People or range · The Qarluq and the nomads of the Ili, the Zhetysu and Dzungaria · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Southern Tian Shan herders

Above the northern road the Tian Shan rises to the snowfields that feed every river of Aksu, Bay, Kucha and Karashahr.

Between the passes lie summer pastures: the Bedel and Sary-Jaz valleys in the west, the Muzart and Kaidu country in the middle, and the broad Yulduz basin above Karashahr in the east. No town stands here and nothing is farmed. Turkic herders take their flocks up in summer and down to the oasis edges and low valleys in winter, under their own chiefs. Who they are in 1200 is not recorded.

The Persia map has the Chigil, Yaghma and Tukhsi in the mountains to the west in Qarakhanid times, paying the gurkhan in animals and service, and the Qarluq hold the Ili country to the north; the herders here are best read as the same Turkic stock, but that is an inference. The Kyrgyz the regional brief names are not attested on this slope: the Persia map has them still on the Yenisei in 1200. The oasis lords below depend on these herders for their water, their horses and the safety of the passes, and the passes are the roads to Issyk Kul, the Ili valley and the Chu.

Who holds it

Title
Chiefs and elders of the herding clans; no clan or chief is named for 1200
Since
not pinned
Born
not known
Family
Not known. The Persia map names the Chigil, Yaghma and Tukhsi as the herding peoples of the inner Tien Shan in Qarakhanid times; the same stock is the natural reading here, but no source says so for this slope.
Confidence
low

Read: the Persia map's province Inner Tien Shan herders (the herders west of this slope), the tau sheet's Qarluq record (the Ili and Zhetysu north of the ridge), Iranica 'Qara Ketay' and 'Chinese Turkestan iii', Wikipedia 'Qara Khitai'. No clan, chief, camp or event is recorded for the southern slope.

Overlord

The gurkhan, by tribute in animals and service, as on the Persia map's Tien Shan; the oasis lords of the northern road by custom, for water and pass tolls. Nothing is recorded.

What it holds

  • The summer pastures and winter valleys of the south slope
  • The headwaters of the Aksu, Muzart, Kucha, Kaidu and other rivers
  • The mountain roads (Bedel, Muzart and others) to the Issyk Kul, Ili and Chu country, as a toll and guide trade

How it was acquired

Not recorded.

Allies and rivals

Below: Aksu, Bay, Kucha, Luntai and Karashahr, whose water and pass tolls the herders share. West: the herders of the Persia map's inner Tien Shan. North: the Qarluq and other Turkic nomads of the Ili (tau sheet). East: the idiqut of Qocho's Turfan and Beshbaliq lands.

How things stand that morning

Quiet; nothing recorded. The high valleys are under winter snow and the herds are on the low winter pastures.

Wealth

Horses, sheep and felt; guide and pack fees and tolls at the passes; the water and timber the oases use. No figures.

Military

Mounted herdsmen; no fortress or levy recorded. No figures.

Threats

  • Hard winters and the loss of herds
  • A demand for animals and service by the gurkhan's tax-gatherers
  • Later: the Mongol campaigns of 1218 on the Ili and in the Tarim

Where the sources disagree

  • Sheet brief: 'the Kyrgyz and Qarluq nomads of the Tian Shan pastures on your side'. Kyrgyz: not attested here in 1200 (Persia map: still on the Yenisei; the move to the Tian Shan is generally placed after the Mongol conquests, not pinned). Qarluq: the tau record puts them on the Ili and Zhetysu, north of the ridge; not attested on this slope. Coloured with the Qarluq realm only because the sheet offers it as the nearest fit, with 'other Turkic herders'.

Evidence: Drawn as a self-governing people's range because no oasis lord or officer is known to rule these mountains. No clan, chief, camp or event is named in any source read. The clans of the Persia map's Tien Shan are the only comparison.

On the map: The upper edge is the main crest, drawn roughly; the tau sheet's Ili and Dzungarian blocks begin beyond it. The west edge joins the Persia map's inner Tien Shan polygon at about 78.55 E.

Primary sources for Qarluq

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

  • The Secret History of the Mongols (1228 or 1240 (the colophon's Year of the Rat is disputed), with later additions; the surviving Chinese transcription and gloss were made under the Ming in the 1380s). The only Mongol account of Temujin's rise, written within living memory. Read online
  • History of the Liao, chapter 30, on the Western Liao, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office (1343 to 1344). The only Chinese official notice of the Qara Khitai, a few pages at the end of juan 30. Read online
  • History of the World Conqueror: the Qara Khitai (Gur Khans) and the Uyghurs of Beshbaliq, Ala al-Din Ata-Malik Juvayni (begun about 1252 to 1253, ends with 1260). Juvayni's chapters on the Uyghur kingdom (its origin legend, Beshbaliq and Qocho, and the idiqut Barchuq's murder of the Qara Khitai resident before his submission to Chinggis Khan in 1209) and on the Gur Khans of the Qara Khitai are the fullest Muslim account of the Tarim and Zhetysu around 1200: the gurkhan Zhilugu's court at Balasagun, his tax collectors in the oasis towns and in Samarkand, his relations with the Khwarazmshah Tekish and then Muhammad, and the arrival of the Naiman prince Kuchlug in 1208. Read online
  • Compendium of Chronicles, Rashid al-Din Fadl Allah Hamadani (1300 to 1311, at Tabriz). The official Ilkhanid history, compiled from Mongol oral tradition and the lost Altan Debter. Read online
  • Compendium of Chronicles: the Turkic and Mongol tribes and the life of Chinggis Khan, Rashid al-Din Hamadani (about 1300 to 1311, in the Ilkhanate). The fullest description of who held what on the steppe around 1200, written a century later from Mongol court records (the Altan Debter) and from informants such as Bolad Chingsang. Read online
  • History of the Yuan, Song Lian (宋濂) and the Ming history office (1369 to 1370). Juan 1, the annals of Taizu (Chinggis Khan), gives a dated outline of Temujin's early wars drawn from the same lost Altan Debter as the Shengwu qinzheng lu: the Tatar war with the Jin in 1196, the Merkit and Naiman campaigns, the Tayichi'ut war, Jamuqa's coalition of 1201 and the Tatar and Kereyit wars of 1202 and 1203. Read online
  • The History of the World Conqueror, Ata-Malik Juvayni (1252 to 1260). Written for the Mongols but with a long retrospective on the powers they destroyed. Read online
  • Journey to the West of the Perfected Changchun (Qiu Chuji), Li Zhichang (李志常) (about 1228, from the journey of 1220 to 1224). A dated eyewitness itinerary across the steppe and the Tarim twenty years after 1200: the Kereyit country and the Ongud frontier, the Naiman mountains, the Uyghur towns of Beshbaliq and the Tarim with their Buddhist and Christian communities, Almaliq of the Qarluq, and Samarkand. Read online

Sources and studies

  1. Encyclopaedia Iranica, 'Qara Ketay'
  2. Encyclopaedia Iranica, 'Chinese Turkestan iii. From the Advent of Islam to the Mongols' (I. Togan)
  3. Wikipedia, 'Qara Khitai'

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.