Sultan Satuq Bughra Khan
Satuq Boghra Khan (Uyghur: سۇلتان سۇتۇق بۇغراخان (also spelled Satuk; died 955) was a Kara-Khanid Khan; in 934, he was one of the first Turks to convert to Islam.[1]
There are different historical accounts of the Satuq's life and they vary.
Satuq came from Artush, identified in the 10th century book Hudud al-'alam (The Limits of the World) as a "populous village of the Yaghma", the Yaghma being one of the Turkish tribes that formed the Karakhanids.[2] According to 13th century historian Jamal Qarshi's History of Kashgar, Satuq was first taught about Islam by Nasr, a wealthy merchant from Bukhara. Nasr befriended the King of Kashgar, Satuq's uncle, and was granted special dispensation to build a mosque in the town of Artush just outside of Kashgar. Here Satuq would often come to watch the caravan's arrive. When Satuq saw Nasr and other Muslims observing their daily prayers he became curious and was instructed by them in the Islamic religion. When the king discovered that his nephew had become a Muslim he punished him by forcing him to build a temple. When he reached the age of 25 Satuq had gathered enough supporters from Kashgar and the Ferghana valley to over throw his uncle and establish Islam in Kashgar. However another account claimed he kept his faith secret until he became the Khan.
According to another account by Ottoman historian Munejjimbashi, based on a tradition ultimately stemming from a Karakhanid emissary in 1105 to the Abbasid court, he was the first of the khans to convert under the influence of a faqīh from Bukhara. After conversion, he obtained a fatwa which permitted him in effect to commit patricide, and killed his presumably still pagan father, after which he conquered Kashgar.[2]
Satuq Boghra Khan died in 955 and was buried in a mausoleum that can still be visited in Artush today. Over the next several centuries many Uyghurs in other oases such as Hami and Turpan followed, though conversion was not forced, and some (particularly the Yugurs) retained their existing religious beliefs. The Uyghurs ruled an independent kingdom, mixing Muslim and Buddhist populations, that stood until 1759, when the Manchu Chinese invaded and destroyed it.
[edit] References
- ^ Asian Mythologies, By Yves Bonnefoy, Wendy Doniger, Gerald Honigsblum, pg. 337
- ^ a b Golden, Peter. B. (1990), "The Karakhanids and Early Islam", in Sinor, Denis, The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia, Cambridge University Press, pp. 357, ISBN 0 521 2,4304 1
[edit] See also
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