25. The formation and demise of Kazakh khanate XV-XVI.

Two sons of Barak Khan, Janibek and Kirai, were quick to take advantage of Abu'l Khayr's reverses. As representatives of a rival claimant, they had been in opposition to Abu'l Khayr since he assumed power. In the mid-1460s Janibek and Kirai led the tribes of their supporters (remnants of the old White Horde) west from Mughulistan into the territory of Abu'l Khayr. With the support of the rulers of Mughulistan, they lay claim to pastureland in western Semirech'e from the lower Chu River valley across the Talas valley to the Betpak-Dala Desert. Abu'l Khayr refused to recognize Janibek's claim over this territory and led an expedition to oppose him; Abu'l Khayr and his son, Shaikh Haidar, died fighting Janibek's troops in 1468. Abu'l Khayr was succeeded by his grandson, Muhammad Shaybani (reigned 1468-1510), who occupied Samarkand and Bukhara and established the Shaybanid dynasty. Fighting between the Uzbeks and Kazakhs continued for most of the remainder of the fifteenth century. In the process, the nomadic economy of Syr Darya and Semirech'e was severely disrupted, animals were killed, and towns and trading posts were plundered.

It is hard to date the formation of a Kazakh khanate precisely, since none of the contemporary accounts of the late fifteenth century paid much attention to the steppe. The official Soviet history of Kazakhstan considers Janibek the first Kazakh khan, holding that, upon Janibek's death in 1480, Kirai's son Buyun-duk (reigned 1480-1511) was elected his successor. Other sources maintain that Kirai was the first elected khan, ruling until his death in 1488, when he was succeeded by Buyunduk.¹² Regardless of which account is correct, clearly the Uzbek-Kazakh rivalry continued throughout the last quarter of the fifteenth century as Muhammad Shaybani and Buyunduk competed for control of the Syr Darya cities. The largest and most important city, Yasi (later called Turkestan), became the headquarters of the Kazakh khan. The rivalry ended temporarily when the two rulers signed a peace treaty in 1500. Peace allowed Shaybani to turn his attentions south, ^:o the conquest of Bukhara and Samarkand.

26. The first Kazakh Khans and Kazakh Khanate in the xy-XVI centuries.

The shift of Uzbek authority to Mawarannahr enabled the Kazakhs to concentrate on the establishment of a stable khanate of their own. Buyunduk's successor, Qasim Khan, is generally credited with the creation of a centralized and unified Kazakh khanate. He expanded the territory under Kazakh control to include some of the eastern pasturelands of the Dashti-Qipchak, more of the Syr Darya valley, and all of the Chu River valley. In 1513 he got as far south as Tashkent but was unable to make an all-out attack on the city; winter was approaching and the Kazakh tribes that had summered in the lower Chu valley had to migrate north to find winter grazing. Qasim strengthened the Kazakh hold over the cities of the lower Syr Darya, which was essential for the regulation of trade between the livestock breeders and the sedentary populations to the south. Control of these cities made the Kazakh territory a viable economic system, self-regulating and self-sufficient. Still, the Kazakh economy and Ka­zakh khanate remained in the shadow of the more powerful Shaybani khanate in Mawarannahr.

During this period the Kazakh confederation expanded as Qasim wel­comed other Turkish tribes, including Kipchaks from the Nogai group and Naimans and Argyns from the eastern branch of the Chagatais. It was possible for the first time to consider the Kazakhs a people: they were approximately one million strong, spoke the same Turkish language, utilized the same type of livestock breeding, and shared a culture and a form of social organization. Under Qasim, political unity was established as well, for his authority was recognized by the sultans who lived in the Kazakh territory. The Kazakh people at this time was essentially a political union, distinguished solely by territorial and political criteria from the Uzbeks, who came from the same ethnic stock and whose language, economy, and culture were virtually identical to those of the Kazakhs. The Uzbeks, who migrated in the territory of Mawarannahr, recognized the authority of Shaybani and paid him tribute, whereas the Kazakh population, concentrated along the Syr Darya and to the north and east, not only did not recognize Shaybani's authority but instead established a distinct and sometimes rival political structure. From the reign of Qasim Khan on, Uzbeks and Kazakhs lived side by side, but they never again considered them­selves one people.

At the time of Qasim's death in 1523, the Kazakh state spread from the Ural River to the lands of Semirech'e and north to the Irtysh River, In the sixteenth century the Kazakhs focused their expansion on the Syr Darya region (the Talas and Zeravshan River valley), where they sought to inherit Uzbek domination. The territory of Kazakh control was not precisely fixed, reflecting instead the ability of the various khans to combine military success with personal persuasiveness. Qasim's successors were unable to maintain the unity that he had achieved, partly because they were less forceful rulers and partly because Kazakh territory had increased greatly during the last 25 years of Qasim's lifetime. Consequently, immediately after Qasim's death, the three Kazakh hordes were important as political entities; a single, unified Kazakh state as such did not then exist. However, one of the khans generally functioned as the pre-eminent authority or military commander for the whole Kazakh nation.

Qasim was succeeded briefly by his son, Mamush, who was killed while trying to consolidate his authority. His successor, Qasim's nephew, Tahir (reigned 1523-1533) attempted unsuccessfully to gain control of Tashkent. After Tahir's death, Buidashe (reigned 1533-1538) came to power but ruled in alliance with two other powerful khans of the day, Ahmed Khan (western Kazakhstan) and Tugun Khan (Semirech'e). During the second quarter of the sixteenth century, the Kazakhs received additional immigrants from the Dashti-Qipchak. The steppe economy flourished as the political stability of the steppe allowed the reintroduction of trade through the area, providing incentive to rebuild the cities Sygnak, Sairam, and Yasi.³⁵ By the end of the sixteenth century they had become walled towns with some brick structures and served as centers of exchange for the Kazakhs and traders from Kashgaria and Mawarannahr. The growth of these cities provided expanded markets for the Kazakhs, which in turn encouraged an increase in the size of the average herd and the general improvement of the Kazakh economic position.

In 1538 Haq Nazar (a son of Qasim) came to power, and in the 1550s he expanded the borders of the Kazakh state by absorbing the eastern section of the Nogai territory.³⁶ In the late 1560s, unsuccessful in his attempt to conquer Mughulistan, Haq Nazar turned his attention toward the trading centers in the Syr Darya region, which had been thriving in the peaceful and lucrative 1560s and 1570s. He and a group of Kazakh sultans swore loyalty to the emir of Bukhara, Abdul II, the pre-eminent political figure in the area, and they supported Abdul's claims against Baba-Sultan of Tashkent. In 1580, after receiving some cities from Baba-Sultan, the Kazakhs briefly switched sides, but once their control of the new territory was consolidated they again took up the Bukharan cause. Haq Nazar was killed in battle in 1580. He was succeeded by Tahir's nephew, Shigai (reigned 1580-1582), but it was Shigai's son, Taulkel (reigned 1586-1598), who was the effective leader of the Kazakhs. Taulkel defeated Baba-Sultan in 1582, whose head he exchanged with Abdul for the Zeravshan River valley. Shortly after this he broke with Abdul. In 1586 he was elected khan by the Kazakhs and led them in their struggle for control of the cities of the Syr Darya River basin. By the end of the century the Kazakhs controlled the cities of Turkestan, Tashkent, and Samarkand, and they had even managed to capture Bukhara for a brief period of time. Taulkel died in 1598, after taking Tashkent, and was succeeded by Esim (reigned 1598-1628). In his first year of rule Esim concluded peace with the emir of Bukhara, Abdullah, who recognized Kazakh control of the Syr Darya region.