when ethnological considerations were in question, still used the word in a non-ethnic sense, to denote a group of tribes who had to be distinguished from the Tájiks.
Other Asiatic authors wrote on these subjects in the same way. Thus, Minháj-ud-Din, the author of the Tabákat-i-Násiri, frequently uses the word Turk to designate the nomadic group generally, and, like Rashid-ud-Din, even brings the name Tatar into the same category. The following is an instance taken from three consecutive paragraphs:—"In this same year the Chingiz Khan, the Mughal, rose up in the Kingdom of Chin and Tamghaj, and commenced to rebel; in all books it is written that the first signs of the end of time are the outbreak of the Turks. … The name of the father of this Chingiz Khan, the accursed, was the Tatar, Timurchi, and he was the mihtar [chief] of the Mughal tribes, and ruler over his people . . . . Among the tribes of the Mughal was another Turk of importance, a ruler and leader, and greatly venerated; and the whole of the tribes of the Mughals were under the rule of these two persons. … All the tracts of the Turk tribes, at the hand of their iniquity and sedition were reduced to misery. …"[1]
Juvaini, the author of the Jahán Kushai, applies to the Mongols the passage from the Koran: "Beware of provoking the Turks, for they are formidable."[2] Abul-feda quotes an Arab author to the effect that the Russians are a people of Turkish race,[3] when pointing to them as belonging to the group of non-Musulman and non-Tájik inhabitants of what were regarded as civilised countries. Ibn Haukal, touching on the question from a geographical point of view, writes: "Tiráz [Táráz] is on the extreme frontier between the country of the Turks and that of the Musulmans"[4]; yet the Musulmans, in this case, were, to a great degree, of Turki race. And, again, Minháj-ud-Din mentions an invasion of Tibet (from Upper Bengal apparently) and says: "All the people [of Tibet] were Turks, archers, and [furnished with] long bows."[5] Idrisi, also, in speaking of Tibet, says: "This is the country of the Tibetan Turks"; and afterwards: "This intervening space is covered with pastures, forests, and strong castles belonging to the
