In 1899, a Russian scholar discovered a Turkic stele in Mongolia, which recorded some of the relations between the Turkic state and the Tang state, and was also a testimony of the friendly exchanges between the Turkic and Tang countries.
In addition, the content on the inscription also confirms that the Great Tang Dynasty is indeed terrifyingly powerful.
Que Secret Service Monument
This stele, known as the Que Secret Service Monument, is carved from marble and has a height of 375 cm, a width of 132 cm at the bottom of the east and west sides, and a width of 46 cm from north to south.
"Que Special Service Monument" can be said to be a "magical" tombstone, surprisingly, this Turkic stone tablet has a total of two words engraved on it, carefully scrutinized, these two words even contain two different meanings, the content of which is not exaggerated.
This stele is engraved in two languages, Chinese and ancient Turkic, one of which was also carved by the Tang Emperor Li Longji, the inscription is a subordinate book, a total of fourteen lines, and the other three sides are carved by Bija Khan, the brother of Que Special Service, the main content of the inscription is to commemorate the important Turkic figure Que Special Service.
On the stone stele, the ancient Turkic script is mainly carved on large and small stone steles, with a total of 66 lines, the large stele on the east side has 40 lines, and the small stele on the north and south sides is carved with 13 lines each, respectively, the beginning and conclusion of the inscription.
In addition, a goat line map is carved above the stone tablet on the east side, and a picture of a she-wolf breastfeeding a baby at the top.
In the beginning, the stone monument was erected on the back of a stone turtle, but later, for unknown reasons, the stone turtle was destroyed, and the stone tablet was re-erected on a granite base.
Chinese scholars Cen Zhongmian, Han Rulin and others also introduced the stele, and Turkic historian Rui Chuanming translated the Turkic text on the stele into Chinese for the first time.
Some scholars believe that the Turkic text on the stone tablet is inconsistent with the content of the Chinese language.
If anyone who has known the history of Turks, he should not be unfamiliar with the name Que Secret Service, he is the son of the founder of the post-Eastern Turks, Bone Zhulu, and the younger brother of Bija Khan.
Regarding the meaning of the words Que Special Service Monument, some scholars have explained that "Que" means a personal name, and its full name is Ashina Que, while "Special Service" is a title of Turkic nobility.
In 731, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang died of illness, and in order to show the friendship between the two countries, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang sent people to mourn and sent craftsmen to assist the Turks in erecting monuments, and even personally wrote some inscriptions.
In the content of the inscription, Tang Xuanzong first mentioned the relationship between the Tang and Turkic countries, and later, Tang Xuanzong's words also took advantage of some advantages, recognizing Ashina Que as a son, and wrote "Catch the Tang and bow down, marry father and son".
After the establishment of the father-son relationship, the border between Turks and the Great Tang was also harmonious for several years.
Tang Xuanzong said that his feelings for Ashina Que were the same as his father was to his son, and now that his son had died, Tang Xuanzong felt very sad, so he wrote the inscription.
As early as the Sui Dynasty, the Turks, one of the branches of the Xiongnu, were a brave and warlike people, and at that time the Turks also joined hands with the Sui Dynasty to solve the conflict between many northeastern tribes.
For a long time, a peaceful relationship has been tacitly maintained between the two countries.
In the early days of the Tang Dynasty, Emperor Li Yuan's forces were mainly used to deal with some stubborn clan forces, and the increasingly conceited Turks also took advantage of the void at this moment, frequently harassing soldiers and people on the border of the Great Tang Dynasty.
It was not until Emperor Taizong of Tang completely conquered these surrounding nomads that the problem of Turkic invasion was temporarily solved.
Although the Turks have always been thieves, there have been several famous Turkic gang incidents in history.
The first was the war between Li Shimin and Xue Ju's father and son, and at that time, thanks to the help of Turkic forces, Li Shimin turned defeat into victory.
On another occasion, the Turks helped Li Shimin break through Hedong, Liu Wuzhou and Liangzhou Li Rail, so that the Tang Dynasty finally completed the unification of the plates.
Although the Tang emperor's soft policy towards the Turks was correct, in addition to the Turks, there was often chaos within ethnic minorities such as the Tubo and the Khitans.
