Empire of the gurkhan · Persia and the Eastern Islamic World · as at first light, 1 January 1200

The Qara Khitai: the gurkhan's own lands

The Qara Khitai are Khitans from northern China who fled west when the Jurchen destroyed their Liao empire in 1125.

Under Yelu Dashi they took Balasagun on the Chu (about 1134), beat the Seljuk sultan Sanjar and the Qarakhanids at Qatwan near Samarkand on 9 September 1141, and became the overlords of Central Asia. They keep Chinese forms: a Son of Heaven with reign names, Chinese titles, Chinese-style cash coins and seals, and a household register; but they rule lightly. Except round their capital they do not govern directly.

The Muslim princes keep their thrones, their armies and their coinage, and pay tribute; the gurkhan's officers collect it, and the Muslim notables write to the court in Persian. On 1 January 1200 the gurkhan Yelu Zhilugu, in his twenty-second year of reign, holds directly the Chu valley with his ordo and the town of Balasagun (Quz Ordu), the Issyk-Kul basin, the Talas valley under his general Tayangu at Taraz, and a garrison at Tirmidh on the Oxus. His vassals are the Qarakhanid khan Ibrahim b.

Husayn at Samarkand (whose authority also runs in Bukhara, where the sadrs of the house of Burhan govern the city and collect the gurkhan's tribute), a separate Qarakhanid khan in Shash, the Qarakhanid khan of Uzgend and Ferghana, where the gurkhan keeps his treasury, the Qarakhanid khan of Kashgar and the khan of Khotan, the Qarluq khans of Qayaliq and Almaliq, the Uyghur king of Qocho, and the Khwarazmshah Tekish, who pays a yearly tribute. The empire has lately suffered a heavy defeat: in 1198 its army under Tayangu, sent across the Oxus after the Ghurids took Balkh from its vassal, was destroyed in Guzganan. The gurkhan blamed Tekish, who had called him into the war, and demanded compensation for the dead: Ibn al-Athir says Tekish refused and beat off a Qara Khitai attack on Khwarazm, while Biran reads the evidence as Khwarazm paying some compensation.

Either way relations with Khwarazm are cold. The court is Buddhist and keeps the Khitan rites; most subjects are Muslims, with strong Nestorian Christian communities in the Chu valley and in Kashgar. Officers and agents: the general Tayangu at Taraz is the one officer named for these years; the Muslim minister Mahmud Tai (sent to Khwarazm for the tribute in 1209) and the chamberlain Baraq (an envoy about 1209-10, later the founder of the Qutlughkhanid line of Kerman) are attested only later, and their posts in 1200 are not pinned.

No resident Qara Khitai commissioner (shahna) is attested in Samarkand, Bukhara or the Ferghana towns in 1199-1200: the gurkhan takes his tribute through the local rulers and the sadr of Bukhara and through envoys sent to collect it, and keeps a resident commissioner (shaojian) only at the Uyghur court of Qocho, beyond this sheet. No son of Zhilugu is recorded; the empire will pass in 1211 to his son-in-law Kuchlug by force.

Who rules

Name
Yelu Zhilugu
Title
Gurkhan ('universal khan'), emperor of the Western Liao (Xi Liao); reign name Tianxi
Since
1177-78: enthroned after the killing of his aunt, the regent Yelu Pusuwan, in 1177; his reign name Tianxi counts from 1178
Born
Not pinned. He was a child when his father died in 1163 (the Liao history says the dying emperor left the realm to his sister because his son was young), so he was born before 1163 and is a grown man in 1200.
Family
Second son of the gurkhan Yelu Yilie (Renzong, reigned 1150-63) and grandson of the founder Yelu Dashi. His aunt Yelu Pusuwan (Empress Chengtian) ruled as regent from 1164 to 1177; she had her husband Xiao Duolubu killed and was herself killed with her lover by her father-in-law Xiao Wolila, who then set Zhilugu on the throne. He has an empress whom the Liao history does not name (Kuchlug honoured her as empress dowager in 1211); the name Ju'erbiesu given for her in some modern lists is the name of the Naiman queen Gurbesu and should not be trusted. He has a daughter, called Hunhu in the Yuan sources and Qunqu in the Persian ones, who is married to the Naiman prince Kuchlug in 1208 (later); her age in 1200 is not pinned. Other children: not pinned. The great Khitan clans of the court are the royal Yelu and the consort clan Xiao.
Confidence
high

Liao history (Liao shi) ch. 30 as summarised by Wikipedia; Biran, The Empire of the Qara Khitai in Eurasian History (2005), pp. 60-75, through the Wikipedia articles that cite it; TDV 'Karahitaylar'.

