New Interpretation on Old Turkic Writ from Tun － huang 17th Cave〔*〕

Xu Yan

(International Cultural Exchange College Xinjiang University，UrumqiXinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region 830046)

Ⅰ．Introduction

In May，1907，the Explorer Mark Aurel Stein，from United Kingdom，got a large number of precious written volumes in the Tun-huang 17th Cave from the Taoist Wang Yuanlu by fraudulent means，in which，the ancient Turk-Runic Writ volumes never seen before in Orkhon River and Yenisei were included．These ancient Turk-Runic Writ volumes covered the world-famous Book of Divination，Manichaean Confessions，religious doctrines，or morality，official release;among them，the latter one was the only transcript about secular life，with special language and historical values．

People who studied the transcript at the early time were Thomson—a Denmark Turkish scientist，Le Cop — a Germany explorer and Orkun — a Turkey scholar，who carried out the character description，transfer and preliminary inter-pretation．

Ⅱ．Analysis of historical data

1．Writing time

As the writ was found in the Tun-huang 17th Cave，the closing time of the cave was the latest finish time of the writ(what we could confirm was that only part of Uyghur scripts was moved here from the grotto excavated in Yuan Dynasty by Wang Yuanlu)．Although the specific closingtime of the Tun-huang 17th Cave was still a matter of controversy，the first half of the 11th century was really a plain truth．In addition，as a large number of nationalities who spoke Old Turkic came to Shazhou(now Tun-huang)，we could speculate that Tubo people were not the master of Tun-huang any more or had not governed Tun-huang yet at that time．Tubo people ruled Tunhuang probably in the year of 787 and retreated from Tun-huang in 848．At the beginning of the 7th century，the invasion of the Eastern Turkic to Hexi was just limited in Ganzhou and did not reach to Shazhou(Tun-huang)．Afterward，Tiele submitted to Tang Dynasty and remainders of Turkic were mostly settled in the line of Yiwu – Jiuquan – Zhangye– Wuwei．It seemed that they did not reach to Tun-huang at the south of Shule River．More people of Turkic entered Tang Dynasty and were settled in the line of Ejina–Ganzhou until the end of the 7th century．During this period(the first year of Yongchun)，Tang Dynasty beat Ashina Duzhi and Ashina Chebu of Western Turkic many times．It was obvious that the governance of Tang Dynasty in Xihe was on firm ground before Empress Wu held power．Volume 205 of History as a Mirror recorded that:(in the first year of Tongtian)Mochuo Khan of Turkic requested himself to be the son of Empress Dowager，and also asked for a marriage for his daughter．They all settled down in Hexi and Mochuo led his troops to crusade against Qidan for the nation．It was indicated that Hexi at that time was still governed by Tang Dynasty．Therefore，the latest finish time of the writ should be the beginning of the 8th century．It could be further speculated that its creation time was between the years of 700 and 786．

2．Writ master

The writ master must conform to four conditions:firstly，he must be a user of the Old Turkic;secondly，he must be an officer owner of Turkic and Tang Dynasty official system;thirdly，he must be a tribe leader who managed Shazhou;fourthly，he was not much familiar with the Old Turkic．

Old Turkic was Phoneme-Syllable character generated based on the pictograph，whose birthplace was in Mongolian Plateau．The character has already been formed as late as in the 6th century，during which it was influenced by the Sogdian letters．From the respective of Turkic applying，the writ master may be a part of Turkic or Uyghur，or Kirgiz or its affiliated tribes around River Cam，or the Western ten-tribe Turkic，Turgesh，and Qarluq in the Western Regions– Central A-sia．

As Turkic and Uyghur regarded themselves as the master of Mongolian Plateau and regarded Jinshan of Yudu as their Holy Mountain，their ruling should not be centered in Tun-huang，but in Khangai Mountain．Tang Dynasty’s control over Tun-huang had been still on firm ground until the Post-Turkic Regime was about to be overturned．It could be seen that Turkic tribes could not be stationed here due to lack of troops．After the post-Turkic regime was overturned，some remnants surrendered to Tang Dynasty．It was recorded in the same volume that:〔in January of the first year of Tianbao(the year of 742)〕，Turkic West Yabgu Albus and Geladuo，Bodezhi– grandson of Mochuo Khan，concubine of Yiran，and daughter of Pika Dengli led hundreds of troops for surrender，so Turkic tribes became smaller gradually．Because of the confrontation between Tang Dynasty and Tubo in Stone Fort City，these surrendered remnants were moved to Taohe River for the assistance of Tang army．At that time，the new ruler of Mobei– Uyghur was busy stabilizing its interior and did not expand westwards．Kirgiz and its affiliated tribes were still in the region of River Cam and did not expand southwards．Moreover，Kirgiz regarded himself as the descendant of Li Ling in Han Dynasty，which was also approved by Tang Dynasty．As for the tribes in River Cam，most of them were dependent on Kirgiz，and all followed its lead，so Kirgiz was unlikely to do it either．

Only Turkic Albus could be seen in the historical materials after the year of 750．In 752，Albus started a rebellion and went back to Mobei，but finally was defeated by Uyghur．A part of Albus tribes was accepted by An Lushan，and the other part escaped westwards．Albus tribes escaped to Qixi were defeated by Qarluq，and Albus died out till then．Since 751，Uyghur started the westward expedition，whose objects were Kirgiz，Basmil，Qarluq and other western tribes．An Lushan Rebellion broke out in 756．After that，Uyghur paid more attention to helping Tang Dynasty suppress the rebellion and defend the Western Regions．In 764，Pugu Huai’en induced Uyghur and Tubo to invade Jingyuan(now the east of Liupan Mountain in Gansu and Ningxia，the west region of Puhe)．It was obvious that Uyghur came from Mobei，not Tun-huang．In 765，Uyghur turned back to defeat Tubo in Lingtai by uniting with the troop of Guo Ziyi in Tang Dynasty．Based on the Chinese historical records，Uyghur often appeared in Mobei and sometimes invaded the border，but never appeared in Tun-huang．

