Talk:Yuezhi

Modern Korean reading

Using modern Korean reading for Central Asia-related terms is ridiculous. Korean reading is one of important sources to reconstruct ancient Chinese reading, but it has nothing to do with Yuezhi! Why don't you use reconstructed sounds? --Nanshu 01:00, 30 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Hello Nanshu. Because it was removed from the article for reader-reference Yuezhi is pronounced WOLSHI in Korean. Why not give us the Japanese pronunciations Nanshu and if you have any info about the reconstructed sounds suggested by scholars like Liu Qiyu (who used Korean & Japanese pronunciations in his reconstructions) why not let us know how much you know.

I didn't add information of the reconstructed sounds only because I feared my data was out-of-date. I referred to a book by Dr. Todo Akiyasu, who died in 1985. According to Todo, Yuezhi was pronounced like "ŋïuǎt dhieg", but I'm not sure this is still supported. --Nanshu 23:13, 2 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Title Change

I propose a title change from Yuezhi to Rouzhi. In modern Mandarin the character "月" is pronounced yuè, and "氏" as shì; but when it comes to the phrase "月氏", the two characters should be pronounced as roù zhī, its ancient pronunciation. In this kind of situations where one character has two or multiple pronunciations, they are called "破音字". It should be noted that a certain amount of ordinary Chinese speakers do often mistaken in these pronunciations. Hence a change in the title should be done, either from the linguistics point of view or the historical one.--G.S.K.Lee 08:09, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The aknowledged name in English is definetely "Yuezhi", or sometimes "Yueh-Chi", which therefore should remain for the article name, but you are pointing to an interesting point of ancient phonetic that would deserve mention in the article. PHG 11:17, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If someone is going to discuss ancient phonetics in the main entry, it needs to be done properly: "Rouzhi" IS the proper MODERN pronunciation, but it won't have necessarily been how the Han pronounced the characters: didn't fourth tone words still have consonantal stops in the Han? If anyone's got a copy of Karlgren, the Chinese pronunciation could be easily figured out. (I don't at the moment).

Nobody can really tell how Chinese words were pronounced 2000 years ago. "Rouzhi" is the proper modern pronunciation of this kingdom, while "Yuezhi" is definitely a mis-pronounciation. --Mongol 03:22, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Rouzhi only gets 582 hits on Google. Yuezhi gets 51,800. Although "Rouzhi" may be the modern prononciation of the word, its seems the English usage is to write "Yuezhi".PHG 22:51, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Rouzhi = "Meat People"?

Why would anyone think that a phonetic change implies a semantic change? Just because "moon" used to be pronounced the way "meat" is now pronounced, doesn't mean that it used to signify "meat"! --Abou 22:43, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

According to the Chinese Wikipedia page it is indicated that Rou Zhi is a mispronounciation. The Ancient pronouciation should be Yue Zhi.There is no meat connotation, but only phonetic translation.--Myf 23：51, 6 March 2006

Moon in Chinese means meat in ancient time also, and the Cantonese is closer to ancient Chinese language than Mandarin, pronunciation of meat and moon are pretty similar.

There are some alternate forms that appear in old sources: 月支 or 月氐. This shows, that it does not mean "meat people", but is rather a phonetic rendering of a foreign word with two Chinese characters. The old readings for "moon" and "meat" were also rather different (Baxter gives in his dictionary the Middle Chinese readings "ngjwot" and "nyuwk"). But the old sources, like the Hou Hanshu, already have the character "moon". To sum up, the correct reading must be Yuezhi. P345 20:24, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Rouzhi or Yuezhi, does anyone notice the similarity to the English word Gypsy? These people were probably also of the same stock as the Gypsies who migrated west to Europe. Anyway the radicals for "meat" and "moon" are actually different. For the "moon" character or radical the two short horizontal lines in the inside are actually horizontal, ie like the equal sign =; whereas for "meat" the two short lines form a shape similar to a greater than sign, ie >. 86.176.116.67 (talk) 23:31, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Huh? Since when does a surface similarity of two names in unrelated languages, and well over a thousand years apart, become 'evidence' that these two peoples are "probably also of the same stock"? What total nonsense! Please, this is an encyclopedia which attempts to present factual information - not a forum for unsupported flights of fantasy. Yours, John Hill (talk) 02:59, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Judging dead people by appearance is not alway accurate

mtDNA of Scytho-Siberian skeleton Human Biology 76.1 (2004) 109-125

Genetic Analysis of a Scytho-Siberian Skeleton and Its Implications for Ancient Central Asian Migrations

François-X. Ricaut et al.

Abstract The excavation of a frozen grave on the Kizil site (dated to be 2500 years old) in the Altai Republic (Central Asia) revealed a skeleton belonging to the Scytho-Siberian population. DNA was extracted from a bone sample and analyzed by autosomal STRs (short tandem repeats) and by sequencing the hypervariable region I (HV1) of the mitochondrial DNA. The resulting STR profile, mitochondrial haplotype, and haplogroup were compared with data from modern Eurasian and northern native American populations and were found only in European populations historically influenced by ancient nomadic tribes of Central Asia.

...

The mutations at nucleotide position 16147 C→A, 16172 T→C, 16223 C→T, 16248 C→T, and 16355 C→T correspond to substitutions characteristic of the Eurasian haplogroup N1a (Richards et al. 2000). The haplotype comparison with the mtDNA sequences of 8534 individuals showed that this sequence was not found in any other population.

...

The N1a haplogroup was not observed among the native American, east Asian, Siberian, Central Asian, and western European populations. The geographic distribution of haplogroup N1a is restricted to regions neighboring the Eurasian steppe zone. Its frequency is very low, less than 1.5% (Table 6), in the populations located in the western and southwestern areas of the Eurasian steppe. Haplogroup N1a is, however, more frequent in the populations of the southeastern region of the Eurasian steppe, as in Iran (but only 12 individuals were studied) and southeastern India (Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh territories). More precisely, in India haplogroup N1a is absent from the Dravidic-speaking population and is present in only five Indo-Aryan-speaking individuals, four of whom belonged to the Havik group, an upper Brahman caste (Mountain et al. 1995).

...

The absence of the Eurasian haplogroup N1a in the 490 modern individuals of Central Asia (Shields et al. 1993; Kolman et al. 1996; Comas et al. 1998; Derenko et al. 2000; Yao et al. 2000; Yao, Nie et al. 2002) suggests changes in the genetic structure of Central Asian populations, probably as a result of Asian population movements to the west during the past 2500 years.