Overlord

None. The gurkhan is the overlord of the Muslim rulers of Transoxiana, Ferghana, Shash, Kashgar and Khwarazm, of the Qarluqs and of the Uyghurs.

What the realm holds

  • Directly: the Chu valley with the gurkhan's ordo and the town of Balasagun (Quz Ordu), the capital since about 1134
  • Directly: the Issyk-Kul basin and the summer pastures of the Tien Shan round it
  • Directly, through his general Tayangu: Taraz and the Talas valley
  • Directly: a garrison in Tirmidh on the Oxus, attested when the Ghurids destroyed it in 1205
  • The treasury, kept at Uzgend in Ferghana (Barthold)
  • Overlordship and tribute: the Qarakhanid khan of Samarkand (Ibrahim b. Husayn), with Bukhara and its sadr
  • Overlordship and tribute: the Qarakhanid khan of Shash (coins at Banakath, 1197-1206)
  • Overlordship and tribute: the Qarakhanid khan of Uzgend and Ferghana
  • Overlordship and tribute: the Qarakhanid lord of Otrar (Taj al-Din Bilge Khan by 1204; earlier tenure not pinned)
  • Overlordship and tribute: the Eastern Qarakhanid khan of Kashgar (Yusuf b. Muhammad) and the khan of Khotan (outside this sheet)
  • Overlordship and tribute: the Khwarazmshah Tekish (written on the Khwarazm records)
  • Overlordship, outside this sheet: the Qarluq khans of Qayaliq and Almaliq, and the Uyghur king (iduq qut) of Qocho, where a Qara Khitai commissioner (shaojian) resides

How it was acquired

Conquest. Yelu Dashi left the falling Liao empire in 1124, was invited to Balasagun by its Qarakhanid khan and made it his capital (about 1134), took Kashgar, beat the Western Qarakhanids at Khujand in 1137 and Sanjar at Qatwan in 1141, and received the submission of Khwarazm in 1141-42. Balkh was held through a Turkish vassal until 1198.

Allies and rivals

Vassals as listed. Rivals: the Ghurid sultans, who took Balkh in 1198 and destroyed the gurkhan's army; the Khwarazmshah Tekish, a vassal who has tried several times to stop paying, who drew the gurkhan into the 1198 war and then, by Ibn al-Athir's account, refused the compensation demanded and beat off a Qara Khitai attack on Khwarazm (Biran thinks some compensation was paid). Beyond the frame: the Naiman, split after the death of Inanch Bilge between his sons Tayang and Buyruq; the Kereit khan Toghrul, who came to the gurkhan for help in the 1190s and got none (Biran); the Jurchen Jin emperors of north China, the old enemy.

No relations with the caliph.

The realm that morning

Peace inside the empire, cold war on its south-western rim. The gurkhan rules from his ordo near Balasagun. The defeat of 1198 has cost him Balkh, and no peace with the Ghurids is recorded; the Oxus is now the frontier, with his garrison at Tirmidh facing the Ghurid governor of Balkh. Relations with Tekish have soured since the gurkhan demanded compensation for the dead of 1198; whether it was paid is disputed. No raiding is recorded on any of his frontiers in the winter of 1199-1200.

Wealth

Tribute in silver and gold from the oasis princes and from Khwarazm; a household tax; the caravan road from China through Kashgar and the Chu valley to Samarkand; the silver of Ilaq and Shash through the Shash khans' coinage; horses and herds of the Tien Shan pastures. The treasury is kept at Uzgend.

Military

A standing army of Khitan and other horsemen paid salaries, not fiefs (Biran); the gurkhan's guard at the ordo; contingents of the vassal princes (the khan of Samarkand and the lord of Otrar ride with Tayangu in 1204). Record: crushing victories in 1137 and 1141, an expedition into Khwarazm in 1172, the disastrous defeat by the Ghurids in Guzganan in 1198, in which Ibn al-Athir puts the dead at 12,000. Fortified points: Balasagun, Taraz, Tirmidh, Uzgend (treasury).

No other figures.

