The Xiongnu (; ) were a tribal confederation of nomadic peoples who, according to ancient Chinese sources, inhabited the eastern Eurasian Steppe from the 3rd century BC to the late 1st century AD. Modu Chanyu, the supreme leader after 209 BC, founded the Xiongnu Empire.
After overthrowing their previous overlords, "The primary focus of the new threat became the Xiongnu who emerged rather abruptly in the late 4th century BC. Initially subordinated to the Yuezhi, the Xiongnu overthrew the nomadic hierarchy while also escalating its attacks on Chinese areas." the Yuezhi, the Xiongnu became the dominant power on the steppes of East Asia, centred on the Mongolian Plateau. The Xiongnu were also active in areas now part of Siberia, Inner Mongolia, Gansu and Xinjiang. Their relations with the Chinese dynasties to the south-east were complex, alternating between various periods of peace, war and subjugation. Ultimately, the Xiongnu were defeated by the Han dynasty in a centuries-long conflict, which led to the confederation splitting in two, and forcible resettlement of large numbers of Xiongnu within Han borders.
After their surrender, the Xiongnu in China intermixed with the Han Chinese and other surrounding ethnic minority groups. They were known as one of the "Five Barbarians", as their descendants founded the short-lived dynastic states of Han-Zhao, Xia and Northern Liang in northern China during the Sixteen Kingdoms period. The Jie people, who led the Later Zhao, were also derived from the Xiongnu, as were the Xianbei Yuwen clan of the Northern Zhou during the Northern and Southern dynasties. By the 7th century, the Xiongnu had completely integrated into Chinese society.
Attempts to associate the Xiongnu with the nearby Iranian Saka and Sarmatians were once controversial. However, archaeogenetics has confirmed their interaction with the Xiongnu, and also possibly their relation to the Huns. The identity of the ethnic core of Xiongnu has been a subject of varied hypotheses, because only a few words, mainly titles and personal names, were preserved in the Chinese sources. The name Xiongnu may be cognate with that of the Huns or the Huna, although this is disputed. Other linguistic links—all of them also controversial—proposed by scholars include Turkic, Iranian,: "Their royal tribes and kings (shan-yü) bore Iranian names and all the Hsiung-nu words noted by the Chinese can be explained from an Iranian language of Saka type. It is therefore clear that the majority of Hsiung-nu tribes spoke an Eastern Iranian language." Mongolic, Uralic, Yeniseian, or multi-ethnic.
Name The word "Xiōngnú" means "fierce slave". They were identified by the Han Chinese as invaders from the north who rode on horseback. The pronunciation of as Xiōngnú is the modern Mandarin Chinese pronunciation, from the Mandarin dialect spoken now in Beijing, which came into existence only in the second millennium CE. The Old Chinese pronunciation has been reconstructed as *xiuoŋ-na or as *qhoŋna according to Wang Li and Zhengzhang Shangfang respectively, the two most widely recognized Old Chinese reconstructions in China. Sinologist Axel Schuessler (2014) reconstructs the pronunciations of as *hoŋ-nâ in Late Old Chinese () and as *hɨoŋ-nɑ in Eastern Han Chinese; citing other Chinese transcriptions wherein the velar nasal medial -ŋ-, after a short vowel, seemingly played the role of a general nasal – sometimes equivalent to n or m –, Schuessler proposes that Xiongnu < *hɨoŋ-nɑ < *hoŋ-nâ might be a Chinese rendition, Han or even pre-Han, of foreign *Hŏna or *Hŭna, which Schuessler compares to Huns and Sanskrit Hūṇā. However, the same medial -ŋ- prompts Christopher P. Atwood (2015) to reconstruct *Xoŋai, which he derives from the Ongi River () in Mongolia and suggests that it was originally a dynastic name rather than an ethnic name.Atwood, Christopher P. (2015). "The Kai, the Khongai, and the Names of the Xiōngnú". International Journal of Eurasian Studies. 2: p of 45–47 of 35–63.
History
Predecessors
The territories associated with the Xiongnu in central/east Mongolia were previously inhabited by the Slab Grave Culture (Ancient Northeast Asian origin), which persisted until the 3rd century BC. "The slab graves culture existed in this territory prior to the Xiongnu empire. Sites of this culture dating back to approximately 1100-400/300 BC are common in Mongolia and the Trans-Baikal area. The earliest calibrated dates are prior to 1500 BC (Miyamoto et al., 2016). Later dates are usually 100–200 years earlier than the Xiongnu culture. Therefore, it is customarily considered that the slab grave culture preceded the Xiongnu culture. There is only one case, reported by Miyamoto et al. (2016), in which the date of the slab grave corresponds to the time of the making of the Xiongnu Empire." Genetic research indicates that the Slab Grave people were the primary ancestors of the Xiongnu, and that the Xiongnu formed through substantial and complex mixture with West Eurasians.
During the Western Zhou (1045–771 BC), there were numerous conflicts with nomadic tribes from the north and the northwest, variously known as the Xianyun, Guifang, or various "Rong" tribes, such as the Xirong, Shanrong or Quanrong. These tribes are recorded as harassing Zhou territory, but at the time the Zhou were expanding northwards, encroaching on their traditional lands, especially into the Wei River valley. Archaeologically, the Zhou expanded to the north and the northwest at the expense of the Siwa culture. The Quanrong put an end to the Western Zhou in 771 BC, sacking the Zhou capital of Haojing and killing the last Western Zhou king You. Thereafter the task of dealing with the northern tribes was left to their vassal, the Qin state.
