The five ideas that the Göktürk inscriptions treat as the foundations of rule, each in its own article, and the one text in which the Göktürk set them down themselves. Read in this order the ideas build on one another: the god, the fortune he gives, the law the ruler keeps, the assembly that can unmake him, and the place from which alone the realm can be held.
- Tengrism Teŋri in both senses, the sacred Earth-and-Water, Umay, and what the inscriptions do not contain.
- Kut The ruler's fortune: said of the khan, not of the place.
- Töre The customary law that the founders held together with the realm.
- Toy The assembly that chose a khan in 581 and could depose one.
- Ötüken The forested upland from which the realm is held, and the question of whether it was sacred or blessed.
- Kül Tegin inscription The text itself, all three faces, with the readings the articles above depend on.