Threats

  • The Ghurids at Balkh, who may cross the Oxus at Tirmidh
  • The Khwarazmshah, who wants to end the tribute
  • Unrest among the Qarakhanid vassals: Kashgar and Khotan rise in 1204 (later)
  • Beyond the frame, the wars of the Mongolian steppe that will send the Naiman prince Kuchlug to the gurkhan in 1208 (later)

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

  1. 3 July 1200 (19 Ramadan 596)The Khwarazmshah Tekish dies on campaign; his son Ala al-Din Muhammad succeeds about August 1200 and at first stays a tributary of the gurkhan (Biran).Depends on: Tekish's illness taking its course. Stopped by: His recovery; Muhammad's death or defeat by a rival brother or nephew.
  2. late 1200 and 1201The Ghurids invade Khurasan after Tekish's death; Muhammad, pressed, looks to the gurkhan, and the Qara Khitai and Ghurid war revives (Bar Hebraeus places the renewal in 1200).Depends on: Tekish's death and the Ghurid sultans' decision to strike. Stopped by: Tekish living on; a Ghurid peace with Khwarazm.

Later, on the likely course

  1. 1201-1204The khan of Samarkand, Ibrahim b. Husayn, dies and his son Uthman succeeds (the sources give 1201, 1202 and 601/1204).Depends on: Natural death of an old man. Stopped by: Nothing in the gurkhan's power.
  2. 1204Tayangu, with Uthman of Samarkand and Bilge Khan, routs Mu'izz al-Din at Andkhud and takes a great ransom; in the same year Kashgar and Khotan rebel and the khan of Kashgar's son is taken to Balasagun as a hostage.Depends on: A Ghurid attack on Khwarazm and a Khwarazmian appeal to the gurkhan. Stopped by: Peace between Ghurids and Khwarazm.
  3. by July 1205The Ghurid governor of Balkh takes Tirmidh and destroys its Qara Khitai garrison (Biran).Depends on: Ghurid strength at Balkh after Andkhud. Stopped by: A reinforced garrison or a peace on the Oxus.
  4. 1208-1211Kuchlug comes to the gurkhan (1208); Muhammad of Khwarazm and Uthman break with the gurkhan; Tayangu is taken near Taraz (1210); Kuchlug seizes Zhilugu while he hunts (1211) and keeps him as emperor emeritus until his death.Depends on: The rise of Chinggis Khan in Mongolia and Muhammad's ambition. Stopped by: Events far beyond 1200.

Places of note

  • Balasagun (Quz Ordu) and the gurkhan's ordo: The capital: a Muslim and Christian town of the old Qarakhanid khans, with the gurkhan's palace camp nearby.
  • Taraz: Seat of the general Tayangu.
  • Uzgend: Where the gurkhan's treasury is kept.
  • Tirmidh: Qara Khitai garrison on the Oxus facing Ghurid Balkh.

Where the sources disagree

  • The GM's dossier puts Bukhara 'under the Burhanid sadrs'. The sadrs govern the city and collect the gurkhan's tribute, but the khan of Samarkand's authority also runs there in these years: Biran says Bukhara was ruled by Ibrahim Arslan Khan by 1193, and Barthold lists Ibrahim's coins struck at Bukhara in 597 (1200-01). See the Bukhara realm record.
  • The GM's dossier gives Tirmidh to the Bamiyan Ghurids. Biran (p. 69, cited by Wikipedia) says the Ghurid governor of Balkh took Tirmidh only by July 1205, destroying the Qara Khitai garrison there; so on 1 January 1200 Tirmidh is most likely the gurkhan's. Drawn here as the gurkhan's.
  • Some modern pages (Wikipedia's Yelu Zhilugu article) say that the Ghurids took Merv, Sarakhs, Nasa, Abivard, Tus and Nishapur right after the 1198 war; those conquests belong to late 1200 and 1201, after Tekish's death.

Evidence: The Chinese history gives the dynasty's bare chronology; the Muslim historians (Ibn al-Athir, Juvaini, Juzjani) see the empire from outside; Biran's synthesis is the modern standard and was read here only through articles that cite it. Officers, consorts and the household register for 1200 are thin.

On the map: The gurkhan's direct lands are drawn as the Chu, Issyk-Kul and Talas country; the line between his pastures and those of his Qarluq vassals in the Ili valley lies beyond the sheet. The vassal khanates are drawn in their own realm colours.

Primary sources for this realm

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.

Sources and studies

  1. Wikipedia, 'Yelu Zhilugu' (citing Liao shi ch. 30, Biran 2005, Barthold)
  2. Wikipedia, 'Qara Khitai' (citing Biran 2005, pp. 46-131)
  3. TDV Islam Ansiklopedisi, 'Karahitaylar'
  4. W. Barthold, Turkestan down to the Mongol Invasion (1928), pp. 182, 371, 377, 380, 390
  5. Wikipedia, 'Muhammad of Ghor' (citing Biran 2005, pp. 68-69, for Tirmidh in 1205)
  6. M. Biran, The Empire of the Qara Khitai in Eurasian History (Cambridge, 2005)

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