Turpan - History

History

Turpan has long been the centre of a fertile oasis (with water provided by karez) and an important trade centre. It was historically located along the Silk Road's northern route, at which time it was adjacent to the kingdoms of Korla and Karashahr to the southwest and the town of Qarakhoja (Gaochang) to the southeast.

The peoples of the Kingdoms of Nearer and Further Jushi 車師 (the Turpan Oasis and the region to the north of the mountains near modern Jimasa), were closely related. It was originally one kingdom called Gushi 故師 (Wade-Giles: Ku-shih) which the Chinese conquered in 107 BC. It was subdivided into two kingdoms by the Chinese in 60 BC. During the Han era the city changed hands several times between the Xiongnu and the Han, interspersed with short periods of independence.

After the fall of the Han Dynasty, the region was virtually independent but tributary to various dynasties. Until the 5th century AD, the capital of this kingdom was Jiaohe (modern Yarghul – 16 km west of Turpan).

From 487 to 541 AD, Turpan was an independent Kingdom ruled by a Turkic tribe known to the Chinese as the Tiele. The Rouran Khaganate defeated the Tiele and subjugated Turpan, but soon afterwards the Rouran were destroyed by the Göktürks.

The Tang Dynasty reconquered the Tarim Basin by the 7th century AD. During the 7th, 8th, and early 9th centuries the Tibetan Empire, the Tang Chinese, and Turks fought to conquer the Tarim Basin. Sogdians and Chinese engaged in extensive commercial activities with each other under Tang rule. The Sogdians were mostly Mazdaist at this time. Turpan, renamed Xizhou by the Tang after their armies conquered it in 640AD, had a history of commerce and trade along the Silk Road already centuries old; it had many inns catering to merchants and other travelers, while brothels are recorded as having been numerously available in Kucha and Khotan. As a result of the Tang conquest, policies forcing minority group relocation and encouraging Han settlement lead to Turpan's name in Sogdian language becoming known as “Chinatown” or "Town of the Chinese".

In Astana, a contract written in Sogdian detailing the sale of a Sogdian girl to a Chinese man was discovered dated to 639 AD. Individual slaves were common among silk route houses, early documents recorded an increase in the selling of slaves in Turpan. Twenty-one 7th-century marriage contracts were found that showed, where one Sogdian spouse was present, 18 out of these 21 of their partner was also a Sogdian. The only Sogdian men who married Chinese women were highly eminent officials. Several commercial interactions were recorded, for example a camel was sold priced at 14 silk bolts in 673, and a Chang'an native bought a girl aged 11 for 40 silk bolts in 731 from a Sogdian merchant. Five men swore that the girl was never free before enslavement, since The Tang Code forbade commoners to be sold as slaves.

The Uyghurs established a Kingdom near Turpan (known as the Uyghuria Idikut state or Kara-Khoja Kingdom) that lasted from 856 to 1389 AD, in its later period surviving as a vassal of the Mongol Empire. This Kingdom, led by Idikuts, or Saint Spiritual Rulers, was established after the fall of the Uyghur Empire to the Kyrgyz Turks. Last Idikut left Turpan area in 1284 for Kumul, then Gansu to seek protection of Yuan Dynasty, but local Uyghur Buddhist rulers still held power until Invasion of Moghul Hizir Khoja in 1389. The conversion of the local Buddhist population to Islam was completed nevertheless only in the second half of the 15th century.