The Nāṣirī Generations 257.3
Tabakat-i-Nasiri 257.3
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- English
257.3.1
This is the place where Mr. H. H. Howorth, in his Mongols Proper page 59, on the authority of some foreign translation says: “He now collected an army and marched against the Keraits. His army was very inferior in numbers, but attacked the enemy with ardour,” &c. His “flight from the Awang Khan” is not alluded to in the least, and he must have been exceedingly clever to collect an army, but, at page 552 of the same book, the story is told from another translation in a totally different manner. Tamur-chi thought it advisable however to withdraw quietly during the night towards the source of the Balijunah—some say, the Lake Baljiunah—Baljunah Nawar—and others, Baljunah Bulak, Bulagh, or Balik, signifying a spring in Turkish, whither the women and children had been previously despatched. This lake was salt, and contained but little water, scarcely sufficient for his people to drink. If we consider that Kara-Kuram was the chief encampment or dwelling-place of the Awang Khan, the retreat of Tamur-chi towards this lake of Baljunah, in which there was scarcely enough muddy water to quench the thirst of man and beast, and his subsequent movements, are sufficiently clear.
257.3.2
The people of those parts, of his own Nairun tribes, who had remained faithful, and had become dispersed when he took shelter with the Awang Khan, were dwelling in the tracts adjacent to Baljunah Bulagh, under his uncle U-tigin, also called Utichkin, and, when he reached them, on this occasion, they began to gather around him, as well as many others from the Awang Khan’s territory. At this time, at the suggestion of the Nu-yan, Karachar, Tamur-chi had a register made of the names of all those who had accompanied him in his flight from the presence of the Awang Khan, and assigned certain ranks and offices to each of them. The two youths, Batae or Badae, and Kashlik, who had warned him of his danger, were made Tarkhans. He was not “abandoned by most of his troops,” nor did he “fly to the desert of Baldjuna,” as Mr. Howorth states (p. 59); nor was he “a hopeless fugitive at Baljuna,” as the same writer states in another place (p. 553).
257.3.3
The meaning of Tarkhan is thus explained: “The person so called is secure and safe from all trouble and annoyance; in every place in which he serves, whatever booty he may take is his own, and he is not deprived of it; he can enter the place of audience of his sovereign without being summoned, and without first asking permission; and he can commit or be guilty of nine offences—nine is a number, as I have already noticed, held in great veneration by the Mughals—without being questioned; and Tamur-chi decreed that, for nine generations, the offspring of these Tarkhans should be exempt from all burdens and imposts.”
257.3.4
In the “General Description of Kashghar,” contained in the “Report” of the Yarkand Mission, previously referred to, we are told [p. 100], as to the Ancient punishments before the 10th century (Moghul): “Under the Moghuls, a noble was entitled to forgiveness nine times, but for the tenth was The descendants of the two persons above referred to were the progenitors of two tribes, styled respectively Badae Tarkhans, and Kashlik Tarkhans. The Tarkhans of the Dasht-i-Kibchak and Khwarazm are the descendants of Badae, while those of Turkistan are the descendants of Kishlik. Several great Amirs arose from these tribes, among whom was the Tarkhan, Haji, who was the founder of a city on the Atil, to which he gave his name. It was known as Haji Tarkhan, which, in after-years, was styled Hashtar Khan, but which European writers have “twisted” into Astrakhan, and not Orientals, as the author of the “Mongols Proper” imagines. In the battle with the Awang Khan, among other booty captured, was the bargah of that sovereign, which was of cloth of gold. This Tamur-chi bestowed, with other things, upon Badae and Kashlik, and, in after-times, the distinguishing mark of a Tarkhan was a piece of the golden cloth tent of the Awang Khan, which they used to wear hanging from their turbans.
