oath.^[1]

The oath

The Qirqiz, the Yabaqu, the Qifchaq and others made alliances in this way. When they entered into an alliance with a person, or became party to a contract with him, they placed an unsheathed sword crosswise before him.^[1] Then they said bu kök kirsün qizil čiqsün.^[1] Kashgari renders the words as “May this iron go in blue and come out red”, and he glosses “red” as “bloody”.^[1] The speaker said it for the case that he broke the treaty.^[1]

Kashgari explains the oath. The man who swore would be killed by iron, so that the iron might be avenged upon him. The reason is that the people held iron to possess great power.^[1]

The proverb

The proverb before the oath is kök tämür kerü turmās.^[1] Kashgari translates it as “The blue iron does not come to rest ineffectually”. He explains that iron wounds when it strikes something.^[1] The word kök, blue, stands in both the proverb and the oath. In the oath Kashgari supplies “iron” in brackets, so that the blue thing is the drawn blade.

Date and peoples

Kashgari wrote his dictionary in the 1070s, so the oath belongs to the eleventh century.^[2] It is not a record of the Göktürk age. Kashgari does not say how old the custom was.^[1] The Qirqiz are the Kirghiz, and the Qifchaq are the Kipchak. Kashgari names the Yabaqu without further description in this entry.^[1]

The Göktürks swore oaths of their own kind, which the article on the Göktürk oath tells.