Tombstones of Sufi sheikhs in Eastern Kyrgyzstan of the Qarakhanid period
Authors:   Kyrgyz-Turkish Manas University, Mokeev Anvarbek , Belek Kairat ,   Kyrgyz-Turkish Manas University
Published: December 2024

The spread of Islam in modern Kyrgyzstan and the neighboring regions of Semirechye is associated with the era of the Qarakhanid state, while a new ethnic community, a new socio-economic structure and a new type of spiritual culture were being formed there. Rather than the ineffective use of force applied by armies, missionaries played a greater role in converting the nomadic Turkic tribes to Islam. The article examines the process of Islamization in Eastern Kyrgyzstan of the Qarakhanid period on the basis of a comparative analysis of materials from epigraphic tombstones with data from written sources. A special attention is paid to the texts of newly discovered epitaphs in the Issyk-Kul Valley during archaeological and archaeographic expeditions. It has been verified that the tombstones are mainly devoted to Sufi sheikhs, who were devotees of Islam in Eastern Kyrgyzstan during the analyzed period. Some epitaphs were placed in honor of individual representatives of the local nobility, who patronized Sufi sheikhs from western Central Asia and eastern Iran. As the nisbas of the memoranda of individual epitaphs demonstrate, along with immigrants from Iran, members of Turkic tribes with a good education in religious centers of Central Asia and Iran made a certain contribution to the spread of Islam in Eastern Kyrgyzstan. A detailed analysis of the epitaph texts found in the Issyk-Kul Valley shows the rivalry of the Hanafi madhhab with the Shafi’i madhhab in the context of the militarypolitical battles that took place between the Qarakhanids and the Seljukids. A recently discovered Muslim epitaph from the northern shore of Lake Issyk-Kul, among other things, contains cross-shaped clan tamgas, which shows that these epitaphs belong to those tribes which confessed the Christianity religion in the pre-Islamic period. A peculiarity of these epigraphic monuments is the excessive praise of the deceased who were not religious figures during their lifetime, but only held a high public post. These monuments do not contain Koranic texts, but praise their deeds in secular life, which is characteristic of the ancient Turkic monuments erected in honor of major statesmen with runic texts. It seems that in this case we are talking about representatives of the local political elite, who patronized Sufi sheikhs of the Shafi’i or Hanafi madhhab in their missionary activities among the Qarakhanid population during their lifetime. The nisbas of some Sufi sheikhs and ordinary Sunni Muslims mentioned in the epigraphic monuments of Semirechye indicate their descent. It should be noted that, although some monuments were written in Arabic script, the content of the texts traces the cultural continuity between the ancient Turkic traditions and Islam. This is manifested in the dating of some texts in accordance with the ancient Turkic calendar, in the use of the name of the ancient Turkic deity, Tengri, instead of Allah, and in the mention of Qut for God-given legitimacy.