257.3.5
Tamur-chi now marched from the head of the Baljunah, and pitched his tents at a pleasant place on the bank of a river named the Ur or Aor Muran [Ur Muran ?], at the foot of a mountain range on the frontier of Kalangae Kada, or Kad, which is the boundary of Khitae on that side, and there he mustered his followers, and they amounted to 4600 men. Leaving that spot after a time, he moved onwards, and reached a place where was a piece of water—the river Kalar—[Kailar of our maps]. Abu-l-Ghazi, Bahadur, calls it the Kula Sue or River Kula—and, there being plenty of grass thereabout, he determined to make some stay. On the way thither, with his forces divided into two bodies, one with the women and followers, and moving on either bank, he fell in with an Amir, Turk-Ili, by name, who had a considerable following, and, on inquiry being made of him as to who he was, and his intentions and objects, he turned out to be a Angiras, a Kunghur-at Mughal, with a considerable body of that tribe, and he agreed to submit to Tamur-chi, and was treated with great distinction. Whilst encamped at this spot, Tamur-chi was joined by other smaller bodies of his other tribes, until, at length, his force grew formidable. Having marched from thence, Tamur-chi despatched from the banks of the river Kurkan [some say from the Kala Nawar.
257.3.6
Abu-l-Ghazi says the Kolgha Nawar] an emissary named Urkae, or Urakae Ghun, the Bahadur, to the Awang Khan’s presence soliciting an accommodation, and several times emissaries passed to and fro between them, but terms of peace did not result therefrom; and his brother, Juji Kasar, who had been taken prisoner, and carried away with his family to the Awang Khan’s presence, now joined him, having made his escape. On the last occasion, Tamur-chi despatched an agent of his own along with the Awang Khan’s envoy, to throw him off his guard, apparently, since he followed himself with all his forces, made raids upon that monarch’s territory, reduced flourishing spots to desolation, slew great numbers of his people, and made others captive. After some time, wherein the Awang Khan’s people had suffered such misery, a battle ensued between Tamur-chi and his forces, and the Karayats—who were vastly superior in numbers—towards manhood, vigour, valour, and intrepidity, all concurred in the close of which Karachar encountered the Awang Khan, struck his horse with an arrow, and brought it head foremost to the ground. The Awang Khan then succeeded in mounting another horse, and took to flight along with his son, Sangun, leaving his wives and daughters captives in the hands of the victor; and such of the Karayat tribe as saved their lives did so by submitting to Tamur-chi’s yoke.
257.3.7
The Awang Khan had fled towards the territory of the Naeman tribe to seek shelter with their ruler, Tuluku or Taibuku, the Tayanak Khan, but, when he reached the Tayanak Khan’s country, some of the latter’s chiefs, without communicating with their sovereign, and on account of an old feud, put the Awang Khan to death. Sangun however managed to escape out of their clutches, and succeeded in reaching the territory of Kirkiz and Tibbat, and from thence got to Kashghar—another writer states that he proceeded towards Khutan and Kashghar, thus indicating the whereabouts of Kirkiz—but he was subsequently put to a cruel death, in the Kashghar territory, by the chief of a branch of the Khilj tribe, of Kulij Kara, called Kara Ma, who sent his family captives to Tamur-chi. The brother of the Awang Khan, whose three daughters were wives to Tamur-chi and his sons Jiiji and Tuli, escaped into Tingkut. Of this person more anon. As the whole of the Karayat tribe, and the forces of the Awang Khan, had submitted to him, the mind of Tamur-chi being now at rest from anxiety, he resolved on taking some recreation after his fatigues. He accordingly passed some time pleasantly in the part, near which the battle took place, in pleasure, and in enjoying the diversion of the chase, after which he set out for his native yurat, or encampment. These events happened in the year 599 H. [A.D. 1202-3], when Tamur-chi was 49 years old, but some say he was 50.
257.3.8
After having gained this important victory, and as the greater number of other tribes of the Mughal i-mak had bent the neck of subjection to him, Tamur-chi assumed the seat of Khan-ship, at the camp or station named Saman-Kaharah, which is also written Saman-Karah [Abu-l-Ghazi, Bahadur, has Naman Karah] which probably was near Dilun-Yuldak, in Ramazan of that same year, and the sovereignty exercised by the Awang Khan passed to Tamur-chi; but, as soon as the Tayanak Khan, also written Tayan, and Tayanak, son of Balikto Inanaj, sovereign of the Naemans [a Turkish tribe, but its direct descent is not certain], became aware of his predominance, he set about organizing an army against him, and the tribes of Durman, Makrit, and Saljiut, the Badshah of the Uir-at, Alin Taighi, and some other Bashliks of the Karayat, the Jajar-at of Jamukah, the Sajan, and some of the Tattar tribes, it is said, entered into a confederacy with the Tayanak Khan for the purpose of making war upon Tamur-chi.