ETHNOGRAPHICAL DESCRIPTION OF KASHGAR.
In the extensive region stretching from the Caspian and Black Seas to
the Kizil Yart and Pamir plateaus, and from the Persian Gulf to Siberia,
the two great families, the Aryan and the Turanian, have in past
centuries striven for supremacy. The latter, embracing in its bosom in
this part of the world the more turbulent and warlike tribes, succeeded
in subjecting those who claimed the same parent stock as European
nations. The Tajik or Persian is the chief representative in this region
of the Aryan family, and he has now for many centuries been the subject
of the Turk rulers of the various divisions of Western Turkestan. These
latter are the personifiers of Turanian traditions. The Tajik appears to
have been subdued, not so much by the superiority of his conqueror in
the art of war, as by his own inclination to lead a peaceful and
harmless life. The pure Tajik, hardly to be met with now anywhere in
Asia, except in the mountainous districts of the Hindoo Koosh, is
represented to us to have been of an imposing presence, with a long
flowing beard, aquiline nose, and large eyes. He is generally tall and
graceful; yet in Khokand and Bokhara the Tajik is at present viewed much
as the Saxons were by the Normans. In those states, too, a man is spoken
of by his race. He is an Usbeg, a Kipchak, a Kirghiz, or a Tajik, as the
case may be, and by this means the rivalry of past ages is to some
extent preserved down to the present time. It is the dissension spread,
or rather the destruction of any sympathy between the various races
caused, by these outward tokens of diversity in origin, that has made
Western Turkestan the familiar home of intestine disturbance, which has
in its turn led up to the easy dismemberment of the various Khanates by
Russian intrigue and by Russian force. In Eastern Turkestan the rivalry
of races has become less bitter, and in nothing is this better
manifested than in the fact that there a man is described by his native
town. He may be a Tajik, or an Usbeg, or a Kirghiz, or a Kipchak, too,
but he is only known as a Yarkandi, or a Kashgari. And while we are at
once struck by this broad and salient difference in popular custom, and
consequently in popular sentiment also, between the Western and Eastern
divisions of Turkestan, a slight inquiry is sufficient to show that the
antipathies of the various races towards each other have become much
more a thing of the past in Kashgaria than they have in the Khanates of
Khokand and its neighbours. At all events, the antipathies that still
prevail in that state are clearly traceable to other causes than
Aryan-Turanian hostility, and are undoubtedly produced either by
religious fanaticism, motives of personal ambition, or the hatred roused
by Chinese pretensions on the one hand, and Khokandian on the other, to
the supreme control of Kashgaria. Bearing these facts clearly in mind,
it is evident that ethnographical descriptions will not make the
political relations of the peoples of the state more easily
intelligible; yet, as matter of historical import, these cannot be
altogether passed over in silence.
The inhabitants of the little known regions now variously known as
Jungaria and Eastern Turkestan were, until recent years, considered to
be of pure Tartar origin, and consequently members of the Turanian
family. There are some still who believe that this definition is the
most accurate. Others dispute it on various grounds, and with much
plausibility. There is no question that the original inhabitants,
historically speaking, were the Oigurs, or Uigurs, and these people
were certainly Tartars. But frequently the Tajik merchants who traded
with Kashgar in the earlier centuries of the Middle Ages, took up their
abode in the country, and by degrees a large colony of Tajik immigrants
was formed on the foundation of the original Oigur stock. These Tajiks
gradually became Tartarised, but they still retained the unmistakable
characteristics of the Aryan family. The two brothers Schlagintweit, and
Mr. Shaw following in their footsteps, were the first to maintain this
view, which is becoming generally accepted. We have, therefore, in
Kashgar the strange spectacle of a Tajik people becoming not only
unidentifiable from the Turanian stock with which it has been
intermingled; but we have also a race tolerance that is unknown in any
other portion of Asia. Undoubtedly the hostility of the settled and
peaceful Andijani immigrant and Kashgari resident to the irreclaimable
Kirghiz is deep-rooted, and, so long as the latter continues a source of
danger to all peaceful communities, abiding; but even this sentiment,
and the religious hatred that has at various epochs marked the political
intercourse of Buddhist and Mahomedan, are probably less durable, and
susceptible of greater improvement in the future, than the race
antipathies that seem perennially vital among the tribes of Western
Asia. The vast majority of the inhabitants of Alty Shahr are of Tajik
descent. In the course of centuries the purity of their lineage has been
leavened by much intermingling with Tartar blood, both at the time of
the Mongol subjection and of the Chinese. In addition to these two great
divisions, there are many Afghan and Badakshi settlers, who have flocked
to Kashgar whenever the progress of events seemed to justify the
expectation that military service in that state would prove a
remunerative engagement. Many of these remained, and they have also left
a clear impression on the features of the inhabitants. It is, however,
to pre-historic times, or certainly to a period lost in the mist of
history, that we must refer for that general exodus of the Aryan family
from the Hindoo Koosh and the plains of Western Asia into the more
secluded prairies of Kashgar, which took place when the Turanian nations
first spread like destroying locusts over the face of that continent. It
was at this period that Khoten, which in its name shows its Aryan
origin, was founded.
