Indian Languages of East Turkestan
East Turkestan is the native name for the Tarim Basin, which is the southern part of Xinjiang. Its norther part, Dzungaria, is the region north of the Tian Shan mountains whereas the Tarim Basin together with the Taklamakan desert is south of the mountains. After suppressing the Altishahr Khoja revolt in 1759, the Qing government renamed Dzungaria and the Tarim Basin as Xiyu Xinjiang (“Western Regions’ New Frontier”), which in 1878 was simplified to Xinjiang (formerly romanized as “Sinkiang”) in 1878. Xinjiang is thus a recent name.
Uttarakuru appears to be the correct name of the region and the word Uyghur is apparently derived from it. Likewise, the region Dzungar, to the north, is seen as derived from the Sanskrit draṅga for “frontier post”.
The historical names for the the region include Altishahr (“the six cities” of the Tarim Basin), Khotan, East Chagatay (it was the eastern part of the Chagatai Khanate), Moghulistan (“land of the Mongols”), Kashgaria (lands to the east of Kashgar), Serindia (where China and India meet) and, in Chinese, Xiyu, meaning “Western Regions”. The oasis city-states provided halting places for travelers in the Tarim Basin and these included Turfan (Tu-lu-fan), Qarāšahr (near modern Yan-qi), Kucha (Ku-che), and Aqsu (A-ke-su) on the Northern Silk Road and Miran (near modern Ruo-qiang), Niya near modern Endere Langan (An-ti-er Lan-gan), Khotan, and Yarkand (Suo-che) on the Southern Silk Road. These two routes merged at Kashgar (Ka-shi) at the western end of the basin.
According to the oldest detailed Chinese and Tibetan texts, the Kingdom of Khotan was established by Indians that included the son of Emperor Ashoka. The languages spoken included the Saka language, and Gandhari Prakrit, an Indo-Aryan language related to Sanskrit. A study of the Saka language has revealed that almost all the verbs of the language are derived from Sanskrit. Both Khotanese Saka and Gandhari Prakrit were spoken at the royal court.
The language of the Rabatak Inscription of the Kushan Empire (which included India as well as parts of Tarim Basin), is called Arya by King Kanishka (r. 127–150). Many texts written and used in the Tarim Basin were in the so-called Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit language, which is a North Indian Prākrit dialect that doesn’t always use the grammar of Classical Sanskrit.
It is noteworthy that the Chinese have used the term Xinjiang in the past for other conquered places. Thus, Sichuan to the west of Tibet was known for some time as “Jinchuan Xinjiang”, and Zhaotong in Yunnan was named directly as “Xinjiang”.
After being defeated by the Qing Empire, the Khojas mounted several unsuccessful revolts over a hundred years to regain power. Finally, the First East Turkestan Republic arose as an independent country for a few months around Kashgar starting 1933, and the Second East Turkestan Republic lasted between November 12, 1944, and June 27, 1946. Presently, the East Turkestan independence movement seeks the independence of the region as a nation state for the Uyghur people.
East Turkestan as an Indian language region
It is generally accepted that the earliest known inhabitants of the Tarim basin spoke Indic (Indo-European) languages. The Kuchean inscriptions in the Brāhmī script found in the Kucha oasis were written in the mid-7th century CE, and there are some more that go to 2nd-3rd centuries. The Kucheans spoke a language of the so-called centum (“hundred”) branch of the Indo-European languages, but one should note that at least one Indian language, Bangani, is also centum.
Indians, Tokharians, Saka (Scythians), and Sogdians formed the substratum of the population. There was intermixing with Turkish and Chinese elements as well. The scripts in use were primarily Indian Brāhmī and Kharoṣṭhī, although later Uyghur language texts found in the Tarim Basin use the Uyghur script which is derived from the Sogdian script.
