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Turkish History under the Light of Chinese Resources
Mutlu: Hello from Turkey. In this part we will discuss the Turkish history under the light of Chinese sources. Our adviser guest is Prof. Dr. Isenbike Togan, faculty member of Middle East Technical University, department of history and our guest is Pulat Otkan, faculty member of Ankara University. Welcome to our program. How do we start to discuss this issue? Togan: Old sources are the Chinese sources except the archeological one. We can start how these sources are started to use. As a faculty member of Sinology, you can make a general explanation from the perspective of your department on Turkish history. Otkan: Generally, there is a relationship between history and geography. This relation is clearer when the human community was dependent totally to nature. In old time, great land called Asia had some natural features. These natural features provided the situation for the development of human communities and historical events. From this perspective, Asia is divided into more than one region. These regions also determined the historical regions of Asia. Especially that was suitable for agriculture, there was an emergence of civilization among the banks of river, Yellow River at East and Yongtise River at south. That is called as “Historical and cultural area of East Asia”. There is a similar area at the banks of river Ganja and Indus in India at South. There is a ‘historical area of West Asia” between Dicle River and Firat River. Besides these, there is also “historical area of inside Asia”. It is also a different world from the others. People who live at the banks of river or valley or basis earn their money from animal husbanding and agriculture and this was a result of natural conditions. When we say East Asia, this includes Vietnam, Korea, Japan and Chine as a center. It is also called as cultural area of written Chinese language” or “cultural area of Confucius”. These historical areas were not independent from each other through the history. They had close relations in terms of culture, economy and politics. They both took form and gave to the each other. Although each region had its own specific cultural and historical features, they are also inspired from the others while developing their culture, history and economy. East Asian historical area, whose center is Chine, has the oldest civilization, which is known, throughout the world. Our first meet with written Chinese reached to before five thousand five hundreds. Chine that had a chance develop written language in early times, has a big written accumulation that includes literature, history and philosophy. So there is a need for great effort to examine this accumulation from the Sinology perspective. Western culture started to that at 15th and 16th centuries. Those were mainly European Jesuit missionaries whose aim was to spread the Christianity. They examined Chinese sources and they also started to translate these sources to European languages. Such a confrontation of different world had a great effect on European world. It also had a great effect for the change and for the development of some institutions in Europe. The trade roads between east and west started to have a safety system as a result of the formation of the Mongol Empire at 13th century. As a result of this change, people started to go east easily and more often. Marco polo was an explorer who lived at the South of Italy. There is an interesting story about him. He went to China twice and he inherited the inheritance nearly seventy kilograms of gold to his two daughters. It was too much money. Merchants like Marco Polo earned great income with going to china only twice. So many merchants offered Marco Polo to go to China. As a result of these trades, cities like Venice and Florence became rich. As a result of these wealth, painting, sculptures and palaces were made. So this wealth played an important role at the formation and the development of Renaissance. It is not limited with that. Some merchants said that they should go to inside of Europe rather than Asia. The borders of the Middle Ages started to open with the free movements of the merchants. Some said that, the basis European community was started in those days. These trades caused the social changes inside the Europe. New ideas from China both in trough system and inventions prepared Europe to Renaissance even the base of the Enlightenment in 18th century. So, China has an important role in the relationship of West and East. It is said that bringing the gun power from China to Europe, which is used for destroying the castles has a great impact on ending the Middle Ages. This idea can not be thought as if it was true as a whole. Because the Chinese did not use gun power at canon. It was firstly used by the westerns suitable to its nature, who made a gun power by making such unification. Mutlu: The wick was to set fire by Chinese. Otkan: West made its old fashioned accumulation new by new ideas taken from East and it also provided the enlightenment. Mutlu: This was an effect of China on the development of West. What is the importance of China to our history? Togan: I think who firstly studied on Sinology are Europeans. The book of the De Guinness was printed under the name of “the history of both Turks, Mongols and Tatars” in 1759. When he wrote it he used the French translation of Chinese sources. This study was done in situations before the French revolution. I do not know well the reasons of that, but I have founded it important. Conquer or Orhan Ghazi did not have any information about Chinese sources of Turkish history before 18th