Who ruled
- Western Göktürk Khaganate Irbis Shegui Khan 642–651 · Ashina Helu 651–657
And beyond the steppe
- China Tang Gaozong 649–683
- Iran Sasanian Yazdegerd III 632–651 · Rashidun Uthman 644–656
- Korea Goguryeo Bojang 642–668
- Byzantium Heraclian Constans II 641–668
Eastern steppe
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Environment · Late Antique Little Ice Age: the cold phase the Altai tree rings define from 536 to about 660 (536–660)
Climate and the steppe empires · First Göktürk Khaganate · Avars
The coldest decade in the Altai is the 540s
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Environment · Lake Telmen stands 4.8 metres above its present level, a humid phase before the drying that follows (600–700)
Western steppe
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Ashina Helu goes west, takes the Duolu lands, proclaims himself Shaboluo Khan at the Thousand Springs over the Ten Arrows, and raids Tingzhou
Ashina Helu · On Oq · Suyab · Western Göktürk Khaganate
Also dated 653 (one modern reckoning): The beginning of Helu's khanate over the Ten Arrows.
After Taizong's death in 649; the Tang annals set the raid and the first campaign in 651, a modern reckoning the khanate from 653
Persia
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Yazdegerd III is killed in flight near Merv; the Sasanian empire ends and Khurasan becomes the eastern frontier of the caliphate
Caucasus and Crimea
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Irbis Shegui, a defeated khan of the Nushibi, moves to the Khazar lands and founds their ruling house: Artamonov's hypothesis, reported with reservations
