The Life of Yakoob Beg; Athalik Ghazi, and Badaulet; Ameer of Kashgar. James D. Boulger

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      The Kipchaks, another great tribe, who however are scarcely represented at all in Kashgaria, pride themselves on being the most select of all the Usbegs, but their day of power has passed by, for the present at all events. Thirty years ago they were at the height of their success, but they incurred the jealousy of other Usbeg tribes and of the Kirghiz. Owing to the abilities of their great chief, Mussulman Kuli, they succeeded in erecting in Khokand a powerful state, which was able to restrain the encroachments of Bokhara, at that time the great enemy of the former Khanate. But the plots that broke out against them in 1853, in conjunction with the advance of Russia on the Syr Darya, were crowned with success, and with the execution of Mussulman Kuli the Kipchak power was completely broken. Since that date, however, several of the more distinguished leaders who have appeared on the scene, such as Alim Kuli and Abdurrahman Aftobatcha, have been members of this clan. The eastern portion of the dominion of Yakoob Beg is almost exclusively inhabited by Calmucks, or tribes of Calmuck descent. The great majority of the inhabitants of Manchuria and Jungaria are of Calmuck descent, and even in Russia in Europe there are many settlements of this tribe along the Volga and the Don. None of these, however, possess any political importance except those who inhabit the country north of Gobi and between Eastern Turkestan and China, and the chief of these are the Khalkas. The Calmucks are attached by old associations to the Government of Pekin; and, although they have sometimes revolted against, and often caused trouble to, the Central Government, they have generally acknowledged their culpability and submitted to the Chinese authorities. In the revolt of the Tungani the Calmucks remained true to China, and performed very opportune service on various occasions. The Chinese army in Eastern Turkestan was mainly recruited from among these tribes, who became distinguished from the Tungani by their religion and fidelity.

      The origin of the Tungani, or Dungans, as the Russians call them, is much in dispute; and as they played so important a part in the loss of Kashgar and Ili by China, as well as in the history of the rule of Yakoob Beg, it may be as well to put the facts as they stand at some length before the reader. There is no question, we believe, that the Chinese in applying the term Tungani attach the meaning thereto of Mahomedan. There is equal reason for supposing that the term Khitay, literally meaning simply Chinese, has been applied to the Buddhists by general usage. If we acknowledge the validity of these two assumptions – and, so far as we have been able to ascertain, the best authorities have adopted them – there would be little difficulty in explaining who the Tungani were. Granting these, they would simply be the Mahomedan subjects in the eastern portions of China. But others believe that the Tungani are a distinct race, presenting peculiar ethnological features. According to this version, the tribe of the Tungani can be traced back as a distinct community to the fifth and sixth centuries, when they were seated along the Tian Shan range, with their capital at Karashar. The most recent investigations, under Colonel Prjevalsky, are believed to show no signs of there having been any important cities in this quarter. It may be convenient to mention here, that at that time they were Buddhists; but when Islamism broke over Asia in the eighth century, they were among the first to adopt the new tenets. This defection from the religion of China brought them into collision with the Emperors of Pekin, and many of these Tungani were deported into Kansuh and Shensi, where we are to suppose they continued a race apart, with their own religion and their own code of morality, for more than ten centuries. Even granting the possibility of such a consistency to a new religion, which history informs us was thrust upon them at the point of the sword, it seems scarcely credible that we should not hear more of this troublesome tribe in Chinese history. Frequent allusions are made in imperial edicts and other official proclamations to the Tungani, but always in reference to their religion, and not in any way as if they were any other but heretic Chinamen. Besides, even in this way little is heard of the Tungani until the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when very sharp measures were taken against them by the emperors, solely because religious propagandists from their ranks were appearing as enemies of a Buddhist Government. The theory that the Tungani were a people and not a sect is new, but it is possible that it may be a true discovery. On the other hand, it is far more probable that it is only an ingenious attempt at elucidating what appears on the face of it to be a simple matter enough. The reader must decide for himself between the two versions. If the Tungani are to be considered a distinct race, then the majority of the inhabitants of Eastern Turkestan are not Calmucks, but Tungani; if the view taken here is adopted, then they are Calmucks who have at various times adopted Mahomedanism. These are the chief tribes of this portion of Central Asia; and in the following pages it may be as well to bear in mind that Khitay is applied exclusively to the Buddhist or governing class, and Tungani to the Mahomedan or subject race in Kansuh and its outlying dependencies. As race antipathies have not entered during recent times so much into the contests of the people of the regions immediately under consideration as religions, the difference as to the true significance of the term Tungani does not materially affect one's view of the general question.

      CHAPTER III.

      HISTORY OF KASHGAR

      The great difficulty encountered in giving a description of the past history of Kashgar is to evolve, out of the series of successive conquests and subjections that have marked the existence of that state for almost two thousand years, a narrative which shall, without confusing the reader with a mere repetition of names that convey little meaning, place the chief features of its history before us in a light that may make its more recent condition intelligible to us. We may say in commencement, that those who desire a historical account in all its fulness of Kashgar must turn to that contributed by Dr. Bellew to the Official Report of Sir Douglas Forsyth on his embassy to Yarkand. They will there find ample details of the events that took place in this region of Central Asia from the commencement of our era; but a mere reiteration of the various calamities, with brief and intermittent periods of prosperity, each wave of which bore so striking a similarity to its predecessor, would not serve the purpose we have at present in view – viz., of considering its own history, for the purpose of better understanding its relations with its neighbours and with China, and how the state consolidated by the Athalik Ghazi was constructed on ruins handed down by an almost indistinguishable antiquity.

      For a considerable number of years anterior to the ninth century, the Chinese Empire extended to the borders of Khokand and Cashmere. But the dissensions that marked the latter years of the Tang dynasty were not long in producing such weakness at the extremity of this vast empire that the subject races and their proper ruling families were enabled to obtain either their personal liberty or their lost positions once more, unhappily without in any case achieving with the severance of their connection with China any perceptible amelioration in their lot – indeed, on almost every occasion only binding themselves with harder fetters, and sinking into a deeper state of servitude. When the petty princelets of Kashgar, Yarkand, Turfan, and the rest broke away from their allegiance to Pekin, and when the imperial resources were unable to coerce their rebellious subjects, the whole country passed under the hands of their feudatories, who split up into innumerable factions, waged continuous war, and sacrificed the happiness and welfare of the subject people to a desire to promote their own individual interests. As the barons and counts of Italy in the Middle Ages devastated some of the fairest provinces of Europe, so these Oigur princes fought for their own hand in the valleys of the Artosh and the Ili. It is very possible that this state of things would have continued until China became sufficiently strong and settled to reassert once more her dormant rights over her lost provinces, but that a new force appeared on the western frontiers of Kashgar. As early as 676 the Arabs, under Abdulla Zizad, had crossed over from Persia, and were carrying destruction and terror in their course along the banks of the Oxus. At that moment a beautiful and gifted queen, named Khaton, ruled for her son in Bokhara. She had not long been left a widow when her country was threatened by this unexpected and terrible invasion. Although assistance came to the queen from all the neighbouring States, including Kashgar, she was defeated twice in the open field, and compelled to seek safety within the walls of her capital. But the Arab leader was unable to take the city by storm, and slowly retired, with a large number of captives and an immense quantity of booty, back to Persia. Some years later the Arabs again returned, but withdrew on the payment of a heavy indemnity. Another chief, Kutaiba, was still more successful, СКАЧАТЬ