century. Some of the Chinese sources were translated at the half of 18th century. These sources have been translated into French firstly. Chinese names are both Chinese and Turkish. Your name is “e-lo-lu”, if we said in Chinese. Erol become “E-lo-lu” in French. Then it was translated from French to Ottoman. It was written in Arabic letters. The book of De Guinness, which is translated to our language by this way, was under the title of “Great Turk history” printed in 1980. Otkan: Sinology research in Europe: with the lose of power of church, the power of Pope was also shaken. At the same time The Mongol Empire opened the road for travel. Pope said, “ there were so many people that they were not Christians. We lost our power in West. If we turned these non-Christians to a Christian, we could gain our old power again”. As a result of that, missionaries started to go east. Jesuit missioners went in this frame. Before spreading Christianity, they searched on what Chinese people believe. They examined their history and philosophy. There were some missioners who stayed twenty or thirteen years in China. They had also relations with the Chinese scholars. They also started to translate Chinese books about both history and Philosophy into Western languages. The first translations were made in Portuguese. Then this was translated to the other languages; Spanish, Italian and French. So, West started to know China from these Jesuit missioners. Sin means China in Latin and Sinology means “sciences of China” like Turkology. Sinology mainly started with these translations in the 16th century. Later, the number of Sinology studies increased with many travelers from West to China. The book written by the De Guinness in the 18th century is accepted as one of the important collected studies about Turkish history. De Guinness did not know Chinese but he wrote the history of Turks, Mongols and Tatars by using Jesuit missioners’ translations. It was printed under the name of “General History of Turks, Tatars and Mongols” and translated by Huseyin Cahit in four volumes. Togan: In Latin alphabet, it is eight volumes. Otkan: It is old, but it is important because it reflects the available knowledge of those days. Mutlu: How our studies were started? When did we decide to go and examine Chinese resources? Otkan: Like any other issues, it also started in the Republican era as a result of Ataturk’s foresight. Mutlu: Before that, is there any study in which the translations of Chinese resources were used? Otkan: Of course, Westerns had many studies related with both history of China and the neighbors of China. Much of this information was the translation of the translation of Chinese resources so that they did not have any value. Later, some scientists like French Pelliot; Maspero lived China for a long time. They realized many important studies about philosophy, history and some manuscripts. They contributed the clarification of both different dimensions of Chinese history and in one respect Turkish history. Mutlu: You said that there are thousands of works. Are any of these resources on Chinese history and culture translated into foreign languages up to that period? Otkan: No, all of them are not translated even today. Mutlu: Where could we find these works? Otkan: What is important is day by day recording of what happened like reporter. We can say that encyclopedia emerged there. The number of books in China in the 17th century was twice or three times of the number of the books in all world. There was such a great accumulation. Togan: As a technique printing was developed there very early. Otkan: Some inventions of the Chinese like press dazzles one. There was a papyrus in Egypt but it was not a real paper. It was created from dried sediments of plant, paper was used for the first time in China. Written Chinese was emerged from iconography like other written languages. Then the whole turned into ideograph. They changed from syllable alphabet to tone alphabet. Written Chinese showed these changes at a certain point and then it stopped. There is one dictionary from Japanese to Chinese, which is made by the Japans. It includes fifty thousand signs. Chinese characters. We should shortly talk about these Chinese characters first to be able to talk about resources. Roughly, Chinese signs are similar to the traffic signs. Wherever you go over the world, the meanings of these signs are same. But their pronunciations are different. Written Chinese is also a system of signs. For this reason, the other members of the language family like Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese use this written system. Even Central Asian people who were not Chinese used this system at some time in the past, including the Turks. To know the meaning of so many traffic sign is the hardest part of it. It is not possible to know the meaning of fifty thousand signs. However, Chinese language is written much similar to how it was written two thousand years ago. So there is a possibility to read and to understand these old resources, because of the continuation of the written language. There are some changes in Chinese, because language lives also. The Chinese in that period is called “Classical Chinese”. There are some differences when we compare the modern Chinese and the Classical one. The difficulty is that some points are lost. Hence, it is difficult to know the meanings of the words without knowing both history and the culture. Togan: In B.C 2000, the creak marks of sheep’s shoulder blade in fire were used in fortune. Answers of some questions were written in shoulder blade. So the oldest written manuscripts were such. The people used traffic signs at the