Jinshan 金山 — The Tugu Turks’ Ancestral Home

According to the Chinese sources, the Turks’ ancestral home is the Golden Mountains/Jinshan, but opinions on their exact localization are divided. In the mid-18th century, French orientalist J. Deguignes was the first to express an opinion about Altai ancestral home of the Tugu Turks. In the 19th–20th centuries, his opinion was supported by Western European sinologists St. Julien and Liu- Mao-tsai. The founder of Russian Chinese studies N. Ya. Bichurin associated Jinshan with the south of the Russian Altai due to the presence of the highest mountains in this area and his translation and commentary on the outline of the mountains of Jinshan in the form of a helmet, which allegedly corresponds to the outlines of the mountains in the south of the Russian Altai. A. G. Malyavkin and L. A. Borovkova came to a conclusion about the mistaken identification by N. Ya. Bichurin of the Jinshan with the Russian Altai. In their opinion, the Turks’ Golden Mountains must be identified with the eastern Tianshan. In the chronicles of the Jin and Wei Dynasties the Golden Mountains/Mountain — Jinshan are repeatedly mentioned in relation to the history of the Xiongnu and Xianbi of the 3rd–5th centuries in the Northern China. The context of the mentioning of these mountains or mountain does not cause any doubts that they were located in the Gansu province, Zhangye district. These mountains are the Qiliangshan mountain range. Comparison of these data with early historical evidence about the Turks allows the author to argue that these are the Golden Mountains of the Turks. The Chinese chroniclers also referred to the Altai Mountains as Jinshan, which is reflected in the chronicles and on the historical maps. However, they had no relation to the early history of the Turks. The information of Sui-shu, Zhou-shu and Tang-shu about the ancestors of the Tugu Turks — “mixed barbarians Hu from Pingliang” — best corresponds with the written data of earlier Chinese chronicles (Jin-shu, Wei-shu) about the residence of mixed groups of Turkic and Mongolian-speaking nomads on the territory of Northern China in the 3rd–5th centuries

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