Influences
Dankoff suggests that the author of the Kutadgu Bilig was attempting to reconcile the Irano-Islamic and Turkic wisdom traditions present among the Karakhanids, the former with urban roots and the latter with nomadic roots. Certainly the recent move from a more nomadic way of life changed the requirements for a good leader; the Kutadgu Bilig's agenda does appear to include instruction for how to be a good leader. In addition, the author of the Kutadgu Bilig states in the text that he was trying to make a Turkic version of something like the Shāh-nāmeh.
The Kutadgu Bilig is often considered to be part of the Mirror for Princes, a genre of literature which includes works like the Qābūs-nāmeh, written in 1082, and the Siyāset-nāmeh, written in 1090. Alessio Bombaci argues against considering the Kutadgu Bilig part of the Mirror for Princes; not only is the first "full-blown" Mirror for Princes the Qābūs-nāmeh, written over ten years after the Kutadgu Bilig, but there are a couple points on which the Kutadgu Bilig and the other Mirrors for Princes differ:
- The Kutadgu Bilig offers advice to all men, and not just princes.
- The names of the characters in the Kutadgu Bilig could be anyone, and aren't the names of any particular historical figures.
While the Kutadgu Bilig is stylistically reminiscent of the Mirror for Princes in a number of ways, there are a good number of other traditions—many Turkic—which it resembles in style:
- Islamic and pre-Islamic strife poems, found in Arabic and Persian literature,
- Aytış, responsive song competition between two opponents found today among the Kazakhs and the Kyrgyz,
- Askiya, a similar style of song competition found today among the Uzbeks,
- Songs between boys and girls, such as Uzbek lapar and Kazakh bedil songs,
- Wedding songs such as Uzbek yor-yor and Kazakh jar-jar
Aside from the Irano-Islamic and Turkic influences, Dankoff posits some amount of Greek and Buddhist influence on the text.
Read more about this topic: Kutadgu Bilig, The Text
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