The Rashīdī History 9.1
The Tarikh-i-Rashidi (Elias, Ross) 9.1
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9.1.1
Their inward thought is that their houses shall continue for ever, and their dwelling places to all generations ; they call their lands after their own names. Nevertheless man being in honour abideth not; . . . — Ps. xlix., 11-12. The province called by Mirza Haidar, 'Mangalai Suyah,' extended, as we have seen, from the western limit of Farghâna as far east as the modern Kâra Shahr, a town and district that, in his day, bore the name of Châlish, and more anciently that of 'Yenki' or 'Yen-Ki.' This district, and the larger one of Turfân, that lay beyond it to the eastward, formed, during the two centuries (or the greater part of them) that the Târikh-i-Rashidi embraces, a Moghul principality which had an entirely separate government from that of the chief Moghul Khanate. During the latter half of the fourteenth century and the first quarter of the fifteenth, while the Dughlât Amirs were in power in the provinces of Kâshghar, Aksu, Khotan, etc.—that is, in the whole of Alti-Shahr—there is nothing in the Târikh-i-Rashidi, or in the work of any Musulman author that I am acquainted with, to indicate who were the rulers of these eastern districts, except Mirza Haidar's mention of their temporary conquest by Khizir Khwâja.
9.1.2
It seems probable, from what may be learned from the side of China, that the region was regarded as more or less under the power of the Moghul Khans, and the author of the Zafar-Nâma, in narrating the wars between Timur and the Moghuls, seems also to imply that this was the case, as has been seen above. Later, again, towards the middle of the fifteenth century, when a division in the Moghul Ulus had taken place, Isân Bugha II., with the support of one section, set himself up in Châlish and Turfân, and there established a separate principality, or Khanate, which lasted down to, and even beyond, the date when Mirza Haidar's history closes. Our author is fond, as will be found in the course of his narrative, of using copulate names, and therefore generally applies to this eastern Khanate, the form Châlish-Turfân, or 'Chalish and Turfan,' from its two central and principal districts. There were times, however, as he relates, when the province of Aksu also fell under the rule of the eastern Khan, though it belonged properly to Alti-Shahr. But on two occasions he mentions a country or province of Uighuristan, and in one passage, when describing the boundaries of 'Mangalai Suyah,' says that it marched, on the east, with the province of Uighuristan. It would appear, therefore, that the small eastern Khanate really bore that name down to the sixteenth century; and if this is the case, the survival is an interesting one.
9.1.3
Within the district of Turfan, and only some twenty-seven miles to the south-east of it, stands the little known, but ancient, town of Kara-Khoja, which has borne also, in the course of its history, several other names, the chief of them having come to us, through the Chinese, in the forms of Kao-Chang and Ho-Chao. The Chinese annals of the Sung and Yuan dynasties mention this place frequently, and make it clear that from the ninth century to within the twelfth, Kao-Chang was the capital of a Uighur kingdom which bordered on the north with another Uighur state, called Bishbalik (the modern Urumtsi), and on the west with a third known, anciently, as Kui-tze, Kus, etc., and now as Kuchar. These States, collectively, appear to have been the home and centre of the Uighur race, until a much later date than when, in the twelfth century, they lost their political independence and became subject to the Kara-Khitai. It would not be improbable, therefore, that the region having become known to neighbouring nations on the west as Uighuristan, when independent, should have retained that name long afterwards, though subject to foreign rulers.