The great nomadic tribe of the Kirghiz, or Kara Kirghiz, as the Russians
call them, to distinguish them from the Kirghiz of the various hordes
who, by the way, are not true Kirghiz at all, has at all times played a
fitful, yet important part in the histories of Khokand, Jungaria, and
Eastern Turkestan. Preserving their independence in the inaccessible
region lying west of Lake Issik Kul, and along the Kizil Yart plateau
and range, this tribe has always been a source of trouble to its
neighbours, whosoever they might be. On various occasions, too, they
have joined the career of conquest to their usual avocation of plunder,
and under the few great leaders that have arisen amongst them they have
appeared as conquerors, both of Eastern and Western Turkestan. But their
achievements have never been of a permanent nature. Like the irregular
undisciplined mass of horsemen which constitute their fighting force,
their chief strength lay in a sharp and decisive attack. They had not
the organization or the resources necessary for the accomplishment of
any conquest of a permanent kind. Their incursions, even when most
formidable and most sweeping, were essentially mere marauding
onslaughts. Their object was plunder, not empire; and having secured the
former, they recked little of the value of the latter. At one time they
were able to carry their raids in almost any direction with perfect
impunity; but as settled governments arose around their fastnesses, and
curtailed their field of operations, what had been a life of adventure
through simple love of excitement, became a struggle for sheer
existence. The region where they dwelt was far too barren to support
throughout the year even the limited numbers of the Kirghiz, and yearly
they had to issue forth against prepared and disciplined enemies in
search of the sustenance that, to preserve their existence, had to be
obtained. But for the intestine quarrels that were sapping the life
strength of the Asiatic states slowly away, there is no doubt that the
Kirghiz would have been gradually exterminated. Soon, however, they had
the skill to avail themselves of these disagreements to sell their
services as soldiers to the highest bidders; and although they were not
equal to the Kipchak tribes in valour, their alliance was considered of
importance, and on many a dubious occasion sufficed to turn the fortune
of the day. By such measures of policy their existence has been
preserved, and at the present time they perform much the same functions,
and are regarded in much the same manner by their neighbours, as in the
past.
The Kipchaks, another great tribe, who however are scarcely represented
at all in Kashgaria, pride themselves on being the most select of all
the Usbegs, but their day of power has passed by, for the present at all
events. Thirty years ago they were at the height of their success, but
they incurred the jealousy of other Usbeg tribes and of the Kirghiz.