beginning. When centralization occurred in B.C 200, the written form also was standardized. Each sign was pronounced with one syllabus. Some signs in Chinese have three pen stokes. The increase in pen stoke does not make syllabus longer. Our perception of Turkish is totally different. If one syllabus becomes longer the voice also becomes longer. Sometimes two syllabuses are united in one word in Chinese and they also pronounced in one syllabus. Because of the standardization of the written language, each traffic sign is called differently in each region in China like any other countries in the world. Yet, people understand its meaning when they see sign. Mutlu: How do we fit the Chinese resources of Turkish history here? We need information about that. Otkan: The beginning of Sinology in Turkey was in 1936 with the opening of the Faculty of Language, History and Geography. Sinology was the one of the firstly established departments with thirteen chairs in that faculty. It was established for that our researchers should examine Turkish history from the real resources according to the desire of Ataturk. Chinese is a great source of Turkish history. Togan: Did Eberhard come sometime? Otkan: Before Eberhard, Von Gobain came in 1940s. The first founders were scientists who came from Germany. We did not have any one individual trained in Chinese. Huseyin Cahit translated some history books about Turkish history from French. Scientists like Anne Marie, Von Gobain, Wolfram Eberhard started Sinology studies in Turkey for the first time. Eberhard had studies depending on the usage of the Chinese resources, and with the excitement of the beginning he formed a definite base. After him, the students of him are Prof. Muhaddere Ozerdim, Prof. Bahaeddin Ogel, and Prof. Riza Bekin. Especially after 1940s, the studies of Sinology in Turkey got its pace. Mutlu: We can come to the question how we have been seen in these resources? Togan: First of all, we should talk about what resources are these. The major source of information is official history. There were twenty-four dynasties in China. Each of them wrote the history of previous era as an official history. Apart from the official histories, there were many literary resources. Mr. Pulat and I study on official history. We try to translate into Turkish how the knowledge of the old days was found in those resources. We have some difficulties in that study. I can not talk about them in detail, but we can talk about generally. Otkan: We said that the Chinese have great accumulation of books on literary, history and philosophy. Their study of history started very early. It was started in B.C 1000, but up to B.C first century, it was anonymous, that is, it is not known who have written about the events of the first millenium. First official dynasty record comes from the B.C 1st century. There was a famous historian, Sima Qian who was an important figure for our history. He wrote a book that can be rendered as a “Records of Historian”. Actually, he planned to talk about Khan Dynasty. It is a general Khiniese history. This work, Shihi in Chinese was one hundred and thirty volumes and included the history of China from B.C 1700 to B.C 100. It is known as the first dynastic record in China. Later, it became a tradition that each dynasty has its own record of history. Before this work, there was a history office and archive in the ruler’s palace in China. Events were recorded as they are. Generals gave reports about wars and events of the outside world. There was also some information that were given by the merchants. Mutlu: What were the reasons behind recording of all such events? Otkan: The written thing was important for them. In our culture, for example, when a peace of bread falls down, it is taken and put to somewhere. It is similar in China with respect to the written materials. It is not seated upon. It is not put on ground. They also read them in addition. They have archives in their palaces. What Sima Qian did was to collect what were inside the archives. This became a tradition for later periods. After that each dynasty started to write its own history. They have historical value, because they were based on the official documents from beginning. The dimension of reality is powerful. They were not about super natural powers. One period is examined with all its dimensions in such works. There are parts about economy and astronomy. Scientists learned that we have seen comet from world in every seventeen years from these resources later. There were exact records and events were examined in great detail. These are related not only China itself but also its neighborhoods, especially about Turks. There was a special section about Huns in the work of Sime Qien. These historical works are formed in different parts that were bibliographic and monographic. If the life of a person was explained, it was done in a bibliographic manner or if they explained one lineage, one country or one tribe, they used monographic style. If Sime Qien would not do this work, we would know nothing about Huns. First was “Shi Qi” that was completed in the B.C Century. The last one was from 17th century. The last Qing dynasty formed by Mencur had such, but it is not examined in the frame of “Twenty Four Histories”. There was so much information about both Turks and history of Central Asia. There was more information about Gokturks. There were “history of previous Tang Dynasty as “history of Past Teng Dynsty”. If these sources would not exist, our knowledge about Gokturks would be limited to a few inscriptions on the stone. Togan: We have also Byzantine sources but they are not about Gokturks of course. Mutlu: Is it explaining