ÿþ<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=unicode"> <meta name="Author" content="Vassil Karloukovski"> <meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft FrontPage 5.0"> <meta name="ProgId" content="FrontPage.Editor.Document"> <title>Hudud al-'Alam - 21 - Commentary of V. Minorsky</title> </head> <body> <font face="Palatino Linotype"> <b><font size=+1>Hudud al-'Alam, The Regions of the World</font></b> <br><b>V. Minorsky</b> <br>&nbsp; </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><b>§ 21. The Khifchkh (Q<i>1</i></b></font><i><font face="Arial Unicode MS"> </font></i><font face="Palatino Linotype"><b>pchaq)</b> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Marquart's <i>Komanen</i> is a special study on the origin and destinies of the Komans-Q<i>1</i></font><i><font face="Arial Unicode MS"> </font></i><font face="Palatino Linotype">pchaqs; though containing a prodigious mass of rare materials and many valuable suggestions it remains in the author's own words, p. 206, only spade-work ("Pionierarbeit"); cf. important critical remarks by Pelliot in <i>Jour. As.</i>, avril 1920, pp. 125-86, and by Barthold, <i>Russ. istor. zhurnal</i>, vii, 1921, pp. 131-56. See also Barthold, <i>Kip ak</i> in <i>EI</i>, A. Bruce Boswell, <i>The Kipchak Turks</i>, in <i>The Slavonic Review</i>, vi, 1927, pp. 68-85 (popular article), and D. Rasovsky, <i>Polovts1</i></font><i><font face="Arial Unicode MS"> </font></i><font face="Palatino Linotype">, in <i>Seminarium Kondakovianum</i>, vii, 1935, pp. 1-18 (to be continued) with a very good European bibliography [part ii, ibid., viii, 1936, pp. 19-40]. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">The name <i>Khifshkh</i> &lt; <i>Khifchkh</i>, <i>Q1</i></font><i><font face="Arial Unicode MS"> </font></i><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>pchaq</i> is already attested in I.Kh., 31. The Russians called the Qipchaq <i>Polovts1</i></font><i><font face="Arial Unicode MS"> </font></i><font face="Palatino Linotype"> (from&nbsp;<img SRC="315_0.jpg" height=17 width=78 align=ABSBOTTOM> "yellowish, sallow") to which name in western languages correspond the terms: <i>Pallidi</i>, <i>Falones</i>, <i>Valani</i>, <i>Valwen</i>, &amp;c. This group of names has no correspondence in Muslim literature. <a href="#315 2.">[2]</a> Another name under which the Qipchaq were known in the Byzantine empire and Western Europe is&nbsp;<img SRC="315_1.jpg" height=22 width=70 align=ABSBOTTOM>, <i>Comani</i>, <i>Commani</i>, which is also found in Idr+s+, who (perhaps quoting from a European source) <a href="#315 3.">[3]</a> calls the Qipchaq&nbsp;<img SRC="315_2.jpg" height=22 width=49 align=ABSBOTTOM> and their land&nbsp;<img SRC="315_3.jpg" height=22 width=36 align=ABSBOTTOM> (Jaubert's translation, ii, 395, 399, &amp;c.). The identity of all these appellations is clear from Rubruquis (Paris, 1839, p. 247): "Commani qui dicuntur Capthat </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="315 2."></a><font size=-1><b>2.</b> But <i>v.i.</i>, p. 317, Barthold's interpretation of Sr+.</font> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="315 3."></a><font size=-1><b>3.</b> One must, however, keep in mind the still insufficiently explained names&nbsp;<img SRC="315_4.jpg" height=25 width=48 align=ABSBOTTOM> (or&nbsp;<img SRC="315_5.jpg" height=25 width=50 align=ABSBOTTOM>) which Gard+z+ quotes on the road to the Kimäk (see note to § 18) and&nbsp;<img SRC="315_6.jpg" height=25 width=64 align=ABSBOTTOM> (variants&nbsp;<img SRC="315_7.jpg" height=26 width=51 align=ABSBOTTOM> and&nbsp;<img SRC="315_8.jpg" height=26 width=91 align=ABSBOTTOM>) given by Rashid al-d+n, ed. Bérézine, <i>Trud<img SRC="i_k.jpg" height=17 width=8 align=ABSBOTTOM> V.O.</i>, vii, 162, as the name of the tenth tribe of the Uyghurs, cf. Marquart, <i>Komanen</i>, 91 and 58.