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Abstract

The Uyghur empire introduced a new hybrid economic system into the history of Inner Asian empires by synthesizing agricultural and urban economies with the well-known pastoralist production of earlier empires, such as the Türks and Xiongnu. Meanwhile, English-language scholarship remains unclear as to how these institutional changes impacted later states like the Oghuz or the Qarakhanids. This paper addresses this problem with an analysis of the political economies of four Turkic confederations (the Oghuz, Qarluq, Kimak, and Qirghiz) in the ninth and tenth centuries. Textual, archaeological, and paleoclimatic data reveal interactions between ecologies and resource mobilization that influenced the organization of political power and inter-confederation violence. First, it argues that the hybrid economic system of the Uyghur empire was used by these four confederations. Second, volcano-driven climatic disturbances in the ninth century intensified debates over rain magic, inter-confederation violence, and enslavement. This paper demonstrates how ecological history helps reinterpret Inner Asian imperial political history.