only the events or is it explaining the structure and relations of society? Togan: It changes according to the resources. Famous legends are narrated in some resources. It mentions the direction of the tent’s door, for example. There is some anthropological information. Sources like Mr. Otkan has mentioned before, like new and old history of Tang does not have any anthropological information. Sources were written for the Chinese Bureaucracy who should learn what happened in the past and how it was solved, so it changes from time to time. It also gives importance to some subjects. Foreign relations is a field which was especially important for them was given more broader scope than any other subject. Otkan: When the Chinese gave information about the non-Chinese, they recorded what was not found in their own society. So it is difficult to say something by looking these differences. We have to know how the Chinese society was in that time. Mutlu: What were our differences? Otkan: The interesting example that Chinese gave about the Huns is that when father had died, the brothers or sons were married with the wife of the death man. It was unnatural for the Chinese. It was a guarantee for people lived in steppes. It is practiced for the purpose of protecting the widowed woman. Animals of Huns were also interesting for the Chinese people. Chinese did not see any person on a horse at the beginning. When they saw it some legends emerged. Foreigners were begun to be depicted as half-man and half-horse. When they saw a rider from afar they perceive them as if they were half man and half horse. The animals that were not found in China were interesting for them. Mutlu: I think that the relations became closer as the time passed. Otkan: There were twenty-five or twenty-six dynasties in China throughout her history. Among them there were also some foreign dynasties. There was a Quing Dynasty that ruled Chine from 1600 to beginning of 20th century. They were Manchus and not Chinese of origin. Its roots were nomadic. There were several periods like that in China. Sometimes, foreigners conquered China. They were called “Conqueror Dynasty”. The administration of Chinese Palace was caught by them, like Mongol Yuan Dynasty. There were also an “sneaking dynasties”. These were established by the people who earlier had taken refuge in the land of China. Since they gradualley infiltrate and grasp the power, we can observe a sort of integration as the time passes. So there were many changes in the customs and tradition of China. These foreigners become very influential for China. This can be observed in the architecture. There were some important architects who came from Central Asia, in the period of Tong Dynasty. There were also some doctors and agriculturists. The oldest resource about agriculture in China and animal husbandry was written in B.C 5-6th centuries. This book was written with the information taken from foreigners. Relations with Turks were established with marriages during the period of Tong dynasty. The mothers of the rulers of China were mostly Turks. Some said that Chinese Rulers uses Turkish in their daily lives. There was a close relation. Mutlu: Was it reflected in resources? Otkan: Of course, it was narrated in great detail in the written sources. There were also some political events in that. In addition, it explains the belief system, marriage system, life styles, and traditions about the lineage in monograph. Mutlu: What is the situation in these studies today? Togan: In our cooperate study, my group examines the sources about Gokturks, while Otkan’s group examines the sources about Huns. As what Mr. Otkan said before, we should know well not only about sources but also the conditions in which these sources were created. So, it is important to understand the period. Mutlu: What is your result of study up to now? Togan: it is hard to tell. I took part in the studies on 16th 17th centuries. Each period has its own problems. For example, many ambassadors came from Central Asia. Chinese did not want such a great population. They were nearly two thousand because only ambassadors have permission for trade. Yet they did not have such a problem with Gokturks. They only had the problems of domination, struggle against the natural conditions and domination over some strategic geopolitical areas. The relationship of China with her neighbors changed from period to period. Indeed, dynasties were not of Chinese origin. Chinese society enlarged through history with the articulation of other ethnic groups. Ethnic distinctions were not to be seen in these history books. Mutlu: Is there any chance of comparing them with the other resources and verifying them? Togan: It is a question of the Mongol period. Information regarding the Western Gokturks can be compared with the Persian resources. If there were some other resource it could be possible to make comparisons. Yet if were not, it is still possible to compare them with other Chinese resources. Mutlu: What are these resources found in China today? Togan: It can not be found everywhere because of printing. We have also in libraries of both History Institution and Sinology. They were printed in Taiwan in 20th century. Also a new edition was printed in Peking. The old resources were written without dots. So you did not know where a sentence starts and ends. Now this new edition was punctuated and separated into paragraphs. Chinese have studied on the resources without interruption, because they are part of their own history. To study on the texts is a long tradition in the Chinese culture. pc12.soc.metu.edu.tr (2 July 2000, Ankara)
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