AAPA 2004

East of Eden, west of Cathay: An investigation of Bronze Age interactions along the Great Silk Road.

B.E. Hemphill.

The Great Silk Road has long been known as a conduit for contacts between East and West. Until recently, these interactions were believed to date no earlier than the second century B.C. However, recent discoveries in the Tarim Basin of Xinjiang (western China) suggest that initial contact may have occurred during the first half of the second millennium B.C. The site of Yanbulaq has been offered as empirical evidence for direct physical contact between Eastern and Western populations, due to architectural, agricultural, and metallurgical practices like those from the West, ceramic vessels like those from the East, and human remains identified as encompassing both Europoid and Mongoloid physical types.

Eight cranial measurements from 30 Aeneolithic, Bronze Age, Iron Age and modern samples, encompassing 1505 adults from the Russian steppe, China, Central Asia, Iran, Tibet, Nepal and the Indus Valley were compared to test whether those inhabitants of Yanbulaq identified as Europoid and Mongoloid exhibit closest phenetic affinities to Russian steppe and Chinese samples, respectively. Differences between samples were compared with Mahalanobis generalized distance (d2), and patterns of phenetic affinity were assessed with cluster analysis, multidimensional scaling, and principal coordinates analysis.

Results indicate that, despite identification as Europoid and Mongoloid, inhabitants of Yanbulaq exhibit closest affinities to one another. No one recovered from Yanbulaq exhibits affinity to Russian steppe samples. Rather, the people of Yanbulaq possess closest affinities to other Bronze Age Tarim Basin dwellers, intermediate affinities to residents of the Indus Valley, and only distant affinities to Chinese and Tibetan samples

xxxxxxxxx — Preceding unsigned comment added by Showbird13 (talk • contribs) 22:33, 28 October 2012 (UTC)

I have edited the articles about the speculation of the so-called false light hairs colors of the mummies because of the degrations, and the strange parallel with the Egyptians Mummies (probably from an afro-centrist)...today most of the hairs of these mummies have analyzed by the pharmaceutic group like L'Oreal, so no there are not from a degradation or speculation, but from serious studying, for example with Ramses:

http://www.lorealdiscovery.com/_us/_en/topic/hair/hair2.aspx?TopicCode=T_Hair_Me_Obs&ChildCode=T_Hair_Me_Obs_text2&? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Showbird13 (talk • contribs) 22:32, 28 October 2012 (UTC)

Here we go again...

(Sigh) This page is starting to look like a repeat of Elam with warring over date formats... Again we see the same bogus claims from the crowd that favors the cumbersome BCE instead of the recognizable BC, that "BCE was the original format for this article"...

Folks, that's what article histories are for. Anyone who says BCE was the "original format" either hasn't done the research into the article history, or is just plain fabricating. From September '03 (when the article was created) to April '04, the only dates that appeared anywhere in "Yuezhi" were all BC. Following that, there was a "mixed" format, as someone added some BCE dates later on without changing the original. Since then there have been several flips back to the original BC format, lasting anywhere from an hour to two months before getting flopped back to BCE. You might come up with all kinds of interesting arguments for why you think BCE looks prettier, or is more "politically incorrect" than plain old BC, or whatever. But "We were here first" ain't one of them. Codex Sinaiticus 13:33, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

sigh indeed. I thought we were meant to be writing an international encyclopaedia for an international audience - most of whom are not already experts in what they are looking up. We really should adapt our language to suit that audience - and not just in choosing BC over BCE. Everytime someone voices the "let's go with the original editor" argument, it means they again are not thinking "how do we best convey this to our audience", and that's true regardless of whether they correctly identify what the original form was or not. In this case, from what Codex writes, at least they appear to have shot themselves firmly in the foot for this article and we can go back to the original (and globally understood) format, jguk 14:36, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

Please look at the history indeed. This page was a meaningless stub until it went through a complete rewrite by Nat Krause in April 26th 2004, which became the basis to today's article. The rewrite was done in BCE/CE. Most contributions have accordingly been done in BCE/CE ever since. There is little point in arguing for an BC/AD standard now. As you know, many people agree that BCE/CE is the international standard for historical publications (this varies with countries, but very much so in the US), and hopefully Wikipedia history articles ought to be aiming at historical publication status. PHG 21:20, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

Wow... take out this BCE crap, now! I had no idea what this article was talking about until I read this page. I've never even heard of these terms before. I'm no Christian, but really don't like these PC revisionist nazis. (Why didn't they just come up for new words for B.C. and A.D. to stand for?) Evan1975 01:20, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Because that would be too easy. The whole argument for BCE/CE vs BC/AD is ridiculous anyway. BC/AD was around first, for a great many years, and it's the format that most anybody will be familiar with now and for many decades to come. I'm not exactly an ardent Christian, but from what I can tell the BCE/CE idea was conceived and forced onto us by the usual small-but-very-vocal group of God-killing "progressive" troublemakers. This is my two cents. Myrddin_Wyllt7 (talk) 02:38, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Use of the "Common Era"

Hi! Well, here is my personal spin on the old argument about whether to use the so-called "Christian Era" or the more neutrally-charged Common Era - please see the article on the subject before you set about changing things. It was not forced on people by "the usual small-but-very-vocal group of God-killing "progressive" troublemakers". Quite the reverse, in fact is the case. the use of the so-called "Christian Era" has been forced on non-Christians.

Why should anyone who is not a Christian be made to use an era in which dates are referred to as BC = "before Christ" and AD = Anno domini = "Year of our Lord"? Here are several reasons I prefer the use of BCE and CE:

1. It does not seem seem appropriate to use a Christian-based era to date events in a country which is almost totally non-Christian. This is rather similar to dating events in, for example, Roman history in the Hegira era - 622 CE (or AD) marking the first year of the Islamic calendar, or 1 AH (anno higirae)]. It would be surprising to me if Christian Italians (and probably other Christian groups) did not complain if someone started doing this.

2. Several Muslim, Jewish and Chinese scholars have complained to me about the use of the "Christian Era" for dating, and preferred the use of the "Common Era". some of them have suggested to me that I use it in my writings, especially as it has now become pretty standard in academic literature.

3. The use of the "Christian Era" was introduced around the world by European imperial powers who made a point of ignoring local eras (such as the Saka Era in India or the Hejira Era in Muslim countries) and substituting their own era and system of dating on their colonies and in the scientific and historical literature.

4. The so-called "Christian Era" is misleading anyway as almost all scholars - including Christian ones - now agree that it is most unlikely that Jesus was born in 1 AD. But, because the "Common Era" has been decided to start in 1 AD, and this is just a convenient decision, it does not imply any particlar accuracy in relation to historical events and does not carry with it religious or imperialistic overtones.

