Zhu-wu Alp Sol, in Chinese 註吾合素, was the second envoy that the khan of the Kirghiz sent to the Tang after the fall of the Uyghurs.[1] The khan had sent the princess Taihe home with an escort. The Uyghurs had killed his envoys. He had no other way to reach the court, so he sent a new envoy with a letter that told what had happened.[1] The envoy reached Chang’an on 16 March 843 with two horses as a gift of the khan.[2]

Name

The Xin Tang Shu glosses the name. Zhu-wu is a barbarian family name, he means fierce, and su means left. The whole stands for a fierce and warlike man who shoots well from the left.[1] The family name suggests nothing in Turkic. The syllable he is well known as the Chinese rendering of Turkic alp, “brave”. “Left” in Old Turkic is sol. The form Zhu-wu Alp Sol therefore suits the gloss.[2] The last character is written su in the Xin Tang Shu and the Jiu Tang Shu, and suo in the Tang huiyao and the Zizhi tongjian.[2]

The journey

The Xin Tang Shu says that he travelled three years before he reached the capital.[1] That makes little sense by the distance. It may have a moral sense. In Chinese texts on foreign embassies, a long and hard journey belonged to the prestige of the empire.[2]

At court

The emperor Wuzong was delighted that so distant a people kept up its tribute. He ranked the envoy above the envoys of Bohai.[1] The audience was on 19 March.[2] The emperor named Zhao Fan, minister of the Imperial Stud, to carry credentials and console the Kirghiz country.[1] The first letter of the court had named Zhao Fan as the man who would carry it. He was now ordered to offer libations and gifts. This suggests that the first letter was never sent.[2]

The envoy brought a proposal for a joint Kirghiz and Tang campaign into the Tarim basin. Wuzong liked it. Li Deyu argued it down on distance, on the 10,000 men each outpost would need and on the cost of supply.[3]

The emperor ordered the chief ministers to meet the envoys at the Court of State Ceremonial. He ordered the interpreters to examine the mountains, rivers and customs of the Kirghiz.[1] The envoy and six companions were questioned there. A painting of the Kirghiz envoys was made together with an account of the Kirghiz nation.[4] Li Deyu proposed a Wang hui tu, a picture of the envoys, as Yan Shigu had proposed a Wang hui pian, a record of the foreign embassies, under Taizong.[1] The emperor also ordered the khan entered in the register of the imperial clan.[1] The claim behind that entry is told in The Kirghiz descent from Li Ling.

The Chinese name of the Kirghiz, written Xiajiasi, 黠戛斯, may have been fixed in this visit, since it is the standard form after it.[5]

Answer and escort

Li Deyu wrote the answer to this mission in a letter to the Kirghiz khan. The letter has the marks of a draft.[5] The first letter, written for the first envoy, Ta-bu-he-zu, seems not to have been sent when the second envoy came. The two missions may have been one, and the second letter a draft of the first.[6]

The Jiu Tang Shu says that Wuzong sent a commissioner to escort the envoy to Taiyuan to welcome the princess.[4] The princess entered Chang’an on 29 March, thirteen days after the envoy.[5] The envoy cannot have reached Taiyuan and come back in time. He may therefore have gone only to meet her outside the city.[5]

The sources do not say when he left or whether he reached home.[1] The picture of the envoys and the account of the Kirghiz country are lost. Part of what the Xin Tang Shu says of the Kirghiz may rest on them.[4] Some scholars trace the notes on Kirghiz farming, and much else in the Xin Tang Shu that the Jiu Tang Shu lacks, most probably to the questioning of this envoy.[7]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217
  2. ^ a b c d e f Drompp 2005, p. 131
  3. ^ Drompp 2005, p. 132
  4. ^ a b c Drompp 2005, p. 133
  5. ^ a b c d Drompp 2005, p. 134
  6. ^ Drompp 2005, p. 134–135
  7. ^ Drompp 1999, p. 400

Sources

Literature

  • Michael R. Drompp, Tang China and the Collapse of the Uighur Empire: A Documentary History (2005)
  • Michael R. Drompp, Breaking the Orkhon Tradition: Kirghiz Adherence to the Yenisei Region after A.D. 840 (1999)
  • Rachel Lung, Sogdian Translators in Tang China: An Issue of Loyalty (2010)

Related

What links here1

Persons
Ta-bu-he-zu

Cite this article

Yavuz, Emre-E. “Zhu-wu Alp Sol.” Turkic Atlas, revised 8 November 2026. https://turkicatlas.org/persons/zhuwu-alp-sol/

Last revised: 8 November 2026