The Power of the Kyrgyz in the Mid-18th Century
Traces of the political activity of the Kyrgyz in the second half of the 18th century can be found not only in Fergana but also in Eastern Turkestan. The most active military leader was the Kuschin feudal Kubad-biy.
In this regard, the well-known orientalist P.P. Ivanov called him “one of the outstanding political figures of the second half of the 18th century.” In any case, it is undoubtedly true that Kubad-biy was the most significant of the tribal leaders of Southern Kyrgyzstan. Information about him reached Russia. When the Siberian engineer I.G. Andreev visited in 1785
the Middle Juz of the Kazakhs, among other Kyrgyz biys, he was told about the leader of the “Kokshin” (Kusch) volost, Ivadlu-biy. This was the same Kubad-biy, whose name, written in Arabic script, can be transcribed in various ways. A.Z. Validov noted this, observing the same meaning of the name Kubad-biy and Ivadlu. In the Bukhara chronicle “Tarikhi Rahim-Khani,” Kubad-biy is even referred to as the “head of the Kyrgyz.” It should be assumed that his power and influence extended to some degree not only over the Kuschis but also over neighboring Kyrgyz tribes. However, there is no documentary basis to assert that he made any attempts to unite the Kyrgyz tribes and concentrate centralized power in his hands. He was an ordinary feudal lord, more energetic and more fortunate (which is why he was more well-known) than others, but he pursued only his purely selfish goals and did not rise to the level of a national hero.
Sources mention other Kyrgyz biys (or beks) such as Hadji-biy, Sadyk-biy, and others, who, along with the Kazakh khans of the Elder Juz, enjoyed “great popularity” in Kokand. Kubad-biy is mentioned in the history of the Kashgar rulers as a direct participant in the struggle between the White Mountain and Black Mountain hodjas for power. In 1755, the head of the Black Mountain party, Hodja Yusuf, sent his trusted dervish to Andijan with a letter to Kubad-biy. The Kyrgyz feudal lord was offered an alliance and asked for help.
At the same time, Hodja's envoys were sent to other Kyrgyz tribal leaders, urging them to join Kubad-biy and assist the hodja in the siege of Kashgar. It can be assumed that the call did not go unnoticed: Kyrgyz feudal lords responded to Yusuf's message and marched on Kashgar. The city was taken, as sources report, only thanks to the help of Kubad-biy.
After a quarrel and a rupture of relations with the Kokand ruler, Kubad-biy paid increased attention to the foreign political events in neighboring Eastern Turkestan. Here, the Manchus initially tried to use the heirs of the former feudal-theocratic ruler Hodja Ahmed, the brothers Burkhan-ud-din and Khan-Hodja, for their own interests. Many Kyrgyz tribes roamed in Eastern Turkestan. Both the Kyrgyz and Uyghur populations fought against the exploitative policies of the local Kashgar hodjas. The Chon-bagys, led by the elder Khugua, were outraged by the predatory policies of Hodja-khan and migrated from Eastern Turkestan to Fergana, where they were sympathetically received by other Kyrgyz tribes. Relations between the Kyrgyz and the Kashgar ruler became so strained that Burkhan-ud-din took, and not without reason, urgent measures to repel a possible attack from them. In the 1750s, the Kyrgyz repeatedly rose against the Kashgar hodjas. Kyrgyz feudal lords attacked the cities of Eastern Turkestan, guided by their own interests, without coordinating their actions with the rulers of Kokand.
Sometimes they sided with one or another contender.
During the power struggles in Eastern Turkestan in the 1750s, when the hodja brothers killed one of the Kashgar rulers, Iké-hodja, his son found refuge among the Kyrgyz of Tian Shan, and they refused to hand him over despite threats.
Based on Bukhara and Kashgar sources, A.Z. Validov came to the correct conclusion that “Kubad-biy was a completely independent ruler, and depending on personal benefits, he could choose to ally with or part ways with one or another of the rulers.”
The first Kokand rulers apparently saw in the leaders of the Kyrgyz tribes a force capable of supporting them in the difficult task of state-building. Since the Kyrgyz in the mid-18th century represented a serious military power, they, despite the temporary recognition of their dependence on Dzungaria by the allied Kokand, continued to wage armed struggle alone. It should be noted that the Kyrgyz not only successfully repelled the Dzungar advance in Fergana but also actively participated in the political life of Eastern Turkestan, particularly besieging Kashgar in 1749.
However, there was never a close alliance between the Kokand and Kyrgyz feudal lords. The alliance of the elites of these two ethnic groups was always built solely on common predatory plans and did not serve the interests of the people.
To get ahead a bit, I will note that the policy of the khanate towards the Kyrgyz essentially boiled down to tax collection. Moreover, the Kokandis sometimes did not even bother to protect their subjects from external aggressors. In particular, in 1825, the Kyrgyz biy Taylak-baatyr, along with his tribe, was left alone against the invading Chinese army, even though he was a subject of Kokand and paid tribute to it regularly. A similar story occurred in 1848 during the campaign of Kazakh Sultan Kenesary Kasymov against the northern Kyrgyz. At that time, all the “help” from the Pishpek garrison of the Kokandis consisted of their sentries lighting a torch on the fortress tower, which signified the approach of enemy troops.
Traces of the political activity of the Kyrgyz in the second half of the 18th century can be found not only in Fergana but also in Eastern Turkestan. The most active military leader was the Kuschin feudal Kubad-biy.
In this regard, the well-known orientalist P.P. Ivanov called him “one of the outstanding political figures of the second half of the 18th century.”
Kubad-biy is also mentioned in the history of the Kashgar rulers as a direct participant in the struggle between the White Mountain and Black Mountain hodjas for power. In 1755, the head of the Black Mountain party, Hodja Yusuf, sent his trusted dervish to Andijan with a letter to Kubad-biy. The Kyrgyz feudal lord was offered an alliance and asked for help. At the same time, Hodja's envoys were sent to other Kyrgyz tribal leaders, urging them to join Kubad-biy and assist the hodja in the siege of Kashgar. It can be assumed that the call did not go unnoticed: Kyrgyz feudal lords responded to Yusuf's message and marched on Kashgar. The city was taken, as sources report, only thanks to the help of Kubad-biy.
After a quarrel and a rupture of relations with the Kokand ruler, Kubad-biy paid increased attention to the foreign political events in neighboring Eastern Turkestan. Here, the Manchus initially tried to use the heirs of the former feudal-theocratic ruler Hodja Ahmed, the brothers Burkhan-ud-din and Khan-Hodja, for their own interests.
Sources mention other Kyrgyz biys (or beks) such as Hadji-biy, Sadyk-biy, and others, who, along with the Kazakh khans of the Elder Juz, enjoyed “great popularity” in Kokand.
Thus, the history of the relationship between the Kyrgyz and the Kokandis and other neighbors in the mid-18th century shows that at this time they were still independent, sometimes uniting in an alliance against a common enemy, but overall they maintained and conducted an independent policy.
The situation changed somewhat from the late 1850s when the Kokand ruler Irdana-biy grew stronger, while the southern Kyrgyz weakened somewhat due to the migration of some of their tribes to the north. With the collapse of the Dzungar Khanate, the Kyrgyz, previously pushed out of Semirechye and Tian Shan to the south, began to return from Fergana to their former pastures. This eased the overall atmosphere in Southern Kyrgyzstan, and the local population became the target of Kokand's encroachments.
Was the emergence of the future Alay queen in the close circle of the political elite of Kokand accidental?