I hope that explains my decision. I don't, myself, feel very strongly about the use of one over the other (and it is very easy to get used to both - as they are so similar), but I do think it best not to unnecessarily annoy people of other cultures and faiths. Cheers, John Hill (talk) 07:37, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

I'll probably regret weighing into this, but: BCE/CE is just BC/AD with the serial numbers filed off. It's basically the same thing, and just as much (in my opinion "not at all") "cultural imperialism" to use it for non-European events. It is however, universally understood (I don't see anyone advocating that all articles should be dated according to the traditional local calender), and I don't know of any universal, non-cultural calender that could be used instead (apart from perhaps Before Present, but that would cause all sorts of other problems). If the Chinese, Arabic, and Hebrew wikipedias want to use their own calanders, then that's fine, but I don't see anything wrong with the English wikipedia using the traditional English dating system. Wardog (talk) 12:21, 8 November 2012 (UTC) (Atheist, born in the Year of Our Lord 1979, in the month of Janus, on Woden's Day).

Edits by 202.156.6.54

Various doubtfull edits have been made recently by User talk:202.156.6.54. Incidentally, this IP has been blocked for vandalism several times in the past. Also, actually registering as a contributor, and discuss changes on the Talk Page first would lend credibility ot the edits. Some of the issues with these edits:

Place of origin of the Yuezhi

User talk:202.156.6.54 insists on Gansu as the place of origin of the Yuezhi, to the exclusion of any other place, speciafically the Tarim Basin. The Gansu area is actually very extensive, and the only part where Yuezhi presence might be considered would be at the maximum northwestern Gansu. Furthermore, scholars generally consider the Eastern Tarim Basin as the place of origin of the Yuezhi:

"At various times subservient to the Xiongnu were two other important nomadic peoples, the Wusun and the Yuezhi... the latter were originally presented as masters of the eastern borderlands of the Tarim Basin, and then , when they were driven farther and farther west by the Xiongnu, they created one of the most dynamic empires of the ancient world, that of the Kushans" (The Tarim Mummies, Mallory and Mair ISBN 0500051011

It is therefore probably inexact to deny the Tarim and only favour Gansu. Both areas should probably be quoted.

Other issues

• "The supply of jade from the Tarim Basin from ancient times is indeed well documented archeologically: " changed to "The supply of jade from the Tarim Basin from ancient times is also well excavated: ". I am afraid the latter expression is not proper.
• "the interpretation of Qilian into Heavenly Mountain as a dwelling location is a much recent academic concept, still most believe that its referred to Qilian as state in ancient sources)": this would have to be referenced.
• "however it is unclear that the pre-migration of nomadic Yuezhi could have share such features, since they could represent an image of Greek or Bactrian (such as the cases for Kushans)": this is would have to be sourced, and is generally contrary to numismatic analysis of the subject. The reference to the image of the Kushans being that of Bactrians or Greeks is plain wrong, and at least would have to be referenced.
• "the Yuezhi organized the Greco-Bactrian into five major tribes": unheard of and contrary to sources.
• "Bust of a Yuezhi chief with Greek royal headband." changed to "Bust of Greek royal headband", whatever that means

I am afraid none of these edits cannot be taken seriously and anyway reflect poor schorlarship. Thanks to User talk:202.156.6.54 to register himself, be more cautious in his edits, and use Talk Pages to express disagreements. PHG 11:51, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Since when did I exclusion other place, places such as Qinghai should be considered it too, why should we included just Tarim Basin? Below, do you have any sources that provide Yuezhi did dwell in Tarim Basin or as a center? If not I don't see any reasons that you could rv my edits, beacuse it is clear from Shiji and other references that, Yuezhi live from Qilian (South of Gansu, portion of Qinghai) to/and Dunhuang (maximum northwestern Gansu). Furthremore, the Yuezhi and Kushan should be separated, since they're not related to each other by genealogical, it is clear of that by stuides from mainland China, no records for the name of Yuezhi ruler are shown from any documentation, how could we suppose those coins referred to the Yuezhi ruler? It is at best considered as Presumed Yuezhi rulers, not historial thing. Eiorgiomugini

• Hi Eiorgiomugini.
• I am fine with Gansu (as already stated in the article), but Tarim Basin is also valid (Dunhuang is also part of the Tarim Basin), so Tarim Basin/ Gansu, and yes /Qilian is a valid description, not just Gansu exclusively as you've been editing. The original text properly reflects these multiple locations (although you may want to add Qilian indeed).
• The barbarized coins of Heliocles are usually considered as Yuezhi imitations. Sapadbizes is usually considered Yuezhi, and Heraios calls himself the Tyran of the Kushans on his coins, making him a Yuezhi (as the Kushans were a part of the Yuezhi as described by the Shiji), with facial featured similar to those of the Sapadbizes.
• Please Eiorgiomugini, no offense intended, but you have big problems with Engligh syntax and grammar (one example among many others: "A imitative, in crude style coins of a Greco-Bactrian king Heliocles" ???). You should maybe refrain from major edits and modifications on the English Wikipedia until you have solved that point.PHG 09:32, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• I am fine with Gansu (as already stated in the article), but Tarim Basin is also valid (Dunhuang is also part of the Tarim Basin), so Tarim Basin/ Gansu, and yes /Qilian is a valid description, not just Gansu exclusively as you've been editing. The original text properly reflects these multiple locations (although you may want to add Qilian indeed). : I just don't get it, why should we included just Tarim Basin? If we are to insists Tarim Basin as the place of origin or center for Yuezhi, and to exclude of any other place, speciafically Gansu, perhaps places such as Qinghai should under consideration too. The Tarim Basin area is actually very extensive, and the only part where Yuezhi presence might considered would be at the maximum eastern portion, which is the part that Tarim River don't runs through.
• The barbarized coins of Heliocles are usually considered as Yuezhi imitations. Sapadbizes is usually considered Yuezhi, and Heraios calls himself the Tyran of the Kushans on his coins, making him a Yuezhi (as the Kushans were a part of the Yuezhi as described by the Shiji), with facial featured similar to those of the Sapadbizes. : Like I said, the Kushan are not necessary to be Greeks or Bactrian, but definitely not Yuezhi, what makes ones so sure that they're Yuezhi, as Heraios calls himself the Tyran of the Kushans not Yuezhi. Eiorgiomugini