As Qarluq Yabgu who moved westward to the area of Gold Mountain caught Turkic Albus and escorted him to Tang Dynasty，he was given the title of“Gold Mountain King”．Volume 216 of History as A Mirror recorded that:〔in the twelfth year of Tianbao(the year of 753)〕，the officer of North Court Protector General–Cheng Qianli chased Albs to Qixi，and then he wrote to Qarluq for help．Albus went in hot pursuit until to Qauluq，and finally was caught up by Qarluq．Qarluq Yabgu took charge of escorting Albus along with his wife，son and thousands of soldiers．In Jiayan，Qarluq Yabgu Ton Bilga was represented with a house as the same level as Sansi，and was titled as“Gold Mountain King”which should be related with the location of Qarluq tribes．It was recorded in Article 174 Yiwu County of Tong Dian that:it(Yiwu County)extended for 146 kilometers from the northwest to Zheluoman Mountain(Mount Tianshan)．There was a great river in its north，connected with Daqi and entered to Gold Mountain，which was the residence of Qarluq．Uchida Ginpu believed that this record could be regarded as the material which indicated the residence of Qarluq since Kaiyuan and Tianbao Periods after Three Military Prefecture was set up(in the year of 658)．The title“King”(qaγan)was not used in Qarluq until about the 10th century．Masoud said that Qarluq lived in Fergana，sas and the land nearby．Qarluq occupied mulk and elected Khan out of all Khans．According to the ancient nationality documents about Western Regions，Qarluq seldom used the titles conferred by the central government for interior greeting．Therefore，“Gold Mountain General”mentioned in the writ might refer to some officials of Qarluq or Yabgu，to indicate his residence．This kind of proper nouns composed of place name plus title was widely used in the ancient northern nomadic tribes．For example，as for the“yarγan”(King of River Yari)of Suzy Inscription in Old Turkic，“yar”was the river name which was located in the east of 107 degrees east longitude and 41 degrees north latitude(now，near Linhe of Inner Mongolia)．It could be speculated from here that the author of the writ might be a military officer of Qarluq tribes and also was the administrator of Qarluq tribes stationed in Tunhuang．

The shape of Old Turkic in the writ was quite primitive，not as clear and concise as the words in Book of Divination．Most of all，the words were arranged irregularly，which indicated that either the writer Prefectural Governor Batuer was not very familiar with the writing rules of Old Turkic or he did this in purpose because of anger．The grammatical features of the writ basically conformed to the standard of Orkhon inscription，but the letter“e”was of totally different application．In the Orkhon inscription，the vowel“e”could be mutually replaced with the vowel“i”when it was the initial syllable of the stem．It could be written as“i”;sometimes it was omitted，and just indicated with No．2 letter．Such writing features indicated that the Prefectural Governor Batuer had some connection with the users of Old Tuckic around the Seven Rivers of Central Asia．Niu Ruji believed that Turgesh tribes who mainly lived around the Seven Rivers basin might have spelt Old Turkic by using Sogdian in the 8th century．Therefore，the Prefectural Governor Batuer must not be the Turgesh．It had already been verified by the writer that the author of the Talas inscription was Western Turkic，but not the Turgesh．The difference between Talas inscription and the writ indicated again that the Prefectural Governor Batuer must not be from Western ten-tribe Turkic．

From the above，there was no doubt that Prefectural Governor Batuer，the author of the writ，was the military leader of Qarluq stationed in Tun-huang．

Ⅲ．Qarluq in tianbao years

Qarluq originally joined the army in post Turkic，and then overthrew its regime jointly with Uyghur and Basmil．In 744，Basmil was attacked by Uyghur and Qarluq，and its Khan Irterish was killed．After the establishment of Uyghur Khanate，Qarluq was unwilling to be driven by alliance before，and left Uyghur tribe union discontentedly for West Turkic which was with ten tribes in the fourth year of Tianbao(the year of 745)．As West Turkic at this time mainly lived in the North Court，it might be moved to the grasslands in Jinshan line，adjacent to ten tribes．

At the turn of spring and summer in 753，Basmil in Uyghur rioted at first．Qarluq could not achieve the plan and had to flee to the West，whose objective might be the area of Ili River．New Book of Tang – Uyghur recorded:Qarluq troops were flourishing after years of Zhide，with Uyghur for the enemy．It still moved to the former ten-tribe Khan region，occupying now Suyab River and Talas，to attack Uyghur，which seriously obstructed the tribute presenting in recent years．

Qarluq entering into Tun-huang might come from two sources:one was the rest troop in Gold Mountain，and the other one was the part moving to Suyab．The guerrilla tactic was applied as for the expedition of Uyghur to Qarluq，namely returning to Jinshan after defeating Qarluq．Therefore，the rest Qarluq troop who did not move westward was entirely possible to take up the line of Gold Mountain– North Court again while Uyghur returned to Mobei．Xue Zongzheng believed:such Qarluq troop located near North Court and kept close relationship with Tang Dynasty，which had long been assisting Tang Dynasty in adhering to the North Court．The Regions of the World recorded．

Due to the withdrawal of Tang troops，the primary duty of Qarluq stationed in Tun-huang was to guard and manage such military town．In this writ mentioned that some Qarluq officials might come here by leading the troops to assist the original garrison and defend together here，and of course，most probably to defend the attack of Longyou Tubo troops．

Notes:

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〔2〕森安孝夫:《沙州回鹘与西回鹘国》，梁晓鹏译，《敦煌学辑刊》2000年第2期。

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