East Asia · Sui, Tang and the khaganates
Türgesh Khaganate
699–766
The Türgesh (699–766) were a Turkic people of the On Oq ("Ten Arrows") confederation who rose to power in the Ili valley and Zhetysu after the Western Turkic Khaganate's fall, with capitals at Suyab and later Taraz.
- Existed
- 699–766
- Shown on the map
- AD 692–749
- Peak area
- 4.1M km²
- Region
- East Asia
Overview
The Türgesh (699–766) were a Turkic people of the On Oq ("Ten Arrows") confederation who rose to power in the Ili valley and Zhetysu after the Western Turkic Khaganate's fall, with capitals at Suyab and later Taraz. Founded by Wushile (Üch Elig, r. 699–706), the khaganate reached its height under Suluk (r. 715/716–738), a Black Türgesh chieftain and brilliant strategist who—known to the Arabs as Abu Muzahim ("the Butting One")—led a decade of resistance against Umayyad expansion into Transoxiana, allied with the Sogdians (victory in 723 with Ferghana and Shash forces). He deftly balanced Tang and Arab pressures with marriage diplomacy. His murder in 738 triggered civil war between the Yellow and Black Türgesh factions. Weakened, the khaganate was destroyed by the Karluks in 766.
Common questions
- What was Türgesh Khaganate?
- The Türgesh (699–766) were a Turkic people of the On Oq ("Ten Arrows") confederation who rose to power in the Ili valley and Zhetysu after the Western Turkic Khaganate's fall, with capitals at Suyab and later Taraz.
- When did Türgesh Khaganate exist?
- Türgesh Khaganate existed 699–766. On this map it is drawn AD 692–749.
- How large was Türgesh Khaganate?
- At its greatest extent drawn on this map, Türgesh Khaganate covered about 4.1 million km². That is the largest area the border data gives it across the years it is drawn, not necessarily its greatest extent in history.
Sources
This compendium cites its sources once for the whole document rather than per territory. Its bibliography names the English Wikipedia article for each polity as the basis of these profiles, supplemented by Encyclopaedia Britannica, chinaknowledge.de, the World History Encyclopedia, museum and university sources, and the academic works it lists. The article this entry is anchored on:
- Wikipedia — Türgesh en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T%C3%BCrgesh
This entry was last updated .
This entry was researched and drafted with AI from the sources above, and has not been reviewed by a historian. How entries are made
Text available under CC BY-SA 4.0: reuse it with a credit to The World Through Time and a link to this page. Passages drawing on the Wikipedia articles listed above are also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 by their contributors.
Border geometry for the map itself comes from Cliopatria v0.12 (Seshat Global History Databank, CC-BY-4.0).
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