1. I am afraid I cannot be clearer: the original article said Tarim Basin and Gansu, so let's keep it this way.PHG 13:37, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
2. The Kushans are usually considered one of the five tribes among the larger tribe of the Yuezhi (all sources I know of). Heraios was the head of the Kushans, and therefore part of the Yuezhi confederation. I don't know what more I can say. PHG 13:37, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

1. No, its only the opening part of the original article said that way, there is a following part did not, its simply stated Tarim Basin.
2. Oh, sorry I was talking about its genealogical, of course Kushans was part of the Yuezhi confederation, silly. Eiorgiomugini

1. Great, so let's write Tarim Basin/Gansu area as a general rule. PHG 21:47, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
2. Cool. So I suppose that you mean that the Yueshi and the Kushan were not genetically related. It's worth a mention, but only if referenced. It's clearly not an obvious and undisputed fact.PHG 21:47, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Issues Provided

• "the interpretation of Qilian into Heavenly Mountain as a dwelling location is a much recent academic concept, still most believe that its referred to Qilian as state in ancient sources)": There's a lot of references, but I'm afaid you can't read it, its in Chinese, do you want a link?.
• "however it is unclear that the pre-migration of nomadic Yuezhi could have share such features, since they could represent an image of Greek or Bactrian (such as the cases for Kushans)": No records for the name of Yuezhi ruler are shown from any documentation, how could we suppose those coins referred to the Yuezhi ruler? It is at best considered as Presumed Yuezhi rulers.
• "the Yuezhi organized the Greco-Bactrian into five major tribes": It is state on Shiji 123 at the part of Ta-Hsia, which provide the information that Kushan wasn't genealogical related to Yuezhi, most Chinese scholars would agreed with that, the Kushan are not necessary to be Greeks or Bactrian, but definitely not Yuezhi. Eiorgiomugini

• Thank you to provide the Chinese link. Any printed scholarly references as well? As you seem to infer, most recent analysis suggests Tian Shan... so why not refer to it preferencially?PHG
• Answered above. For the Kushans, nobody think they depiction on coins is that of Bactrians or Greeks (just see Kanishka and all the other rulers). Your claim is unsustainable. I would love to see references on that PHG 09:42, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Please quote the Shiji on "the information that Kushan wasn't genealogical related to Yuezhi". I am not aware of such a claim. As far as I know, the Chinese kept calling the Kushans "Yuezhi" until the 4th century CE.PHG 09:42, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Thank you to provide the Chinese link. Any printed scholarly references as well? As you seem to infer, most recent analysis suggests Tian Shan... so why not refer to it preferencially? : Here is the link for recent analysis of scholarly references which suggests that the Qilian of Yuezhi could be Tian Shan not Qilian [1] from CASS, by Wang Jian. What I suggests is that, to provide an alternative view on the edits, which is a better comprehend for the others and to you.
• Answered above. For the Kushans, nobody think they depiction on coins is that of Bactrians or Greeks (just see Kanishka and all the other rulers). Your claim is unsustainable. I would love to see references on that : Well, I was talking about the Yuezhi, not Kushan, the facts is the earliest references for the name of Yuezhi (Kushan) ruler was Kujula Kadphises (given name: Qiujiu Que), but since Sapadbizes was the earliest Yuezhi ruler, why wasn't he was mentioned on the lists? How could we suppose to know that he was a Yuezhi instead of one of the yabgu? A better suggestion in the edits is that, a consideration for the name of Presumed Yuezhi ruler.
• Please quote the Shiji on "the information that Kushan wasn't genealogical related to Yuezhi". I am not aware of such a claim. As far as I know, the Chinese kept calling the Kushans "Yuezhi" until the 4th century CE. : A recent analysis (by Xu Wenming) shows that the Kushan could be in fact de facto a tribe from the population of Ta-Hsia, and hence Kushan wasn't genealogical related to Yuezhi, Kushan = Yuezhi is just a nominal term [2], as for the primary source please take a look at Hanshu, 96. Eiorgiomugini

Thanks for the discussion.

1. I do not quite understand your point. If indeed Qilian is Tian Shan, than we are talking about the Tarim Basin, not Gansu. Why write exclusively in the article that the Yuezhi originated from Gansu? I think you should leave the first version as it was.PHG
2. I am not trying to prove anything on Sapadbizes, as it is not the object of Wikipedia. I am only relaying general scholarship and numismatic research according to which Sapadbizes is considered as a Yuezhi. I indeed wouldn't mind with a "presumed Yuechi ruler", if you insist.PHG 13:31, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
3. I had never heard of Xu Wenming, but for him to write "迦腻色伽一世（公元前58年-前31年" (about 200 years off the mark) is quite incredible as far as Western scholarship is concerned. Is he published? Does he have some reputation in Historical research? I would conversely doubt the statement that the Kushans were actually Bactrian, although it would deserve mention as an alternative view if indeed Xu Wenming can be used as a scholarly reference (although that would be a very, very marginal position). Please kindly quote Hanshu, 96 if it is material to this discussion, as I do not have access to it. PHG 13:31, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I would suggest you restore the articles as they were and only modify point 2. above if you wish. For the rest, I am afraid these edits cannot stay.PHG 13:31, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

1. No, you missed the point, if indeed Qilian is Tian Shan, it is still a recent analysis suggests, which is why to provide an alternative view on the edits is necessarily, since Shiji never mentioned anything with regard to Tian Shan or Tarim Basin.
2. Sure.
3. He is a Prof. from Beijing Shifan Daxue [3], it is published in 1999 Dec, he did have a historical research on reputation. I seriously doubt that you even read the paper, he never claimed that Kaniska I reigned from 58-31, since he wrote: 迦腻色伽王一世（Kanishka）即位之年定为公元78年，有人定为128年，还有人定为144年等等，但这些说法都与中文史料特别是佛教中的记载相左。羽溪了谛在《大月氏之佛教》中将迦王一世定在丘就却之前，以之为公元前58年的毗讫罗摩（Vikrama）纪元的创立者，或近其实，但这一说法还缺乏比较充分的根据，尚须进一步的论证. And he never mentioned anything that the Kushan were actually Bactrian, but possibility Saka. "Please kindly quote Hanshu, 96", I don't have to, since the quote is already on the link I provided.

