Phew, good question. Bear with me as I try to help you understand this situation. (part 1)
Turkic Confederations
Luckily for us, Persian chroniclers tell us that in the 10th century, the lands of modern-day Northern Kazakhstan are shared by a Nomadic Steppe people known as the Kirghiz and the Kazakhs. A bit West of them they tell us that these regions are inhabited by the Cumans, some may know them as the Kipchaks, the Russians called them the Polovsy – this group will eventually migrate West to the lands of modern-day Southern Ukraine and Southern Russia. In Southern modern-day Kazakhstan as well as modern-day Kyrgyzstan, a loose confederation of Turkic tribes roamed. Just like the Cumans, different people had different names for this group; the Byzantines had a name for them, the Persians called them the Ghuzz, I’ve heard of them commonly referred as the Oghuz Turks.
These tribes were pretty much constantly fighting with each other, whether it was for territory, survival, you name it. With lots of fighting came lots of practice so they were often used as mercenaries or even brought in as slave soldiers by the sedentary people that bordered them. All of this fighting is one of the reasons many historians believe that the Cumans decided to head West, perhaps they would have better luck in that direction. We know of this movement because of Byzantine and Rus chronicles, in the 11th century they began mentioning the Cumans. And this type of movement wasn’t unorthodox for these people, a man named Dukak Temur Yalig (literally meaning of the Iron Bow) who was the chieftain of the Kinik tribe (part of the Oghuz confederation), lead his tribe closer to the Western side of the Aral Sea. If his “surname” is of any hint, these people were fierce warriors and excellent hunter, and they had a lot of practice shooting their bow and that made them specialists of their weapon. Dukak is very important in this story because he is the father to a certain legendary man named Seljuk. This certain Seljuk will lead his tribe to the Syr Darya river sometime before the Cuman migration West (so potentially in the late 10th century) and began moving south to modern-day Uzbekistan, and they were now inhabiting the borders of Transoxiana.
Transoxiana was in this period under the control of the Iranian dynasty known as the Samanids. This government had experience dealing with Turkic tribes and used a tactic which seems to be a preventative campaign against the Nomads. Their thought process was probably along the lines of bringing the fight to the troublesome tribal people rather than waiting for them to be attacked or raided. Another tactic the Samanids will try is conversion; they viewed these tribal people as Shamanistic and barbarous, and they thought that if they could bring Islam to them then they could educate them and “pacify” them. This is not an uncommon tactic for this period, for instance the Byzantines will use a similar tactic on the Bulgarians by introducing Christianity to them.
The Samanid Dynasty was suffering for multiple reasons in the latter 10th century. North East of them lied another Turkic confederation comprised of the Karluks, Yagmas, Chigils and other Turkic peoples – the Kara-Khanid Khanate. This group of people started to gain the upper hand on the Samanids, especially since they had some internal problems as well, and with their enemy approaching they thought of a brilliant plan. You see, the Kara-Khanids were already Muslim, so the Samanids thought of them as less barbarous then Seljuk and his crew, so the Samanids thought they could use the Turkic tribe that recently showed up on their borders to fight the Kara-Khanids.
Unfortunately for our Iranian friends, as their empire continued to weaken internally their enemies smelled blood. The Kara-Khanids will move in with the intent of conquest and in 962, one of their Turkic slave soldiers no less, who was employed as a commander in their military took his chance and seized control of Ghazna – a city in Central Afghanistan. The descendants of this commander will go on to create the Ghaznavid Empire.
Seljuk Beg
I’ve already mentioned that Seljuk lead his tribesmen to the borders of Transoxiana but I want to talk about his background for just a bit so that you can understand his past. First of all, a lot of this is legend and we have few sources that can verify all of this information, but it’s a cool story nonetheless.
As I stated earlier, Seljuk is the son of Dukak and there are arguments on whether Dukak was already Muslim or whether they belonged to the Nestorian Christian faith in the East. The reason we can narrow it down to these two faiths aside from geographical location is the names of Seljuk’s sons. Their names are Biblical – Michael, Israel, Moses and Jonah; however, with that said, they could have easily been Mikail, Israil, Musa and Yunus. This is something I admittedly shouldn’t do, but I prefer the Nestorian Christian claim and I will explain in just a second, but first: Seljuk’s military career.
Before the migration Southwards, it is said that Seljuk personally served in the Khazar army. This is very important because he would have learned some interesting military tactics. So, he wasn’t just a raider, he had the benefit of military experience and he could lead his troops in this fashion.
Back to the theology bit because I believe it is important to mention that according to Seljuk legend, after leading his tribe to the borders of Transoxiana, Seljuk himself will convert to Islam. This really adds to the legitimacy of House Seljuk as he lead the tribes to the land of opportunity and converted to the religion which his descendants would follow because once the Seljuks adopt Islam, they consider themselves as Muslim warriors rather than Turkic warriors – and remember the Great Seljuk Empire which we will talk about here in a bit will essentially be the predecessor to the later Ottoman Empire, and again, the Ottomans consider themselves Muslims, not Turkish, though they do not forget their roots.
Our protagonist here had the title “Beg” which in Turkic language translates to Lord. Maybe his tribesmen called him Lord and it was exalted in Seljuk legend as well; however, this is a bit of a stretch he would have been considered a Warlord through and through. Regardless, it is an important distinction to make because he will never be Emperor, his grandsons are the ‘creators’ of the Great Seljuk Empire.
Seljuk’s son Michael will die in one of their battles and he will raise his sons Toghril and Chagri as his own.