Page 128 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol V

turkic empire 1905

Inkarrí lives on, and the Túpac Amaru revolutionary Origins
movement of recent times obviously chose him as their Türk origins remain obscure. Their language, first
symbol because of what he means in the minds of many recorded in a series of inscriptions in the Orkhon river
ordinary Peruvians today. region, the center of their state in present-day Mongolia,
belongs to the Altaic language family, which consists of
Ward Stavig
Turkic, Mongolic, Manchu-Tungus, and possibly Korean
See also Andean States; Spanish Empire and Japanese.There has been much debate over whether
these language groupings are related genetically or have
converged due to long periods of contact and borrowing.
Further Reading There can be little doubt that the Türks emerged from
O’Phelan Godoy, S. (1985). Rebellions and revolts in eighteenth century Mongolia and southern Siberia, the westernmost region
Peru and Upper Peru. Cologne, Germany: Bohlau Verlag Koln Wien.
Stavig, W. (1999). The world of Tupac Amaru. Lincoln: University of of the Altaic peoples, who were largely in Manchuria.The
Nebraska Press. Türks’ immediate neighbors to the west and northwest
Stern, S. J. (Ed.). (1987). Resistance, rebellion, and consciousness in the
Andean peasant world, eighteenth to twentieth centuries. Madison: were Iranians (in western Mongolia) and the Uralic peo-
University of Wisconsin Press. ples of Siberia.
Serulnikov, S. (2003). Subverting colonial authority. Durham, NC: Duke The Türks, under this name, emerged onto the stage of
University Press.
Thompson, S. (2002). We alone will rule: Native Andean politics in the history only in the mid-sixth century. Various Turkic-
age of insurgency. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. speaking peoples had earlier been part of the Xiongnu
(Asian Hun) empire (c. 209 BCE–mid-second century CE),
of still undetermined ethnic origins. Some Turkic group-
ings migrated or were pushed westward to the steppes of
Turkic Empire present-day Kazakhstan and the Volga-Black Sea region as

a result of warfare between the Xiongnu and the Chinese.
he Türks created a vast Eurasian empire that domi- The migrants were incorporated into the polity of the
Tnated the nomadic steppe zone and adjoining lands European Huns, whose relationship with the Xiongnu
of sedentary civilization from Manchuria to the Black Sea remains the subject of much debate. These early migra-
from the mid-sixth to mid-eighth century. It was the first tions initiated a movement by Turkic peoples from the
of the great, trans-Eurasian empires and was surpassed in Chinese borderlands to the western steppes that contin-
size only by the Mongol empire of the thirteenth century, ued for more than a millennium. Later empires in Mon-
which in many respects was built on Türk traditions of golia, such as the Rouran (Asian Avars, early fourth
governance.The name Türk was adopted by otherTurkic- century CE–552 CE), drove other Turkic groupings west-
speaking peoples as a political designation during the ward into the Black Sea steppes by around 463. None of
period of theTürk empire. It then was used by theTürks’ these peoples called themselves Türks.
neighbors (for example, by the geographers and histori- The Orkhon inscriptions tell us nothing of Türk ori-
ans of the Muslim world) to denote the Turkic-speaking gins. Contemporary Chinese accounts, which state that
peoples with whom they came into contact from the lat- they derived from “mixed Xiongnu,” record a variety of
ter half of the seventh century onward. Most of these peo- ethnogonic tales reflecting, in all likelihood, the diverse
ples had been part of the Türk state. Türk survives today origins of the core peoples that constituted the tribal
as the ethnonym of the dominant ethnic grouping of the union the Chinese termed Tujue.The name Türk does not
modernTurkish state and has been used as an ethnic des- appear until the Chinese accounts relate the foundation
ignation for other Turkic peoples. of their state in the mid-sixth century. The Chinese