I don't see the reasons that these edits cannot be stay, maybe you should had explained with regarding your points. Eiorgiomugini

1. As far as I'm concerned the analysis that Qilian is Tian Shian is quite widespread. A mention of "or possibly Qilian" in the article for the original ground of the Yuezhi would be OK.PHG 21:59, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
3. Thanks for the heads up on Chinese (I read Japanese but my Chinese is only superficial). So the dates are OK. Yes indeed the Kushans may have been Sakas (so far you only mentionned Greeks and Bactrians). That's a totally different claim. Could you kindly quote the part of the Hanshu 96 which you are refering to, and explain what it says exactly? Thank you PHG 21:59, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

1. No, you are quoting from Shiji, which is not the case for you to input Tian Shan, to provide an alternative view on the edits is necessarily, since Shiji never mentioned anything with regard to Tian Shan or Tarim Basin.
2. I had lost my interests, I would simply quote from my reference OF PRIMARY SOURCE (unless you are blind from the words), its said the Yuezhi divided the country into five yabgus: 月氏为匈奴所灭，遂迁于大夏，分其国为休密、双靡、贵霜、肸顿、都密，凡五部翕候。后百余岁，贵霜翕候丘就却攻灭四翕候，自立为王，国号贵霜王. Eiorgiomugini

1. Your point is unclear. Tian Shan is a modern analysis, which deserves mention as the result of scholarly work.PHG 02:52, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
2. Thanks for the original quote, which I integrated in the article. As far as I can see nothing is said about the Kushans being "Bactrian, Greek" or even Saka, so I guess your Hanshu reference is pointless on this specific matter. PHG 02:52, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

1. No, my point is clear and straight. I never state that Tian Shan doesn't deserves to be mention. I talking about an alternative view on the edits. But since you had provided an alternative view on the edits, its fine then.
2. And did you see anything with regard of Kushan being Yuezhi (genealogical)? The fact that Kushan was a selected yabgus from the population of Ta-Hsia, and is clear that population of Ta-Hsia at that time was about 1millon or more, which is an outnumbering number for a newcomer like Yuezhi, Kushan = Yuezhi is just a nominal term Eiorgiomugini

2. Where do you get that "Kushan was a selected yabgus from the population of Ta-Hsia"??? PHG 05:44, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

2. And where do you get that Kushan being Yuezhi (genealogical)? You should have answered my question first. Eiorgiomugini

2. Generally the Kushans are considered as just one tribe of the Yuezhi (as described by the Hanshu), and therefore assumed to be "genealogically" connected. It is only an alternative, rather marginal, view that they may have been Saka instead, and is not directly supported by any primary source I know of (but I respect it as an opinion). Thanks to answer my question next. Regards. PHG 06:12, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

2. Ok, since the Kushan genealogically (either Yuezhi or Ta-Hsia) was not directly supported by any primary source, one could also assumed the Kushan are not genealogically connected with Yuezhi, its nothing wrong then. Eiorgiomugini

2. So after all your claim that "Kushan was a selected yabgus from the population of Ta-Hsia" is totally unfounded? Please abstain from such claims if unreferenced. On the contrary, the prevailing scholarly opinion is that the Kushans were just one of the tribes of the Yuezhi: it is the general analysis of historians based on the most straightforward reading of the Hanshu and ulterior history, although another theory is that they were Sakas. Please do not remake history through your own Original research: you should be able to reference (either through Primary or Secondary sources) statements made on Wikipedia. Regards PHG 07:29, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

2. It is not totally unfounded, but a reference from the link which I provide earlier. Indeed, thanks for noticing that, there is still some mistakes on your edits though, for example: "The Yuezhi were organized into five major tribes, each led by a yabgu, or tribal chief, and known to the Chinese as Xiūmì ...". Hanshu state that the Yuezhi "divided the country into five yabgu", it doesn't seem to reflects anything else with regard of the organization of five major tribes, since "Kushan" appeared only after Yuezhi settled down at Ta-Hsia, and prior to that there's no such tribe or division called "Kushan" (Guishuang) "月氏为匈奴所灭，遂迁于大夏，分其国为休密、双靡、贵霜、肹顿、都密，凡五部翕侯。" Another part: "although the states from Dayuan west to Anxi (Parthia), speak rather different languages, their customs are generally similar and their languages mutually intelligible. The men have deep-set eyes and profuse beards and whiskers." A straightforward reading from Shiji, would be "west of Dayuan to Anxi" "自大宛以西至安息，国虽颇异言，然大同俗，相知言。其人皆深眼，多须珣，善市贾，争分铢。" in this case. Eiorgiomugini

Most of article is unsourced

According to WP:ATT unsourced material may be removed by any editor. The burden in on the editor inserting the material to provide references. It would greatly improve the credibility of this article if it were properly sourced. As it is the article seems quite messy and hard to read. Sincerely, Mattisse 13:34, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

The addition of marks virtually everywhere throughout the article seems rather exagerated (vandalism?). I would recommend such symbols to be introduced with moderation at the really critical parts of the article needing reference. PHG 18:56, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Footnotes for approved ways of footnoting articles. Also, see Bart King, today's Feature Article as an example, although the subject is a sports figure so there are fewer areas where verification is required. Examples of a well documented historical articles are Hoysala architecture and History of Poland (1945–1989). It would benefit the article if the footnotes were more comprehensive and the format improved. Jimbo added a POV tag on an article recently because of a sentence that he disagreed with in the intro that was not sourced. As you probably know, Wikipedia has become much more strict on the issue of correct sourcing. Sincerely, Mattisse 17:02, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

"related groups" info removed from infobox

For dedicated editors of this page: The "Related Groups" info was removed from all {{Infobox Ethnic group}} infoboxes. Comments may be left on the Ethnic groups talk page. Ling.Nut 17:11, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Yuehzhi

You said your addition were referenced, where's the quote? Eiorgiomugini 00:53, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Dear Eiorgiomugini, please discuss the pertaining contents of the article in the Talk page of the article, for the benefit of other participating editors of the article. To your question: quotation marks are inappropriate if the citation is not a verbatum quotation, but a rendering of the facts and ideas expressed by the quoted author. I can provide you, or anybody interested, with the original phrasing, from the referenced work by Zuev, on the pages 6 of his work, with all my pleasure. I will also address any other criticisms you may want to express. Barefact 01:09, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Glad to be of help, Google is great, and last time I checked it, it also had "Yuechji". The inclusive article should show the terminology pertaining to the subject, not exclude it. Same would apply to Dasya, and if you have comments on how to improve the rendition of ancient Chinese phonetics, I can only be greatful for that.

