The Kaganate is a kind of state system. At the head of such an education is the kagan, or, according to one interpretation of this title, "khan khans". The term itself is mentioned for the first time in connection with the ancient Mongolian tribe of nomads Xianbi.
Originally from China
In the III century BC of the ancient union called "Dungu", formed around 1100 BC, one of the tribes was singled out. The new association for three centuries was called in different ways, and in 330 the Zhuzhan Kaganate arose. This state, formed by the Xianbi tribe, lasted until 555. In 402 the ruler of the tribes Zhuzhani first of all began to call himself kagan, thus creating a new title of supreme ruler. According to one of the historical versions, the name of the subordinate tribe is a contemptuous nickname given to them by the Chinese. Zsuzsany - slowly creeping, or reptiles. Not surprisingly, this people wanted to be independent. In this case, the Kaganate is the union of the Zhuzhan tribes, which also represented a confederation.
Mighty State
And at the beginning of the 6th century, from this formation, in turn, the tribe separated, wishing to be independent. They formed the Avarian Khaganate, which existed from 562 to 823. The territories of modern Slovakia and Croatia, Romania and Hungary, Serbia and Ukraine accounted for the area of this state, founded by the kagan Boyan I. Back in 555 the Avars were known as the nomadic people driven by the Turks, forced to leave the steppes of western Kazakhstan and move to the remote bank of the Volga. And already in 565-566, after skirting the Carpathians from the north, they captivate the king of the Franks Sigibert I, defeating his army. Contemporaries were so shocked by this fact that they attributed the gift of magic to the Avars. During its peak, the Avarian Khaganat stretched from the Black Sea to the Adriatic and from the Alps to the Elbe. The Avars achieved such power thanks to the wise and rigid rule of the talented leader Boyan I, who ruled the country from the time of its formation in 562 until his death in 602. The sly and cynical leader, without hesitation, changed allies, destroyed entire tribes to achieve his goal, and As a result, even forced the Byzantine emperor Tiberius II to pay tribute to him. The Kaganate is a rigid dictatorship, and the kagan is a sovereign in the medieval nomad hierarchy, a person who, without any restrictions, has absolutely all power.
The fall of the colossus
When studying the history of ancient times, there are always several views on the same question. Thus, Avars are referred to different ethnic groups: Mongolian, Iranian-speaking, Turkic. Representatives of the archaeological school of Hungary, in whose territory the Avarian Kaganate was located, include most of the Avars to the Europeans and only a small stratum to the Mongoloids. But this smaller part of the population played a dominant role, was the elite of the Avar state. It can be assumed that the representatives of the ruling elite did not assimilate with the conquered peoples. The first defeat of the brazen Avars was given at Constantinople in 626 AD. Immediately from the Khaganate separate tribes began to separate - the first to run Kutrigurs, modern Bulgarians. In 631, Khan Alzek, ruler of the future Great Bulgaria, withdraws his army from the Khaganate after an unsuccessful attempt to seize power. Then the Avars only defend and retreat. From Dalmatia, the Croats dislodge them in 640. The franco-Avar war, which lasted a very long time, did the Khaganate. Gradually, all the enslaved peoples rebelled. And the last region, dedicated to the Avars, Pannonia, headed by a baptized kagan, was captured by the Hungarians in 899. Avars completely ceased to exist. The once powerful state, which lived about 3.5 centuries, disappeared without a trace.
The state structure of the most powerful Khaganates
The question arises about what is the Kaganate, how it is arranged, why it disappears, as a rule, without a trace. It is interesting that the kagan, a man who subsequently possessed absolute power, was elected by the people's assembly. In the Khazar and Aavrian kaganates, the governor had a governor named Tudun, who was entrusted with supervisory, organizational and diplomatic functions, and yugur, who was probably the supreme priest. Tribute was collected by representatives of the nobility - the Tarkhans. And behind them, according to the hierarchy, there were leaders of tribes who played an important role in the structure of the country. They also led their peoples out of the Kaganate. Maybe that's why this state disappeared from the face of the Earth, which was polyethnic.
