Resettlement of the Kyrgyz to the Yenisei.
The early medieval population of the Yenisei was referred to as "herkis," "khirkhiz" in Greek sources, "syatsazy," "dzilidzisy" in Arabic and Persian, and "kyrgyz" in ancient Turkic, Uighur, and Sogdian texts.
The last term was an accurate representation of the self-name of the people.
Resettlement of the Kyrgyz to the Yenisei. Disputes among the ancestors of the Huns for power forced Chzhichzhi-khan to flee to the Minusinsk Basin of the Yenisei River. Some scholars believe that together with his tribes in the mid-1st century BC, part of the Kyrgyz arrived at their new homeland. Others argue that the resettlement of the Kyrgyz to the Yenisei occurred for different reasons and at a different time.
Social Structure. The state of the ancient Yenisei Kyrgyz experienced a stage of disintegration of the primitive communal system and the formation of a class society in the 3rd-4th centuries. Its foundation consisted of free farmers and herders. At the head of society stood the nobility — wealthy and noble ancestors, who resolved the most important issues of relations with other clans and tribes, as well as the life and everyday affairs of society members. Slaves, who had no rights, formed a separate group.
The Yenisei Kyrgyz, as noted in Chinese sources, were Europoids with "red hair, rosy faces, and blue eyes." They lived in large patriarchal families. Polygamy was a common phenomenon, as was the bride price, which sometimes reached very large sizes, up to a thousand heads of livestock. The nobility wore high white felt caps with turned-up brims. This ancient ethnographic feature has been preserved in the Tian Shan tradition of wearing white caps to this day. The metaphorical self-name of the Kyrgyz in the epic "Manas" is "ak-kalpakty," meaning "white-capped."
Occupations of the Kyrgyz, daily life, rituals, and customs. The main occupations of the Yenisei Kyrgyz were agriculture and animal husbandry. In mountainous and forested areas, hunting developed. Hunters obtained fur and musk (a fragrant substance from the special glands of the Siberian musk deer, beaver, nutria, and other animals). Farmers lived in settlements, building wooden hexagonal conical dwellings, while herders and hunters lived in yurts.
The Kyrgyz cremated the deceased, and the ashes were buried. For the nobility, large mounds surrounded by vertically buried stone steles, called "chaa-tas," meaning "stone of war," were constructed over the graves. Sometimes, secret chambers were built under their mounds to hide treasures. Ancestors and other noble people arranged huge family burial mounds, sometimes burying up to a hundred relatives in them. According to the pagan beliefs of Kyrgyz religion, the supreme deities, like those of other Turkic peoples, were considered to be the divine couple Tengri and Umai. The most reliable beliefs of the Kyrgyz in the 8th century were described by the Persian historian Gardizi: "The Kyrgyz, like the Indians, burn the dead and say: 'Fire is the purest thing; everything that enters the fire is purified; thus, the fire purifies the dead from dirt and sins.' The ashes of the deceased were placed in small bags and hidden among their clothes. From the deceased's clothing, a doll resembling them was made. For its face, brightly painted posthumous masks made of plaster were sometimes used.
The Kyrgyz developed their own writing system in the 7th century. The literacy of the people was likely high: over 120 monuments of ancient Kyrgyz writing have been found in the Yenisei and Tuva.
The Kyrgyz in the 6th-12th centuries