The citation is from a scientific work of Prof. Zuev, and citation is referenced, thus conforming to the WP rules. Zuev (not only him, it is a subject of many studies) clearly states that migrating Yueji split into two parts, and a part of them remained in Central Asia and was traced there for centuries. One branch of them is listed jointly with the Kidan (Khitan) tribes, the other with the Oguz (Oghuz), etc. I hope this is helpful Barefact 19:41, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Romanisations

Dear Barefact and Eiorgiomugini: As far as I can see, there is no need for an argument here at all. The quotes from Zuev contain Chinese words in a Russian system of transcription. There have been at least 16 different systems of transcriptions from Chinese into European languages that I am aware of. That was one of the main reasons why the Chinese, soon after the Communist takeover, tried to standardise the transcriptions with a new one known as Pinyin. This is the system the English Wikipedia now tries to make standard - although the Wade-Giles system (commonly in use in the English-speaking world until recently - and still in use in Taiwan, (actually it is less and less used there now) and quite similar to the defunct French EFEO system), is still acceptable.

However, I believe it is a good idea for the sake of clarity when translating passages into English for the Wikipedia to convert other systems of transcriptions of Chinese words into Pinyin.

None of these systems of transcriptions into Roman script are very accurate and none of them are much use at all in trying to understand ancient pronunciations.

There have been several attempts by eminent scholars (especially Karlgen and Pulleyblank) to recreate the sounds of ancient - mainly by comparing lists of ancient rhymes or checking what Chinese characters ancient scholars used to try to represent foreign sounds with (especially in the translations of Buddhist works from other languages).

However, none of the attempts to go back much before the Tang period can be considered very reliable (although they still can give valuable clues when trying to recreate the derivation of ancient foreign names). In all these cases of reconstructed ancient sounds it is probably easiest to use the symbols of the authority you are quoting from or symbols from the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).

I hope this answers some of the valid concerns each of you seem to have. If I can help with any other related issues please let me know. Best wishes to you both, John Hill 07:45, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Dear John Hill and Eiorgiomugini: Sorry for a very slow response. I agree with objective of consistent language and a WP convention of using Pinyin for transcribing Chinese characters, and at the same time there is a need to communicate with the rest of the English-speaking world which uses differing spellings and, especially young people searching for references may know other terms and not know the WP convention. While Pinyin may be used in the title and body of the article, [4] suggests that the first sentence contain equivalent names, it is a legitimate way to include alternate names. Following the principle of inclusion, rather than exclusion, and adding equivalent names is consistent with the Pinyin convention and uniform language of the article. A reasonable and simple method to evaluate the use of a term is to google it. Inclusion would also bring the article to the attention of those who google for references. I hope we can reach a consensus on inclusion of alternate terms, in a WP spirit. Thanks, Barefact (talk) 08:50, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 20:30, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Place of origin of the Yuezhi

Dear editors, the following is a quotation from Yu.Zuev's (2002) "Early Türks: Outline of history and ideology", ISBN 9985-441-52-9, p.13. In the introductory section, that recounts what is well established, it reads:

Prior to the end of the 3rd century BC, the dominating force in the eastern part of Eurasia was the "state" confederation of nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes dominated by Uechji (Pinyin Yuezhi‎) tribe . The borders of this confederation can be outlined only conditionally. From the vague records of the later time, its southeast limits were at the left bank of the river Huang He from the headwaters before the northern bend to the south. The border further went to the north, covering western and eastern slopes of the Great Khingan. At the northern extremity it turned to the west, from Northern Mongolia and Southern Baikal area to the Sayano-Altai mountains. It included tribes of different origin, various languages and anthropological shape, and a non-uniform cultural and economic condition. The native territories of the Uechji were lands from the Nan Shans mountains in the south to the Altai in the north.

The memory of Uechjies (Pinyin Yuezhi‎) in the Altai survived as a group of Pazyryk kurgans with fabulous funeral inventory, which remains for decades a research subject for different scientific specialties. Chronologically, the first of them are dated by the 5th century BC (A Yu. Alekseev et al. C14 dating testifies to much earlier period - Translator's Note). The arrival of Uechjies in this region, according to linguists, belongs to the period not later than 7th-6th centuries BC. Other scientists, deeming them Tochars and from the archaism of the many elements in the monument language of the Tocharian writings (end the 1st millennium AD) in the Eastern Turkestan, are inclined to date the beginning of their movement from the Asia Minor to the east by the 2nd millennium BC. The presence of Tochars explains the sharp change in quality in the art of Bronze Epoch, and introduction of wheeled transport in China during the In epoch (13th-11th centuries BC). The presence of Tochars also explains the arrival in China of a foreign goddess cult "Mother-queen of the West" (Ch. Si-van-mu), who lived on the top of the Kuenlun mountains.

Anthropologically (Fig. 1), the Pazyrian Uechjies were a mix of predominantly Europoids with a minority of Central Asian Mongoloids. The Sünnu (Huns) tribes, thought of as Mongoloid racial type, started to consolidate and threaten the borders of China, being in political dependence from Uechji. How this dependence was expressed is not known. The annals only inform about a system of hostages from the dependent tribes at the horde of the Uechji ruler. Such hostage was Maodun, a son of the first Sünnu tribal ruler Touman."

Before I start inserting bits and pieces, I would like to hear your opinions. Thanks, Barefact (talk) 20:23, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Name

As far as I am aware the characters 月 and 肉 are not interchangeable as parts of pictograms or anything else for that matter. The reference used for the source, i.e. the Chinese Wikipedia article 月氏, does not support the assertion made - the section is titled 月氏的“月”字读音问题 which means "Pronunciation of the character "月" Issue" and discusses how different dictionaries treat the pronunciation in this context not the characters themselves. Philg88 (talk) 09:07, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

"Tok Ar" theory needs better sources

The article currently contains a claim that Yuezhi was pronounced something like "Tok Ar" (I am not familiar with the notation but presume this is an approximation) and identified with the Tocharians, and elsewhere some rather jarring notes about how "Yuezhi/Rouzhi" is not how the name was pronounced in ancient times. I would say the claim requires better sources because:

1. The only source for the "Tok Ar" pronunciation is via a footnote and appendix in one source
2. The claim seems novel. While claiming that "Yuezhi" is a mispronunciation of "Roushi" or vice versa seems at least plausible, "Tok Ar" seems to vary hugely from either of the recorded pronunciations.
3. The link to Tocharians suggests, to me, that this "Tok Ar" reconstruction is a post facto rationalisation derived from that identification.
4. There are additional prima facie difficulties with the theory. Apart from the most common characters 月氏, the subject has also been identified as 禺氐, 禺知, 禺氏, all of which are pronounced somewhat similarly to Yuezhi, but nothing like Tok Ar. The "Tok Ar" theory would require not one but two common Chinese characters to have changed their ponunciations in completely alien ways.

