Chula ruled for little more than a year between two brothers who ruled for a decade each, and what the Jiu Tang Shu records of him is a policy inherited, a pretender crowned, and a death that a later source explained by poison.[1]

Accession (619)

When Shibi died in the second month of 619 his son Shiboubi was too young to succeed and was made Nibu Shad, with a camp in the east north of Youzhou; the tribes set up Shibi’s brother, the Silifu Shad, as Chuluo Khan.[1] The son was seventeen.[2] Chula married the Sui princess Yicheng, his brother’s and his father’s widow, and sent envoys to announce the death; the Tang emperor Gaozu held mourning, suspended court for three days, had the officials condole with the envoys at their lodge, sent Zheng Deting to condole with Chula, and gave thirty thousand pieces of silk; Chula thereafter sent tribute often.[1] The generous payment and the halt of the campaign Shibi had begun were the Tang buying the new khan off.[2]

King of Sui at Dingxiang (620)

The Sui empress Xiao and Yang Zhengdao, the son of the prince of Qi and grandson of the last Sui emperor, had fallen into the hands of the rebel Dou Jiande; in the second month of 620 Chula fetched them to his court and set up Zhengdao as king of Sui; all the Chinese of the Sui period who were in the khan’s land were made his subjects, the Sui calendar was kept, officials appointed, and he lived at the walled town of Dingxiang with ten thousand followers.[1] It was a symbolic act to lend legitimacy to Göktürk intervention in China, alongside alliances with the warlords Wang Shichong and Dou Jiande.[2]

At the same time Chula kept his brother’s alliance with the Tang. When Li Shimin, not yet emperor, was sent against Liu Wuzhou and halted at Taiyuan, Chula sent his brother, the Buli Shad, with two thousand riders to join the imperial army; in the sixth month Chula himself came to Bingzhou, where the governor Li Zhongwen came out to receive him, stayed three days, and his men carried off many of the beautiful women of the city, which Li Zhongwen could not prevent.[1]

Death (620)

Soon afterwards Chula died.[1] He died unexpectedly before a campaign planned with Liang Shidu, in which Dou Jiande was to cross the Taihang mountains and join the Göktürk in the prefectures of Jin and Jiang, and the Zizhi Tongjian carries the indications that the Chinese minister of ceremonies Zheng Yuanshu poisoned him; that a Chinese held such a post at the khan’s court shows how far the leaning toward China had gone since Yami.[2] The princess Yicheng passed over Chula’s son, the Aoshe Shad, as ugly and weak, and set up Chula’s brother Duobi, who became Ilig Khan.[1]

Assessment

Chula is the khan who shows the eastern state at the height of its leverage over China, with the Sui pretender in one hand and the Tang’s gratitude in the other, and shows also that the leverage was managed by Chinese advisers and a Chinese princess who chose his successor. His inconsistency stands, beside Yami’s treachery, among the failures of leadership that undid the house.[2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Jiu Tangshu (Old Book of Tang), juan 194
  2. ^ a b c d e Yavuz 2025

Sources

Literature

  • Emre-E. Yavuz, The Gokturk Empire: 2nd Edition (2025)
  • Peter B. Golden, An Introduction to the History of the Turkic Peoples (1992)

Related

What links here4

Persons
Ilig Khan · Shibi Khan
Polities
First Göktürk Khaganate · Tang

Cite this article

Yavuz, Emre-E. “Chula Khan.” Turkic Atlas, revised 13 September 2026. https://turkicatlas.business-5d4.workers.dev/persons/chula-khan/

Last revised: 13 September 2026