Without exception, these ethnic groups all have a keen eye on the Tang Dynasty, so the regime of the Great Tang has not been very stable.
The Turks are not as polite and honest as the Great Tang, and in the cognition of these ethnic minorities, whoever has the strength and has the toughest fist can be hegemonic as king.
Take Que Secret Service, for example, he once killed his cousin with his own hands for the sake of imperial power, and then let his own brother sit on the throne of the khan.
Que Teqin was the son of the Turkic founder Bone Lu, and according to the general etiquette, after the death of his father, it was generally the son who inherited the throne.
At the time of his death, Que and his brother were still very young, and the Turkic subjects naturally did not want to support such a child as the new king.
After Bone Rush's death, it was eventually Bone Rush's younger brother, Que Teqin's uncle Mo Si Khan, who eventually inherited power.
After the death of Mo Si Khan, Que Secret directly killed Mo Wei's son Ku Ju, and then supported his brother to take the throne, which was later Bija Khan.
The reason why Bija Khan was able to sit in the position of the Great Khan is that Que Special Service can be said to be indispensable.
It is rare that in the chaotic relationship between the Turkic internal divisions, the relationship between Que Secret Service and the brothers of Bija Khan is very close, and even the two can not value who sits in the position of khan.
Under the advice of the Que secret service, the relationship between the Turks and the Great Tang was finally slowly repaired, the two countries rebuilt the old and reconciled, the Turks were even willing to honor Tang Xuanzong as their father, and the people on the border also lived a stable life again.
How terrifying is the power of the Great Tang
There is only one Chinese character engraved on the "Que Special Service Monument", and almost the entire text describes that the interaction between Turks and the Great Tang was the right decision, and the surrounding people lived and worked in peace, and there were many words of praise for Que Special Service.
Generally speaking, most of the stone tablets are at most double-sided inscriptions, and it is also a very interesting situation that there are words engraved on all four sides like the Que Special Service Monument.
It is undeniable that Bija Khan, who erected a monument for Que Special Service, loves his younger brother very much, probably because Biga Khan misses Que Special Service too much, so he engraved his endless thoughts and words on this stone tablet.
However, from the inscriptions inscribed in Turkic script on the other three sides, it seems that the Turks are not as willing to sincerely respect Li Longji as their father, and even willingly bow to the Tang Dynasty.
It would be a great honor for ordinary people to be recognized as godsons by the Tang Emperor, but for Bija Khan and Que Secret Service, this was not the case.
Bija Khan believed that the existence of the Tang Dynasty limited the development of Turkic tribes.
As early as the reign of Emperor Taizong of Tang, the economy of the Tang Dynasty was restored and developed to a certain extent, and in order to face the threat from the Turkic and other nomads at any time, it had already been fully prepared in military terms, creating a good environment for the Northern Expedition.
Of course, the main thing is that there is also some chaos within the Turks from time to time, which also makes some Turkic peoples and the Central Plains achieve further integration.
From the relevant historical records, it is not difficult to find that the trade between the Turks and the Han has also become more frequent at this moment, and the Turkic people often exchange their sheep, horses and other agricultural and livestock products for the brocade and other items of the Central Plains, which is enough to show that the Turkic people are also quite passionate about the culture of the Central Plains.
During the reign of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang, some Turkic nobles often carried out rebellion against the Tang Dynasty, these people pointed the finger at the Tang Dynasty, forced a large number of common people to become slaves, and carried out barbaric burning and looting of many small tribes in the north.
Due to the opposition of the vast number of Turkic people to this separatist activity, this group of nobles was attacked by tribes such as refusal and Sijie, which eventually made it impossible for the Turks to continue to maintain their rule.
Immediately afterwards, Bija Khan wrote on the stone tablet, "They tempted the Turkic people with sweet words and gorgeous treasures... Whoever dwells near gives good gifts..."
While saying that the Tang Dynasty limited their development, Bija Khan said that the Han people gave the Turks a large amount of gold and silver treasures.
In the face of reality, Bija Khan is contradictory.
After the Tang Dynasty first established the world, the courtesy to the Turks was very heavy.
Whenever a Turkic khan or envoy came to visit the Tang Dynasty, the emperor of the Tang Dynasty received him with the highest number of courtesies, which was enough to show that the Tang Dynasty attached great importance to and respected the Turks.