If the "Tok Ar" theory is only a hypothesis and not a widely accepted position, then it should be presented as such, and not as fact (which is how it is currently presented).

Perhaps the editor who originally added the reference could elucidate. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 15:03, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

It's a proposal by Christopher Beckwith, which I hope is clear now. Kanguole 13:17, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

internal inconsistency

"were an ancient Indo-European people. They are believed by most scholars to have been an Indo-European people[6]" Does Roux list the scholars that support this viewpoint? If not, it's weasel wording. 71.163.114.49 (talk) 13:03, 4 November 2012 (UTC)

Hi, I agree. Most scholars excludes Chinese scholars. This unreliable source should be removed.QN35max (talk) 18:00, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Head of a Yuezhi warrior

Copyright might be a problem, but I think we should try to replace the drawing of the "Head of a Yuezhi warrior" with an original photograph. It seems to be based on the sculpture shown here (black and white) and here (colour, 6th image down). Neither show the blue eyes in the drawing. (The linked text here says some of the statues had blue eyes, but that particular one doesn't appear to, so showing it as such is misleading). Iapetus (talk) 15:04, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

I tend to agree both that it should be replaced, and that finding a replacement we can use will be hard. A further problem is that we don't seem to have a well-sourced description for this object. Kanguole 13:15, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

Source

Migration and Settlement of the Yuezhi-Kushan: Interaction and Interdependence of Nomadic and Sedentary Societies Xinru Liu Journal of World History Vol. 12, No. 2 (Fall, 2001), pp. 261-292 Published by: University of Hawai'i Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20078910 Page Count: 32

Rajmaan (talk) 22:40, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

Connection to European Huns

I saw on the talk page this identification of Pulleyblank supported by Yury Zuev :

The Utigurs of Menandr are Uti, and the word Uti was a real proto-type of a transcription Yuezhi < Uechji < ngiwat- tie < uti

the Utigurs were tribe of European Huns. Is this possible? Someone to share some information? Crusador2000 (talk) 08:54, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

Massagetae Thyssagetae

There seems to be an edit war here between two members over the identification of the Da Yuezhi and Xiao Yuezhi as the Massagetae and Thyssagetae by a seeming minority of scholars. This article, and every Wiki article for that matter, must take into account scholarly consensus on historical issues, meaning that the rules outlined in Wikipedia:Reliable sources and undue weight should be applied. I haven't read enough material about Yuezhi origins to confirm what the consensus is now, but the amount of scholars seems to be at least a sizeable minority: James P. Mallory, Victor H. Mair, Alexander Cunningham, and Edgar Knobloch. Although this may seem like a great many scholars, they might actually represent a fringe of the scholarly community and NOT the consensus. That's why I would urge people to consult major academic works on the subject of their origins, like the various Cambridge University history series (which are highly reputable and almost always reliable). For instance, The Cambridge Ancient History, The Cambridge History of Iran, and The Cambridge History of China. Unfortunately I don't have the time to check all of this material, but I hope this section serves as a starting point for discussion and edit-war resolution. The views of Mallory and others could be included, but perhaps the details should be trimmed to a couple sentences explaining this theory, since it doesn't seem to be a widely accepted one. Pericles of Athens^Talk 20:30, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

The material seems to be based entirely on the Sino-Platonic Papers article by Jhutti. The identification of the Greater Yuezhi with the Massagetae has been proposed by Cunningham, Knobloch and Mallory&Mair. (But note that the y- initial is a recent change; it was ng- in Middle Chinese and presumably earlier.) The identification of the Lesser Yuezhi (last seen on the border of Gansu and Tibet) and the Thyssagetae (in the southern Urals) is only proposed by Dahiya (and supported by Jhutti), apparently on the sole basis that the Yuezhi and Getae are both described as having greater and lesser divisions. I'd say that the latter proposal has insufficient weight to be mentioned here, but the Massagetae bit belongs with the Bactria period. Kanguole 22:49, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

I will argue that Massagetae are the same people as Yuezhi and the equation Massagetae = Da Yuezhi should be included in the article. The other equation Thyssagetae = Xiao Yuezhi should be put on hold for the time being because of the lack of recent academic sources to support it. First I will discuss the phonetic evidence - the paper by Jhutti is not the only source. But even if it was, the information that it provides is sufficient because Jhutti has made academic review on the subject. The equation Massagetae = Da Yuezhi is supported also by other scholars as Tod, Tolstov (page 22), Klaproth(page 23)[5] More recently James P. Mallory and Victor H. Mair wrote in their book "The Tarim Mummies"(which is not free for reading) on pages 98-99 we have :

"Da (Greater) Yuezhi, or in the earlier pronunciation d’ad-ngiwat-tieg, has been seen to equate with the Massagetae who occupied the oases and steppe lands of West Central Asia in the time of Herodotus; here Massa renders an Iranian word for “Great,” hence “Great Getae." [6]

Obviously Yury Zuev also supported this identification but his work is uploaded on a website which is on WP blacklist. Anyway, type in google "ZUEV THE STRONGEST TRIBE" and you will get it. On page 33 we have :

"...Massagets of the earliest ancient authors. They are the Yuezhis of the Chinese sources (Krukov, 1998, p. 235),..."

so, here we have 2 more scholars to support the eqn Massagetae = Da Yuezhi ( Zuev himself and Krukov) I think this is enough to justify it. We have 10 academic scholars (Mallory, Mair, Cunningham, Knobloch, Zuev, Dahiya, Tolstov, Klaproth, Krukov and Jhutti himself) - they are from different countries and they worked at different time periods. This hardly can be put as academic minority. If you can find some other theory about the origin of the Yuezhi, supported by 10 scholars, I would like to hear it.

Also the phonetic argument can be supported further by archaeological argument and genetic argument. First I will discuss the archaeological argument - it is related to the artificial cranial deformation practiced by the Yuezhi. Unfortunately, again the paper "Cranial vault modification as a cultural artifact" (C. Torres-Rouff, L.T. Yablonsky, May 2005) is not free for reading [7] but free excerpt can be found on the net.(Type in google Yablonsky, Cranial vault modification as a cultural artifact). In a nutshell the point is :

1. artificial cranial deformation in Central Asia(Kazakhstan) is from from the early Iron Age, Yablonsky discusses it in details how cranial vault modification became common among the nomads in Central Asia between 800-500 BC. Indeed he does not relate it to Massagetae, but the cemeteries that he discusses are exactly where Massagetae lived(for example Southern Tagisken cemetery on the shore of Aral Sea). From about 500 BC artificial cranial deformation disappeared from Kazakhstan.