</font> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><img SRC="line_down.gif" height=18 width=596> <br>316&nbsp;&nbsp; <i>Commentary</i>&nbsp;&nbsp; § 21 </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">[*Qipchaq]; a Teutonicis vero dicuntur Valani [read: <i>Falani</i>] et provincia Valania [read: <i>Falania</i>]." The origin of the names <i>Coman-/Qoman</i> remains dark (cf. note to § 14, 1.). The name&nbsp;<img SRC="316_1.jpg" height=21 width=28 align=ABSBOTTOM> (still suspect!) to which Marquart attaches such an exceptional importance might explain the Magyar form <i>Kún</i> but it does not account for <i>Qoman</i>. Even without taking&nbsp;<img SRC="316_2.jpg" height=21 width=23 align=ABSBOTTOM> into consideration we can imagine the derivation of Magyar <i>Kún</i> from <i>Qoman</i> but there is no explanation for the expansion of an earlier *<i>Qkn</i> into <i>Qoman</i>, simultaneously with its supposed survival (?) as <i>Kún</i> in Magyar. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Like the Khirkh+z, Kimäk, and Rks the Khifchkh are represented in our source as living in the immediate neighbourhood of the Northern Uninhabited Lands. To their south <a href="#316 1.">[1]</a> are placed the Turkish Pechenegs. Our source (§ 6, 44.) adds that the Rks river (Volga above its junction with Kama?) skirted the Khifchkh confines. <a href="#316 2.">[2]</a> Were then the Qipchaq imagined to live down-stream from the Rks on the left bank of the upper course of the Volga? This, however, would be an entirely imaginary construction due exclusively to our author, for Gard+z+, who uses much the same materials, distinctly says that the Khifchaq lived to the east of the Pechenegs. Having substituted <i>north</i> for <i>east</i> our author fitted in the peoples into his scheme without much care for the actual situation. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Gard+z+, 82, mentions the Khifchkh as one of the seven tribes of the Kimäk. Our author seems to refer to a later stage of the Khifchkh emancipation: he admits the vassal dependence of their king upon the Kimäk but considers the Khifchkh as a special tribe, maybe separated from the Kimäk by the territory called <i>Andar az Khifchkh</i>. To what an extent the form of association of the Qipchaq with the Kimäk was changed towards the end of the eleventh century is witnessed by the quotation from Kshghar+ (iii, 22), <i>v.s.</i>, p. 305, which shows the Yimäk, <i>i.e.</i> presumably one of the two original clans of the Kimäk, as a kind of poor relatives of the Qipchaq. In a.d. 1318 al-Warraq quotes the Yimäk as a clan of the Qipchaq, cf. Marquart, <i>Komanen</i>, 157. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Marquart, <i>ibid.</i>, 100, must be right in assuming that the Qipchaq first profited by the victory of the Ghkz over the Pechenegs. To characterize the further succession of nomad tribes in southern Russia suffice it to mention <a href="#316 3.">[3]</a> the following facts: in 1036 Yaroslav of Kiev inflicted the final crushing defeat on the Pechenegs. Under 1054 Russian chronicles for the first time mention the appearance both of the Torks (= Ghkz) and the Polovts<img SRC="i_k.jpg" height=17 width=8 align=ABSBOTTOM> (= Qipchaq). The former were evidently fleeing under the pressure of the latter. Henceforth for 170 years up to the Mongol invasion <br>&nbsp; </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="316 1."></a><font size=-1><b>1.</b> Read: west (?), cf. Gard+z+ on the Pechenegs, <i>v.s.</i>, p. 314, line 20.</font> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="316 2."></a><font size=-1><b>2.</b> On the other hand the <i>northern</i> boundary of the Turkish Pechenegs was the mysterious river Rkth (§ 6, 45.) which is not mentioned in connexion with the Kh<img SRC="i_k.jpg" height=17 width=8 align=ABSBOTTOM>fchakh. We may imagine then that, on our author's Map, the Rkth divided the Rks and Pechenegs only on the right bank of the Volga. [Or should we read eastern, instead of northern, boundary, cf. supra note 1.]</font> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="316 3."></a><font size=-1><b>3.