Kazakhstan: Russian Scholar Finds West Kazakhs And All Other Kazakhs To Be Descendants Of Different Ethnicities – OpEd

In Tatarstan, a Russian autonomic republic, there lives a man of advanced age who had much to do with the restoration of historical truth about the Nogais, a distinct ethnic group formed after the disintegration of the Golden Horde.  It’s about Marcel Akhmetzyanov who is characterized by the Tatar Center of Academic Science as “a world-famous scholar, a leading specialist in textology, paleography, archeography, and epigraphy, who devoted his life to collecting and studying the written monuments of the Tatar people”. 

Here, there is a need to note that the scholar considers the Nogais to be an integral part of the Tatar people. According to him, the Nogai Horde, that appeared after the fall of the Golden Horde and was one of the major states in Eastern Europe during the 14-16th centuries, should be seen as a historical heritage of the Tatar people. He is considered a leading expert not only in Tatarstan but in the Russian Federation on the question of who else must be seen as the direct descendants of the Nogai horde’s population today.

Here are two quotes from his publications that may be of interest to those engaged in dealing with the matters of the origin and history of the Kazakh country and nation.

The first one says: “The keepers of literary legacy were usually the so-called “zhyrau” [creators of the epic genre] who, as is known, came from the cities of Saraichik, Astrakhan, Azak [Azov], etc. The most notable “zhyraus” were Asan Kaigy Sabit ugyly (XV century), Shalkiyz zhyrau (1465 – 1560), Dosmambet zhyrau (1493 -1523). The Nogai “zhyraus” created beautiful dastans [eposes] such as “Idegey”, “Koblandy”, “Er Targyn”, “Alpamysh”, “Chura Batyr”, and “Kyrk Kyz”.

The second one says: “The immediate descendants and heirs of the Nogai Horde are the Nogais (a Caucasian people), the Crimean, Volga-Ural, and Siberian Tatars, the Kazakhs of the Younger Zhuz, and the Karakalpaks”.

Thus, according to Marcel Akhmetzyanov, it turns out that: first, all so-called Kazakh literature up until the 18th century was and is actually Nogai literature; second, only the representatives of the Alshyns or the Younger Zhuz can be considered the heirs of the Nogai genetic and cultural heritage from among all the modern Kazakhs. Yet the Tatar scholar leaves unanswered the questions of whose descendants and heirs the Kazakhs of the Senior and Middle Zhuz were and are, and what should be considered their literary and cultural legacy up until the 18th century. Perhaps Marcel Akhmetzyanov isn’t aware that in literary history of Kazakhstan, there was and is no other literature applicable to those times (XV-XVII), besides what he sees as Nogai literary legacy.

Such conclusions by the Tatar scholar find many confirmations in the works of other well-renowned authors. Mukhamedzhan Tynyshpayev, in his research piece entitled “The History of the Kyrgyz-Kazakh People”, wrote this: “All the legends of the Kazakhs of the Younger Horde are associated with the names of the Golden Horde khans and the Nogai mirzas [the representatives of the ruling class]. Murat Monkin, a Kazakh poet who died in 1906, in his works entitled ‘Uch-Kiyan’, ‘Kaz-Tugan’, “Atten bir kafy dunie”, “Karasai and Kazy”, glorified exclusively the descendants of the Nogai mirza Edige-bi: Musa, Yambyrchy, Seidak, Shah Mamai, Orak, Smail, the legendary hero Esterek-uly Er Targyn, etc”.

The past, reflected in historical memory of the Middle Zhuz Kazakhs, who formed the basis of the Kazakh Khanate, is represented by the history of the deeds of the Chingizid Khans who ruled them, the descendants of Urus Khan.

The past, reflected in historical memory of the Alshyns, or people from the Junior Zhuz, is associated exclusively with the deeds of the descendants of the Nogai mirza Edige-bi. The very fact that he was called not a khan, but a bi, shows that he was not a Chingizid. But it was his descendants who, according to the official historiography, ruled the Nogai people for almost three hundred years, from the end of the 14th century to the end of the 17th century. Actually, the facts are such that it is highly probable that they were the rulers of the Alshyns, because the entire collection of Nogai folklore which is unique for its historical and literary significance and has survived to modern times, has preserved in the memory of the Junior Zhuz, and not of the various groups of Russian Nogais now living in the North Caucasus.

It seems that the same thing was repeated itself with the ethnonym “Nogai” and its former bearers that happened in the case of the ethnonym “Uzbek” and those former Uzbeks who remained faithful to the traditions of nomadic life until modern times. Let us recall that the Kazakh Khanate was at first created in XV century by people from the Uzbek Khanate. What is noteworthy is that now both of them are called “Kazakhs”. In the first case, it refers to the Alshyns, in the second, to the Middle Zhuz, as well as to part of the Senior Zhuz.

The Alshyns most obviously have a whole different history. It is different from Kazakh history, which is now generally accepted, in many ways. When did these two histories merge and become common?

According to M.Tynyshpaev, part of the Nogai Alshyns joined the Kazakhs in 1555, and the last, more significant group, in around 1600. Murat Monkin, a representative of the Adai tribe of the Younger Zhuz, who had glorified “exclusively the descendants of the Nogai mirza Edige-bi”, died in 1906. Muryn Sengirbayev, another member of the Adai tribe of the Younger Zhuz, the only one person who had collected and preserved the epic tales of all forty Crimean (Nogai) heroes, passed away in 1942. Their creative activity gives a fairly clear idea of the historical, cultural and spiritual priorities of the Alshyns.

According to the official version of Kazakh history, it turns out that the Alshyns, even three or almost four centuries after having joined the Kazakhs, continued to glorify exclusively Nogai rulers and Nogai heroes. In doing so, they were spiritually nourished and inspired by their seemingly very distant Nogai past, and at the same time, they were just completely ignoring the heroics and heroes of Kazakh history.

In the pre-Soviet period, the Alshyns deep inside never became a part of Kazakh society and did not accept its historical values and historical figures as their own, because, first, their actual final unification with the Kazakhs took place much later than is officially considered; and second, because their historical, cultural and spiritual values are completely different from those of the Kazakhs of the Middle and Senior Zhuz in many ways. And they are even antagonistic to the spiritual values of those in some ways.

The Kazakhs of the Middle and Senior Zhuz have contradictions, too. Yet those contradictions stem from minor differences in political and cultural traditions. And such differences are quite surmountable.

The Middle Zhuz’s historical and spiritual values are based on the Mongolian steppe traditions of social and state polity. This is, so to speak, their cornerstone.

Senior Zhuz’s public and state policy priorities are based on the sedentary-nomadic dualistic traditions of the Chagatai statehood and culture.

Another matter is the Alshyns or the so-called Junior Zhuz, especially the members of its Adai tribe. This is a completely different world in the historical and spiritual sense. Evidence of this is everything that was created by Murat Monkin, and what Muryn Sengirbayev dedicated his entire life to. Evidence of this is the works of the Tatar scholar Marcel Akhmetzyanov, too.