To the west, the Pazyryk culture (6th – 3rd century BC) immediately preceded the formation of the Xiongnus. A Scythian culture, it was identified by excavated artifacts and mummified humans, such as the Siberian Ice Maiden, found in the Siberian permafrost, in the Altai Mountains, Kazakhstan and nearby Mongolia. To the south, the Ordos culture had developed in the Ordos Loop (modern Inner Mongolia, China) during the Bronze and early Iron Age from the 6th to 2nd centuries BC. Of unknown ethno-linguistic origin, it is thought to represent the easternmost extension of Indo-European-speakers.: "From that time until the HAN dynasty the Ordos steppe was the home of semi-nomadic Indo-European peoples whose culture can be regarded as an eastern province of a vast Eurasian continuum of Scytho-Siberian cultures.": "From the first millennium b.c., we have abundant historical, archaeological and linguistic sources for the location of the territory inhabited by the Iranian peoples. In this period the territory of the northern Iranians, they being equestrian nomads, extended over the whole zone of the steppes and the wooded steppes and even the semi-deserts from the Great Hungarian Plain to the Ordos in northern China." The Yuezhi were displaced by the Xiongnu expansion in the 2nd century BC, and had to migrate to Central and Southern Asia.
Early history
Western Han historian Sima Qian composed an early yet detailed exposition on the Xiongnu in one liezhuan (arrayed account) of his Records of the Grand Historian ( BC), wherein the Xiongnu were alleged to be descendants of a certain Chunwei, who in turn descended from the "lineage of Lord Xia", a.k.a. Yu the Great."The Account of the Xiongnu, Records of the Grand Historian",Sima Qian.DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004216358_00Shiji Ch. 110: Xiongnu liezhuan quote: "" Even so, Sima Qian also drew a distinct line between the settled Huaxia people (Han) to the pastoral nomads (Xiongnu), characterizing them as two polar groups in the sense of a civilization versus an uncivilized society: the Hua–Yi distinction. Sima Qian also mentioned Xiongnu's early appearance north of Wild Goose Gate and Dai commanderies before 265 BC, just before the Zhao-Xiongnu War;Shiji Vol. 81 "Stories about Lian Po and Lin Xiangru - Addendum: Li Mu" text: "" translation: "About Li Mu, he was a good general at Zhao's northern borders. He often stationed at Dai and Wild Goose Gate, prepared [against] the Xiongnu."Theobald, Ulrich (2019) "Li Mu " in ChinaKnowledge.de - An Encyclopaedia on Chinese History, Literature and Art however, sinologist Edwin Pulleyblank (1994) contends that pre-241-BC references to the Xiongnu are anachronistic substitutions for the Hu people instead. Sometimes the Xiongnu were distinguished from other nomadic peoples; namely, the Hu people; yet on other occasions, Chinese sources often just classified the Xiongnu as a Hu people, which was a blanket term for nomadic people. Even Sima Qian was inconsistent: in the chapter "Hereditary House of Zhao", he considered the Donghu to be the Hu proper,Shiji, "Hereditary House of Zhao" quote: "" translation: "(King Wuling of Zhao to Lou Huan:) Now Zhongshan is at our heart and belly [note: Zhao surrounded Zhongshan, except on Zhongshan's north-eastern side], Yan to the north, Hu to the east, Forest Hu, Loufan, Qin, Han at our borders to the west. Yet we have no strong army to help us, surely we will lose our country. What is to be done?"Compare a parallel passage in Stratagems of the Warring States, "King Wuling spends his day in idleness", quote: "" Jennifer Dodgson's translation: "From Mount Chang to Dai and Shangdang, our lands border Yan and the Donghu in the east, and to the west we have the Loufan and shared borders with Qin and Han. Nevertheless, we have no mounted archers ready for action." yet elsewhere he considered Xiongnu to be also Hu.Shiji, Vol. 110 "Account of the Xiongnu". quote: "" translation: "Later on, Qin conquered the six other states, and the First Emperor dispatched general Meng Tian to lead a multitude of 100,000 north to attack the Hu; and he took all lands south the Yellow River. [...] The Xiongnu chanyu was Touman; Touman could not win against Qin, so [they] fled north."
Ancient China often came in contact with the Xianyun and the Xirong nomadic peoples. In later Chinese historiography, some groups of these peoples were believed to be the possible progenitors of the Xiongnu people. These nomadic people often had repeated military confrontations with the Shang and especially the Zhou, who often conquered and enslaved the nomads in an expansion drift. During the Warring States period, the armies from the Qin, Zhao and Yan states were encroaching and conquering various nomadic territories that were inhabited by the Xiongnu and other Hu peoples.
Pulleyblank argued that the Xiongnu were part of a Xirong group called Yiqu, who had lived in Shaanbei and had been influenced by China for centuries, before they were driven out by the Qin dynasty. Qin's campaign against the Xiongnu expanded Qin's territory at the expense of the Xiongnu. After the unification of Qin dynasty, Xiongnu was a threat to the northern border of Qin. They were likely to attack the Qin dynasty when they suffered natural disasters.
State formation The first known Xiongnu leader was Touman, who reigned between 220 and 209 BC. In 215 BC, Chinese Emperor Qin Shi Huang sent General Meng Tian on a military campaign against the Xiongnu. Meng Tian defeated the Xiongnu and expelled them from the Ordos Loop, forcing Touman and the Xiongnu to flee north into the Mongolian Plateau. In 210 BC, Meng Tian died, and in 209 BC, Touman's son Modu became the Xiongnu chanyu.