</b> Here we cannot discuss the migrations farther south and west. See now Rasovsky, <i>o.c.</i> [The first attack of the Pechenegs on Kiev is recorded in the Russian Chronicle under A.D. 968.]</font> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><img SRC="line_down.gif" height=18 width=596> <br>§§ 21-2&nbsp;&nbsp; <i>The Khifchakh (Qipchaq)</i>&nbsp;&nbsp; 317 </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">(a.d. 1224) the Qipchaq remained masters of the steppes down to the Caucasus. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Explaining the process of formation of the Qipchaq tribe Marquart assumes three gradual stages of its mongolization (?). According to Gard+z+ the original Kimäk separated from the Tatr (following Marquart, <i>o.c.</i>, 95, in the seventh century); for a second time the Qkn, a clan of the Mongolian Marqa mentioned in 'Auf+ (see note to § 20) put into movement the original tribes in the beginning of the 11th century, <i>o.c.</i>, 55, 57; for a third time the foundation of the Qipchaq (in the <i>Yüan-shih</i>: *<i>Kin ch'a</i>) state is explained by the arrival towards A.D. 1120 of some princes whose original habitat was near Jehol in Northern China, <i>o.c.</i>, 115, 117, 137. Many of these facts still need confirmation and their interpretation by Marquart is subject to considerable caution (see the reviews of Marquart's book by Pelliot and Barthold and the latter's <i>Vorlesungen</i>, p. 114). </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">It remains to mention here that in 'Auf+'s much discussed passage the chain of moves among the nomadic tribes is opened by the invasion of the Qkn (<i>Q.r+</i>) into the Sr+ land (<i>zam+n-i Sr+</i>). The inhabitants of Sr+ (<i>ahl-i Sr+</i>) <a href="#317 1.">[1]</a> press the Ghkz-Türkmäns and the latter move into the southern seats of the Pechenegs (§ 47). Barthold in his review of Marquart&#39;s <i>Komanen</i> thinks that by <i>Sr+</i> the Qipchaq are meant, and this hypothesis is certainly supported by the fact that the Qipchaq were the people who drove before them the Ghkz (<img SRC="317_1.jpg" height=20 width=94 align=ABSBOTTOM>) and gave their own name (<i>Dasht-i Khifchkh</i>) to the steppes formerly associated with the name of the Ghkzz. Barthold even suggests that <i>sr+</i>&lt;<i> sar1</i></font><i><font face="Arial Unicode MS"> </font></i><font face="Palatino Linotype">, in Turkish "yellow", is not an unsuitable name for the people known in the west under the names: <i>Polovtsi</i>, <i>Pallidi</i>, &amp;c. [One wonders whether the original group of the Qipchaq had something to do with the &quot;Yellow&quot; clans of the western T&#39;u-chüeh, v.s., § 17.] </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Against Barthold's hypothesis is the fact that in 'Auf+'s text <i>ahl-i Sr+</i>can only be interpreted as "people of [the territory called] Sr+". However, the name of the <i>Sar1</i></font><i><font face="Arial Unicode MS"> </font><font face="Palatino Linotype">-su</font></i><font face="Palatino Linotype"> could form a connecting link with some "Yellow" tribe (<i>v.s.</i>, p. 284, n. 5). Moreover, on the road supposed to lead to the Sar<i>1</i></font><i><font face="Arial Unicode MS"> </font></i><font face="Palatino Linotype">-su (notes to § 18) lay the sands called by the Turks&nbsp;<img SRC="317_2.jpg" height=23 width=51 align=ABSBOTTOM> (<i>v.s.</i>, p. 315, n. 3). Had this latter name anything to do with the Qomans it would pave the way to the demonstration that the "people of Sr+" were not different from the "Qomans" (= Qipchaq). <br>&nbsp; </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="317 1."></a><font size=-1><b>1.</b> The text as it stands does not suggest any leadership of the Qkn over the people of Sr+.</font> <br>&nbsp; </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">[<a href="hud_21.html">Previous</a>] [<a href="hud_22.html">Next</a>] <br>[<a href="index.html">Back to Index</a>] </font> </body> </html>