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Abstract

Political authority in Central Asia during the first millennium CE was often in the hands of nomadic pastoral groups. Large tribal confederations such as the Scythian-Saka, Yuezhi, Xiongnu, Wusun, and Kangju established their supremacy over sedentary oasis states, yet their influence on sedentary populations was not particularly strong, their relations largely limited to the collection of tribute, with administration conducted by local dynasties or ruling houses of nomadic origin that had gradually integrated among their subjects. I argue that the Western Türk Qaghanate (568-740) marked a significant departure from this pattern. Unlike earlier nomadic political formations, the Türk Qaghanate did not merely establish political supremacy over sedentary regions but penetrated deeply into their territories. The Western Türk Qaghanate in particular, the western wing of the Türk imperial structure, governed territories inhabited by both nomadic pastoralists and sedentary agricultural communities and introduced a system of governance distinct from that of earlier nomadic empires. Rather than ruling through local vassals, its rulers appointed their own representatives in oasis centers including Chach, Otrar, Ferghana, Bukhara, Tokharistan, and Kabul, often members of the Ashina dynasty or other Turkic lineages. I examine how this situation is reflected not only in written sources of the period, preserved in Chinese, Sogdian, Bactrian, Old Turkic, and other languages, but above all in material evidence from the same era. Drawing on coins, seals, palace murals, and various objects associated with authority and belief, I show that Turkic elements become increasingly prominent across the sedentary zones the Qaghanate governed. I demonstrate that the principal rulers of the Western Türk Qaghanate minted their own coins in the Chach oasis bearing their names and titles, the presence of Tardu Qaghan and Tun Yabghu Qaghan on such coins providing vivid examples, and that local representatives likewise issued coins and seals bearing Old Turkic titles and tamghas, thereby emphasizing the legitimacy of their authority in the sedentary oasis regions. The frequent depiction of Turkic representatives in palace wall paintings at Afrasiab, Varakhsha, Shahristan, and Panjikent, read alongside numismatic and written evidence, allows me to reconstruct how the Western Türk Qaghanate projected and legitimized political authority across a diverse imperial landscape in which nomadic and sedentary traditions of sovereignty were brought into direct and productive tension.