Kunçuy

Kunçuy names a woman of rank. It is the word that the Orkhon inscriptions use for the khan’s sister, and it stands among the women of the royal house in the lament on the north face of the Kül Tegin monument. The Yenisei epitaphs use it for the wife of the dead man.^[1] Turkic Atlas puts the word beside the other words for women under the katun.

In the Orkhon inscriptions

The Kül Tegin inscription tells how the Göktürks gave Bars Beg the title of khan and a wife. The khan says: kagan at bunta biz birtimiz. siŋilim kunçuyug birtimiz, “we gave him the title of khan here, and we gave him my sister, the princess.”^[2] The same line is quoted from the Bilge Khan inscription.^[1] Turkic Atlas tells the marriage under Bars Beg.

The word stands again in the lament for Kül Tegin on the north face. The khan names the women of his house who would have been enslaved if the camp had fallen: ögüm katun, ulayu öglerim, ekelerim, keliŋünüm, kunçuylarım, “my mother the katun, and after her my stepmothers, my elder sisters, my daughters-in-law, my princesses.”^[3] One study draws from the line that even a katun could be taken prisoner and made a slave.^[4]

In the Yenisei epitaphs

The Yenisei epitaphs have a formula of farewell, kuyda kunçuyum özde oglum, “my kunçuy in the kuy, my son in the öz”. It stands in the epitaph of Uyuk-Turan and, in a restored form, in Elegest IV, and a version of it stands in Barık III.^[5] Here the word is understood as “wife”.^[1]

The study that compares the two uses says that the meaning may have widened or changed. It also allows that the formula may be a man’s address to his wife as “my princess”.^[1] The epitaphs are undated.

The word and its rank

The Chinese word that the Old Uyghur texts match with kunçuy is 公主, gongzhu, “princess”. In other places the same texts match it with 女人, nǚrén, “woman”.^[6] In Old Uyghur the word also stands after the title terken, as in terken kunçuylar, “noble princesses”.^[7]

The dictionary of Kāshgarī is reported to define the word as a lady of the court, one rank below the katun.^[8]^[1] Some scholars take the katun for the chief wife of the khan and kunçuy for the next rank at court, and for the first rank in small places.^[9] The word is also said to have been given to the khan’s later wives and to his sisters.^[10]

References

^ a b c d e Tokyürek 2013, p. 123
^ Kül Tegin inscription
^ Kül Tegin inscription
^ Tokyürek 2013, p. 122–123
^ Sertkaya 1993, p. 71–73
^ Tokyürek 2013, p. 123–124
^ Tokyürek 2013, p. 124
^ Dīvān Lughāt al-Turk
^ Tokyürek 2013, p. 127
^ Tokyürek 2013, p. 120

Sources

Literature

Hacer Tokyürek, Runik Türk Yazıtlarında ve Eski Uygur Metinlerinde Kadın Hiyerarşisi (2013)
Osman Fikri Sertkaya, Yenisey Yazıtlarının Yayınlarındaki Bazı Okuma ve Anlamlandırmaların Düzeltilmesi, Yeni Okuma ve Anlamlandırma Teklifleri (1993)