drew off towards Khotan.[1] Yet Khizir Khwája is known, from Mirza Haidar's narrative, to have made at least a temporary conquest of Turfán and Kara-Khoja.
These events occurred during the best days of the Moghul power, when raiding and general lawlessness flourished, and it is to be inferred from what little we know of the history of those times, that even if Kamar-ud-Din sometimes held sway in Uighuristán, he was not necessarily the recognised chief of the State. But, whoever was the chief, he seems to have been subdued by the Ming army, for we read of Turfán, in 1406, sending a mission of homage to Peking, while two years after that date another is recorded to have been despatched by the ruling Khan, this time under the leadership of a Buddhist priest. In 1422 a chief of Turfán, whose name is given as In-ghi-rh-cha, is reported to have been expelled from his government by Vais Khan of Bishbálik (i.e., Moghulistan), and to have personally carried his appeal for redress before the Emperor, who caused Vais Khan to restore In-ghi-rh-cha to his possessions. What means the Chinese Emperor took to compel the Moghul to perform this act of restitution is not stated, but the Ming-Shi goes on to relate that in 1425 and 1426 In-ghi-rh-cha appeared a second and third time at Peking, "at the head of his tribe," to present tribute. In 1428, shortly after his return home, he died.
The next reigning chief mentioned is one Ba-la-ma-rh, on whom the Ming Emperor bestowed presents in 1441, on the occasion of the Egyptian envoy passing through Turfán on his way homeward from Peking. It was about this time—the middle of the fifteenth century—that the Turfán chief, one Ye-mi-li Huo-jo (Imil Khwája?) took possession of Kara-Khoja and Lu-ko-tsin and assumed the title of Wang, or 'Prince.' Previous to this, says the Ming historian, Turfán was of little account, but it now became powerful, and appears to have extended its territory, for he incidentally mentions that it was bordered on one side by Moghulistan, and on another by Khotan. The rise in power of the Turfán chiefs did not prevent them from continuing to send tribute to China, and it was shortly afterwards (in 1465) settled that a mission should be despatched regularly once every five years.
The particulars of these missions, the demands they made at
- ↑ Pétis de la Croix, iii., pp. 216–17.