Many scholars have identified the Yue-zhi with the Tokharians, and since the Yue-zhi were already present on the western borders of China in the late 2nd millennium BCE, the presence of the Tokharians must go back even earlier. The inhabitants of the Northern Silk Road inhabiting the area around Tumshuq and Maralbashi spoke an Indo-Iranian language closely related to Khotanese, and also used Brāhmī and Kharoṣṭhī scripts.
Sanskrit texts see the region as a part of greater India beyond the Himalayas and it is called Uttarakuru in these texts. There is no mention of Uttarakuru in the Vedic Samhitas so the migration to Central Asia must have occurred already by the third millennium BCE.
Uttarakuru is named in Buddhist texts and in the Rājataraṅginī of Kalhaṇa (1150 CE), which describes King Lalitāditya Muktāpīḍa of Kashmir leading a war expedition against the tribes of north (i.e. north of Kashmir) and in sequence, encountering the Kambojas, Tusharas, Bhauttas, Daradas, Valukambudhis, Uttarakurus, Strirajya, and Pragjyotisha. This sequence places Uttarakuru in Central Asia.
Political Changes
Historically, China attempted to dominate the Tarim and Dzungar basins, but it seldom exercised real or lasting authority beyond Dunhuang at the eastern tip of the Tarim Basin and at the western end of the long Gansu corridor. The oasis was protected by an elaborate system of defensive works, which was eventually replaced by the Great Wall. The Hua, or Hephthalites, invaded Khotan in 445, and appear to have been rulers between 502 and 556.
Under the Tang the Chinese embarked on a series of conquests of the oasis states surrounding the Tarim basin, though the actual campaigns were conducted mainly by Turkish (Tu-jue) mercenaries on their behalf. The famous Buddhist travelers Faxian (400 CE) and Xuanzang (640 CE) describe Khotan in some detail.
Toward the end of the 8th century the Tibetans extended their domination over the Tarim basin, capturing Khotan in 791 and ruling until about 842. Now began a struggle with the eastern Turkish Uyghurs. who had migrated from their homeland in Mongolia after their capital city was sacked, and this brought an end to Tibetan power in the Tarim basin.
According to Chinese histories, the last kings of Khotan included Viśa Saṃbhava (r. 912-ca. 966) who they officially recognized as the legitimate ruler of the “jewel country of Khotan”. Viśa Saṃbhava married a Chinese princess and their son Viśa Śūra led a victorious army against the Muslim ruler of Kashgar. King Viśa Śūra was succeeded by Viśa Dharma in 978.
With the Muslim conquest in 1006, Buddhist culture and the Indic languages disappeared, and few traces of the early languages formerly spoken in the Tarim basin remain.
Faxian’s travelogueFoguo ji (Record of the Buddhist Kingdom) describes the monastaries as well as cultural life of the region.
The common people of this and other kingdoms (in that region), as well as the sramans, all practise the rules of India, only that the latter do so more exactly, and the former more loosely. So (the travellers) found it in all the kingdoms through which they went on their way from this to the west, only that each had its own peculiar barbarous speech. (The monks), however, who had (given up the worldly life) and left their families, were all students of Indian books and the Indian language. [James Legge, translation, 1886]
The transmission of Indian culture across the Pamir and Karakorum mountains into the Tarim Basin is confirmed through the discovery of 5th century set of Sanskrit Ayurvedic medical texts (Bower Manuscript) in 1889 in a ruined stupa near the oasis of Kucha. It includes the oldest dated fragments of an Indian medical text, the Navanitaka, and also fragments of the Bhela Samhita. The divinities invoked include the Buddha, Shiva, Vishnu, and Devi.
See also:
Uyghurs, Uttarakuru, and Kashmir
Millward, J.A. Eurasian Crossroads: A History of Xinjiang. Columbia University Press, 2007.
Russell-Smith, L. Uygur Patronage In Dunhuang: Regional Art Centres On The Northern Silk Road In The Tenth and Eleventh Centuries. 2005.
