CHAGATAI KHANATE

central of the Mongol Empire

By Kim Lau

Chinggis Khan’s west-ward expansion brought the Mongols into Central Asia, inherited by Chinggis’s second son Chagatai. He died in 1242, and the khanate fell to Ogedei’s grandson Kaidu who opposes Kublai. The western half of the khanate fell to Tamerlane in 1380, and the eastern Chagatai Khanate took on the name of Moghulistan and it resisted Turkic assimilation. The Sheibanids then ousted Tamerlane’s successors. They were descendants of Jochi, and they later called themselves the Uzbeks.

This is the core of the Silk Road where Persian-Turkic tribe resides. Uyghur, Kyrgyz migrated from Central Mongolia, Kazakh and Uzbek descended from Golden Horde Khans, Tajik and Afghan retained earlier Persian culture. Chinggis Khan’s invasion of Bamyan (Afghanistan) gave rise to the Hazara people with Mongolian features. Tamerlane’s descendent Babur crossed into India, forming the Mughal empire which ruled India for 3 centuries.

Turkic groups in Central Asia had little boundaries until the Soviet Socialist Republic era, where physical boundaries were delineated. Independence in 1991 actuated these boundaries, hence the birth of Kyrgystan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan. Do note that -stan is of Persian orgin, means nation. Afghanistan was the only one that were spared from the Soviet domination. Eastern Turkestan was a name of Southern Xinjiang, Land of the Uyghur Turkic tribe. Its under the firm control of China.