Amrak

Amrak was the khan nobody had wanted and everybody could accept. He was Taspar’s son. His father, dying in 581, had wished the throne on his nephew Töremen instead.^[1] The assembly at Ötüken refused the wish. Ishbara, the lesser khan of the east, then proposed Amrak as the eldest prince and Taspar’s own son, and the delegates accepted.^[1] Amrak reigned less than a year.^[1]

Election (581)

By the lateral rule of the Göktürk succession, the throne should have gone to the eldest man of the next generation, since all Taspar’s brothers were dead. By one account Amrak was that man and did not press the claim himself. Another account of the same assembly has Amrak, supported by his faction, refuse to give the throne to his cousin Töremen, and has Ishbara step in. The two accounts agree that Amrak held the throne first and Ishbara after him. They differ on whose hand moved.^[2] Under the crisis, Turkic Atlas sets out the rule and the objection.

Abdication

Töremen rejected the election and raised his following for a revolt. Amrak, cautious, chose diplomacy. He abdicated, believing that he had thereby averted the revolt, and named Ishbara in his place.^[1] The revolt came anyway, and it came against Ishbara. In the settlement that followed, Amrak was proclaimed second khan on the Tola river. Ishbara was supreme at Ötüken, and Töremen became Apa Khan.^[3] After that the sources lose Amrak. Nothing is recorded of his part in the civil war, of his death, or of any descendants.

Assessment

Some scholars count Amrak among the four princes who put the khaganate at risk. He was the one among them who tried to give the throne away. The name Amrak is said to be the origin of the modern Turkish name Emre. A khan who abdicated to keep the peace and did not keep it is a small figure in a large story, and the sources treated him as one.

583–587 Four khans

From Apa's break with Ishbara in 583 to his capture in 587. Ishbara holds the court at Ötüken, with Amrak as second khan on the Tola. Apa reaches from the edge of Ötüken beyond the Altai; the Sui Shu has Kucha, the Tiele, Hami and the peoples of the western lands attach themselves to him. Tardush, the old khan of the west side, stands behind Apa and sent him back east with troops, and nearly a hundred thousand horsemen of Apa's tribes rejoined him. Where Apa and Ishbara meet, the border moves with the war.

Place named in a source (position as commonly identified)
Position disputed or approximate
Zone drawn after the editor's map of 584 and the Sui Shu
Vassal states, as the editor's map draws them
Frontier zone between the steppe and China, held by neither side (hatched)
Movement named in a source (route drawn)

The Göktürk civil war, 583–587, in one view: the zones of Ishbara, Amrak, Apa and Tardush and the oasis states of the Tarim. Modern map after the editor's map of 584 and the Sui Shu, on a base of Natural Earth; the zones are approximate, and the routes are schematic.