The Gokturk Empire: Rise of the Turkic Peoples

They ruled an empire larger than the Roman Empire at its peak. From China to Byzantium, their mounted archers were feared, while their merchants connected the Silk Road between Europe, Persia, and India. The Gök-Türk ("Sky Turks") established the first Eurasian great empire in history—a state spanning over 7 million square kilometers, which would not be surpassed until 700 years later by the Mongols.Yet hardly anyone knows their story. A sad gap in our historical consciousness, because the history of the Göktürks and all ancient Turkic peoples is a fascinating epic stretching across three millennia. To understand their significance, we must undertake a journey through space and time, far from today's Anatolia. For the origin of Turkish civilization lies in the vast plains of Central Asia.In this distant world of antiquity, the early Turks lived side by side with the ancestors of the Mongols, Tungusic peoples, Japanese, and Koreans. Initially settled farmers, they peacefully coexisted with their neighbors. But between 3000 and 300 BCE, one of history's greatest migrations began: Old Turkic-speaking groups moved westward and southward through the Eurasian steppe. The harsh climate of this new homeland—between Korea and Ukraine—forced them to fundamentally change their way of life, transforming from farmers to semi-nomads organized into various clans and federations.After the collapse of the powerful Xiongnu Hunnish Empire, Turkic groups experienced a period of subjugation. Between 200 and 500 CE, they had to submit as vassals to various states, most recently the Mongolian Rouran Empire. But then, in 552 CE, at the threshold between antiquity and the Middle Ages, something extraordinary happened: a Turkic clan named Ashina rose against their oppressors. Under the leadership of the charismatic Bumin, who proclaimed himself Khagan—emperor of all steppe peoples—they united all Turkic peoples under a single rule for the first time, and in less than a decade.These Ashina simply called themselves Türk—a name meaning "powerful" or "matured" that would later give name to all Turkic peoples. They became known as "Gök-Türk"—the "Heavenly," "Original," and "Eastern" Turks. This special name was no coincidence, as they were followers of Tengri, the almighty ruler of the Eternal Blue Sky. Legitimized by this god, they built an empire from the legendary Altai Mountains that soon extended from Ukraine to Korea and from the Siberian North to the gates of Iran.Thus, the Göktürks created not only the first state with the self-designation Türk but also the largest contiguous empire in world history up to that point.But who were these mysterious "Sky Turks" really? What drove them to rise as rulers of the steppe? What did the economic and social structures of the state look like? What role did the Tengrist religion play? And what impacts did the fall of the Göktürks have on the course of world history?Based on Turkic runic inscriptions, Chinese chronicles, and Persian, Korean, and Byzantine sources, supplemented by the latest archaeological discoveries, this work reconstructs the astonishing rise of the Göktürks from a small tribe to a Eurasian superpower.Also included are dozens of illustrations and reconstructed historical portraits, political maps, a comprehensive bibliography, the Orkhon Inscriptions of the Göktürks translated from Old Turkic, and indexes of the most important persons, places, and Turkic peoples of that time. Read more