Owing to the abilities of their great chief, Mussulman Kuli, they
succeeded in erecting in Khokand a powerful state, which was able to
restrain the encroachments of Bokhara, at that time the great enemy of
the former Khanate. But the plots that broke out against them in 1853,
in conjunction with the advance of Russia on the Syr Darya, were crowned
with success, and with the execution of Mussulman Kuli the Kipchak power
was completely broken. Since that date, however, several of the more
distinguished leaders who have appeared on the scene, such as Alim Kuli
and Abdurrahman Aftobatcha, have been members of this clan. The eastern
portion of the dominion of Yakoob Beg is almost exclusively inhabited
by Calmucks, or tribes of Calmuck descent. The great majority of the
inhabitants of Manchuria and Jungaria are of Calmuck descent, and even
in Russia in Europe there are many settlements of this tribe along the
Volga and the Don. None of these, however, possess any political
importance except those who inhabit the country north of Gobi and
between Eastern Turkestan and China, and the chief of these are the
Khalkas. The Calmucks are attached by old associations to the Government
of Pekin; and, although they have sometimes revolted against, and often
caused trouble to, the Central Government, they have generally
acknowledged their culpability and submitted to the Chinese authorities.
In the revolt of the Tungani the Calmucks remained true to China, and
performed very opportune service on various occasions. The Chinese army
in Eastern Turkestan was mainly recruited from among these tribes, who
became distinguished from the Tungani by their religion and fidelity.
The origin of the Tungani, or Dungans, as the Russians call them, is
much in dispute; and as they played so important a part in the loss of
Kashgar and Ili by China, as well as in the history of the rule of
Yakoob Beg, it may be as well to put the facts as they stand at some
length before the reader. There is no question, we believe, that the
Chinese in applying the term Tungani attach the meaning thereto of
Mahomedan. There is equal reason for supposing that the term Khitay,
literally meaning simply Chinese, has been applied to the Buddhists by
general usage. If we acknowledge the validity of these two
assumptions--and, so far as we have been able to ascertain, the best
authorities have adopted them--there would be little difficulty in
explaining who the Tungani were. Granting these, they would simply be
the Mahomedan subjects in the eastern portions of China. But others
believe that the Tungani are a distinct race, presenting peculiar
ethnological features. According to this version, the tribe of the
Tungani can be traced back as a distinct community to the fifth and
sixth centuries, when they were seated along the Tian Shan range, with
their capital at Karashar. The most recent investigations, under Colonel
Prjevalsky, are believed to show no signs of there having been any
important cities in this quarter. It may be convenient to mention here,
that at that time they were Buddhists; but when Islamism broke over Asia
in the eighth century, they were among the first to adopt the new
tenets. This defection from the religion of China brought them into
collision with the Emperors of Pekin, and many of these Tungani were
deported into Kansuh and Shensi, where we are to suppose they continued
a race apart, with their own religion and their own code of morality,
for more than ten centuries. Even granting the possibility of such a
consistency to a new religion, which history informs us was thrust upon
them at the point of the sword, it seems scarcely credible that we
should not hear more of this troublesome tribe in Chinese history.
Frequent allusions are made in imperial edicts and other official
proclamations to the Tungani, but always in reference to their religion,
and not in any way as if they were any other but heretic Chinamen.
Besides, even in this way little is heard of the Tungani until the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when very sharp measures were taken
against them by the emperors, solely because religious propagandists
from their ranks were appearing as enemies of a Buddhist Government. The
theory that the Tungani were a people and not a sect is new, but it is
possible that it may be a true discovery. On the other hand, it is far
more probable that it is only an ingenious attempt at elucidating what
appears on the face of it to be a simple matter enough. The reader must
decide for himself between the two versions. If the Tungani are to be
considered a distinct race, then the majority of the inhabitants of
Eastern Turkestan are not Calmucks, but Tungani; if the view taken here
is adopted, then they are Calmucks who have at various times adopted
Mahomedanism. These are the chief tribes of this portion of Central
Asia; and in the following pages it may be as well to bear in mind that
Khitay is applied exclusively to the Buddhist or governing class, and
Tungani to the Mahomedan or subject race in Kansuh and its outlying
dependencies. As race antipathies have not entered during recent times
so much into the contests of the people of the regions immediately under
consideration as religions, the difference as to the true significance
of the term Tungani does not materially affect one's view of the general
question.