9.1.4
On the partition of the empire of Chingiz Khan among his sons, we read of Uighuristan falling to the appanage of Chaghatai Khan, and we also learn, from Mirza Haidar, of Chaghatai having entrusted the province called 'Mangalai Suyah,' as far east as Chalish, to the care of the Dughlats, but not a word is said regarding the disposal of the districts to the eastward of Chalish. Referring to a later date—about 1320—Abul Ghazi mentions Uighuristan as one of the countries, the inhabitants of or Uighuristan, which, being without a Khan at that time, summoned Isan Bugha I. from Mawara-nn-Nahr to reign over them. But although a region is often mentioned by this name subsequent to the time of Chingiz, no indication, as far as I am aware, is given of its situation, until we come to Mirza Haidar's incidental statement that it constituted the eastern neighbour of 'Mangalai Suyah,' and was, consequently, identical with the Khanate of 'Chalish and Turfan.' On the other hand, though the Khanate is mentioned by Erskine, he does not connect it with the Uighuristan of Asiatic authors, but speaks of it always as 'the Eastern districts' — presumably of the Moghul Khanate in general. Mirza Haidar, unfortunately, omits to apprise his readers of the extent of the Khanate of Uighuristan. At periods when Aksu was not comprised within its limits, it could not have been large.
9.1.5
On the east it did not include Kumul (Hami) till as late as 1513, when Mansur Khan annexed that State and joined it on to Turfan, as we learn from Chinese sources of information. On the south it may have stretched to a considerable distance, but if so it could have enclosed, in that direction, only the sands of the desert. Northward, among the ranges of the Tian Shan, and along the valley of the Yulduz river, the inhabitants in the sixteenth century, at all events, and probably long before, appear to have been the Oirat or Kalmaks, but whether the Khans of Uighuristan counted these people among their subjects is, from the Tarikh-i-Rashidi, not clear. It is possible that they may have done so at some periods, if not always, and in this case their State may have extended to the upper waters of the Yulduz and to the northern slopes of the Tian Shan. In the days of Khizir Khwaja of Moghulistan (about 1383 to 1399), the country of the Kalmaks would appear to have formed part of that Khan's possessions, and, for this reason evidently, was invaded by Timur in his expedition of 1388. According to Klaproth (who does not name his authorities in this instance) the region, thus limited, is almost exactly that which was occupied by the Uighurs at the latest period of their existence as a people, though this was long past the time when they had ceased to constitute self-contained or independent states.
9.1.6
Indeed, he assigns to them this position until beyond the date of Timur, or within the fifteenth century, and speaks of them as a group of small but not independent principalities. In all probability the independence, or otherwise, of these Uighur communities, had no influence on the name which their country went by among neighbouring nations; it seems merely to have acquired the race-name of the inhabitants, as is often the case elsewhere, and (what chiefly concerns us here) to have preserved that name for some two hundred years, after a new and foreign principality had sprung up on its soil. The only consecutive account of the history of Turfan, from the days of Chingiz and the Uighur chiefs onwards, would seem to be that contained in the Chinese chronicles of the Ming dynasty, and we are indebted to Dr. Bretschneider for an epitomised translation of them. The companion province of Chálish is not mentioned in the epitome, and for this reason, we may assume that no notice of it is contained in the Ming-Shi. Possibly the Chinese annalists may have regarded it as part of Turfan, and if this was the case, their account of that province may be taken to embrace the whole of the eastern Khanate of Uighuristan.
9.1.7
The Ming record begins very shortly after the opening dates of the Tárikh-i-Rashidi, by relating how the prince of Tu-lu-fan (or Turfán), having repeatedly plundered foreign embassies proceeding through his dominion towards China, the Emperor, in 1377, despatched an army to punish him and ravage his territory—a task that seems to have been accomplished with success. No name is mentioned for this prince. The date would correspond with the reign, in Moghulistan, of Kamar-ud-Din, but I know of nothing that points to Uighuristan forming a part of Kamar-ud-Din's territory, unless perhaps the fact that Timur, shortly after the date in question, when overrunning Moghulistan in the course of a punitive expedition, sent one of his columns as far east as Kara-Khoja, which lay well within Uighuristán. On the other hand, a few years later, on the death of Khizir Khwaja, Timur's army, under Mirza Iskandar, laid waste the country only as far east as Kuchar, and then (for what reason is not stated) drew off towards Khotan. Yet Khizir Khwaja is known, from Mirza Haidar's narrative, to have made at least a temporary conquest of Turfan and Kara-Khoja.