Another Turkic state
The Turgesh Khaganate did not last long - from the beginning to the middle of the VIII century. At the very beginning of the century, the leader of the Türgershes Ushlik overthrew the Chinese governor and demanded to recognize himself as a kagan of the Celestial Empire. He made his capital city Suyab, which was his bid. The entire territory of the new Kaganate included 20 territorial units, each of which had 7,000 soldiers. They were located in the squares of Chinese provinces and stretched from Beshbalyk to Tashkent. In 705, in view of the threat of the Arab occupation of the country, the Kaganate concludes an alliance with China and breaks up Arab forces. The next rulers - Soga, Zhen, the Great Suluk, in which the Kaganate reached its peak, waged successful wars with both the Arabs and China. But after the murder of Suluk, the authorities began to slip from the hands of his successors, who were Kutsha and Baga-Tarkhan, Bilge and Tengri-Ilmysh - the last kagan, with the death of which the Turgesh Khaganate ceased to exist. Remains coins of this state with Sogdian inscriptions, minted with these rulers.
New in place of the old
A little longer the East Turkic Khaganate existed . The capital was the city of Orda-Balyk. The history of this state of nomads began in 603 after the dissolution of the Türkic Kaganate to the Western and Eastern parts. For three decades, the newly formed Eastern Kaganate, which had a common border with China, waged quite successful wars with it, but in 630 the country was again captured by the Turkic Empire. After 50 years, the Kok-Turks revolted, as a result of which the Eastern Khaganate under the new name of Kok-Türk was rebuilt. And again his troops were smashing the army of neighboring China - in 686 at Xinzhou, in 694 - near Lingzhou. The second kagan Kapagan Mochur, who ruled from 693 to 716, successfully invaded China in 698 and defeated the imperial troops. The following 6 rulers did not achieve such successes. And at the last, Kulun-beke, the troops of the Kaganate in 745 were defeated by the Uighur troops of Khan Moyut-Chur. The Kok-Türkic Kaganate, an area of 4 million square kilometers, formed in 682, ceased to exist.
New strong education
The Karluk Kaganate, which arose 11 years after the collapse of the Kok-Türkic, is also a Turkic state, and it existed from 756 to 940. The territory occupied by it included the spaces between the lakes of Issyk-Kul and Balkhash, from the middle course of the Syr-Darya to the Djungar Alatau. That is, it was within modern Kazakhstan. The roots of the Karluk Kaganate grew from the Western part of the Turkic state, which had broken up (in 603). Being a certain period under the strong influence of China, at the beginning of the VIII century the Karluks (inhabitants of these regions) begin a gradual migration towards the west. They have been known about them since the 5th century. This is also a multi-tribal community - they were joined in the VII century by such tribes as the Bulak, Chigil and Tashlyk. On their way, the growing detachments of the future new Kaganate won a series of major victories. So, they helped the Arabs in 751 to win in Talas, or Atlakh (Talas Valley, Attle City), the battle against China (the Tang Dynasty). They fought with the East Turkic Khaganate. But the Karluk state, which knew the ups, did not last long. She was also absorbed in another Turkic formation - Eastern Turkestan, which in 940 seized the capital of the Karluk Khaganate Balasgun. However, part of the population managed to escape the Ili River, the longest in the Semirechye, where they created a new state called the Karluk Khanate. The capital was the city of Kaylyk.
A sad fate
On the question of what a Kaganate is, you can answer that this is a purely Asian form of government. Nowhere in Europe or America has there ever been such an entity. In Asia, there were quite a few - there was even a Russian Khaganate on the Lower Don. He also ended his existence in the middle of the IX century. As history shows, a rather unfortunate form of government - all the khaganates were routed, and the population of many disappeared without a trace or dissolved among other tribes, for example, Khazars and Avars. But the significance of these Turkic states is very difficult to overestimate. Thanks to military expansion, the culture of the East was enriched by the achievements of the ancient civilizations of the Mediterranean. Many tribes left China and reached Western Europe, assimilating along the way with the peoples living on these expanses.