In order to consolidate the friendly relations between the two countries, they even adopted the strategy of peace in exchange for a harmonious and stable production environment for the people.
The region where the Turkic peoples are located, because of the climatic environment and geographical environment, has always been regarded as a bitter cold place, and the people living here are not as self-sufficient as the people in the Central Plains, and the days of the year are completely dependent on the sky to eat.
When the weather is good, the Turkic people are "rich in wealth", cattle and sheep are flocked, once the weather becomes cold, with the arrival of a blizzard, the cattle and sheep of the Turkic people will be frozen to death, and the wealth accumulated through a year's hard work will be destroyed overnight.
At this time, they need to plunder the resources of the Han people to survive the winter.
For this reason, the Turkic people have always yearned for this comfortable and comfortable life in the Central Plains, and the voice of Bija Khan is basically this layer of meaning, and before that, many Xiongnu people have also expressed this layer of meaning similar to Biga Khan.
While the Tang Dynasty was trading with the Turkic peoples, many Turkic nobles still said that the silk of the Central Plains was not comparable to their fur, and the food of the Central Plains was not comparable to their mutton.
In the eyes of the Bija Khan, these things sent by the Tang were alluring "sugar-coated shells", which made the Turkic people weak and weak, and lost their fighting spirit.
It is no wonder that the Bija Khan would utter such angry words, "They were thus instigated, and the ignorant listened to those words, approached the Han, and many died." ”
In addition, Bija Khan lamented that his country was divided and destroyed because of the treachery of the Great Tang.
The Bija Khan wrote on the stone tablet, "Because of the treachery and deceitfulness of the Tang people, because of their seduction, because they turned their brothers against each other, because they caused discord between the officials and the people, the Turkic people lost the state that became a state, the noble men became the slaves of the Tang people, and the innocent girls became maids..."
This history of the Turks has to start with the Sui Dynasty.
During the Sui Dynasty, the Turks were officially divided into two regimes, East and West, due to their own internal contradictions, and Emperor Wen of Sui took the opportunity to win over one of them, making the Eastern Turk Khans submit to the Sui Dynasty, and the Eastern Turk region became the county of the Sui Dynasty, and was controlled until the time of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang.
For more than a hundred years, the existence of Turks has always been a huge tumor for the Tang Dynasty.
A series of Turkic activities in the north were a threat to the border people and had a huge impact on the development of the Tang Dynasty.
At that time, Li Shimin took advantage of the contradiction between the two Eastern Turkic khans and skillfully divided the relationship between the two Turkic khans.
After a period of rest and recuperation, the Tang Dynasty was strong and strong, and at the same time boldly appointed many generals of ethnic minorities who were good at war, and under the all-round development of economy, talents, and military, Li Shimin dispatched an army of 100,000 people, and finally calmed the scourge of Eastern Turks.
The entire inscription of Bija Khan expresses his dissent and dissatisfaction with the Great Tang Dynasty, and these words also show from the side that the strength of the Great Tang Dynasty is indeed very terrifying, and he warns his descendants on the inscription that they must remember the pain of losing the country.
Because of the strength of the Tang Dynasty, he could only use Turkic script that no one in the Central Plains knew to engrave these words, showing the true colors of two-faced people.
Compared with other similar content of the Bija Khan stele, the reason why the Que Special Service Monument is so famous is mainly due to the rich Turkic writing on the stele, and it has maintained relatively clear handwriting so far.
Moreover, among the stone tablets found around the world so far, the Que Special Service Monument can be called a special existence.
The mood of Bija Khan when he wrote the Que secret service monument should be awkward.
In such a special era, Bija Khan was not willing to submit to the powerful power of the Tang Dynasty, but he had to become a vassal of the Tang Dynasty.
In such a helpless situation, Bija Khan could only use his brother's death to incite the emotions of the Turkic people, but he feared that those in power would discover their misdelicate thoughts, so they had to use Turkic to confirm their status.
Resources:
[1] From Chen Hongyan, editor-in-chief. Jinshibei Tuoshanben Palm Death 1[M]. 2017: "Que Secret Service Monument"
[2] From Geng Shimin. Research on ancient Turkic inscriptions[M]. 2005: "Que Secret Service Monument"