2. Yuezhi appeared in the Chinese chronicles between the 5-3 centuries BC, and they practiced artificial cranial deformation. See for example Kim, page 33, [8]

3. According to Yablonsky the artificial cranial deformation reappeared in Kazakhstan in the 1st century BC : " Circular modification reappeared in Central Asia in the last century BC..." [9]

Yablonsky avoids any discussion who were these nomads as an ethnic group, but we do know that Kushans/Yuezhi practiced exactly circular type of cranial deformation ([10], circular = annular) and that they were the people who moved from Tarim basin to Kazakhstan. I think that the argument is very clear: artificial cranial deformation parallels the movements of the Yuezhi-Massagetae back-and-forth between Kazakhstan and China.

Probably I will be accused of original research, so this information cannot be put on the article, but it gives further strength to the identification Yuezhi=Massagetae. After all the main purpose of any Encyclopedia is to inform people what exactly happened as historical truth, and the readers don't care if the truth is supported by 12 or 18 scholars.

In addition there is similar genetic argument: someone has transmitted the haplogroups R1a, R1b and J2 between Eastern Europe-Bactria-Tarim Basin back-and-forth. Considering the equation Getae->Massagetae->Yuezhi, it is not difficult to guess who were these people.Sabir Hun (talk) 13:54, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

Indeed the cranial and genetic arguments would be disqualified as original research.

Looking at the Mallory&Mair quote in context, it is clear that they are not endorsing the equation with the Massagetae, but rather listing all the different proposed identifications based on similarity of names in different languages to make a point about the unreliability of that method. Early speculation based on even less knowledge of ancient languages than we have now, e.g. Cunningham, Tod and Klaproth, would not be considered reliable today. The truth is many have speculated, but no-one knows.

Probably the best we can do is list all the peoples they've been linked with, as Mallory&Mair do. Kanguole 00:50, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Having spent many years studying and writing about the Yuezhi, I totally agree with Kangole's comments. The origins of the Yuezhi are still hotly debated between experts. Sincerely, John Hill (talk) 05:08, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

I've been searching a couple of days all free sources on the net and I couldn't find anything specific about some other people that may be linked to the Yuezhi. Except one paper by some Dutch guy who consider Yuezhi (without bothering to prove it) to be of Mongol stock. And I found another book stating that Yuezhi=Massagetae :

The Huns, Rome and the Birth of Europe By Hyun Jin Kim, p. 201 [11]

My opinion is that the connection Massagetae->Yuezhi should be added to the article with some note of warning to the readers that it is not accepted by all scientists. Sabir Hun (talk) 00:46, 13 November 2016 (UTC)

I think it would be fine to add a note on the possible connection - but I think the warning should be firmer - such as: "but only a few, if any, historians still accept this theory." Cheers, John Hill (talk) 02:43, 13 November 2016 (UTC)

The trouble is that there are many theories of which that is true, so it seems undue to single out this one. It's probably best just to list them. Kanguole 03:08, 13 November 2016 (UTC)

ok, but can you tell us what are these other theories about the origin of Yuezhi? I don't mind to list them all, the problem is that I couldn't find any.Sabir Hun (talk) 03:25, 13 November 2016 (UTC)

The Mallory & Mair passage you cited (pp98–99) lists Massagetae, Iatioi, Goths, Getae, Guti, Kushans, Gushi and Kucheans, and suggests that the list isn't exhaustive. They also give no suggestion that a link to the Massagetae is more likely than any of the others. Kanguole 01:37, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

I think that the passage is quite clear:

Da (Greater) Yuezhi or in the earlier pronunciation d'ad-ngiwat-tieg, has been seen to equate with the Massagetae who occupied the oases and steppelands of West Central Asia in the time of Herodotus; here Massa renders an Iranian word for "Great," hence "Great Getae." ...Others have seen in this word an attempt to capture in Chinese the name of a tribe that is rendered in Greek as the Iatioi who are recorded in Ptolemy's geography. The original pronunciation has been reconstructed as gwat-ti or got-ti or gut-si, which opens up distant lexical similarities with the Goths (the German tribes of northern and eastern Europe), the Getae (the Dacian, i.e., Balkan, tribes northwest of the Black Sea), the Guti (a people on the borderlands of Mesopotamia), the Kusha (our Kushans), the Gushi (a people mentioned in Han texts and regarded as brigands along with the peoples of Kroran), or a combination of some but not all of the above...

Sabir Hun (talk) 02:53, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

It is indeed clear – they are not endorsing any of these equations that have been proposed based on similarity of names, just showing what widely varying and contradictory results the method produces. Kanguole 15:05, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

Even if we rule out the book by Mallory & Mair, on the net there are many books that state this connection, I have provided enough, someone will discover them and he/she will wonder why they are not on WP, here is another such book: The Search For Shangri-La: A Journey into Tibetan History, By Charles Allen [12] Sabir Hun (talk) 03:20, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

You can't make an article out of Google Books search results. Context is vital. Kanguole 15:05, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

I really can't understand you, for me there is nothing wrong to include 1 sentence on the article stating this possibility, with some explanation that it is not accepted by all scholars. If you want you can write these 2-3 sentences yourself according to your own taste, for me it doesn't matter who will write them. Here is another source, the official web-site of the University of Washington states that Yuezhi and Massagetae are the same people: https://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/texts/hantxt1.html#yueshi Sabir Hun (talk) 01:29, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

I don't know how I can be any clearer. The article should say that the Yuezhi have been linked to a large number of ancient peoples on meagre evidence, but none of them are widely accepted. Perhaps it should list them. But there is no reason to single out the Massagetae.

The text on the UW website is a reproduction of this article from 1881, which is hugely dated. Kanguole 15:45, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

I've never said that we should single out only the Massagetae, other ancient people can also be included. On a side note, science is not fashion, for example this course [13] at UW is based on this work [14] from 1687. Sabir Hun (talk) 19:21, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

It's not a matter of fashion: 19th-century sources are usually considered unreliable, because of all the advances (e.g. in archaeology, history, the understanding of ancient languages) that have been made since then. This is particularly true of 19-century European views on ethnography. Kanguole 17:14, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

I saw that you have removed a lot of information from the article. It wasn't well organized and some parts were speculative, but some parts of the removed information are important and valuable. For example the origin of the titles kagan/yavuga and the genetic research tracing the pre-turkic population of Xinjiang. Why ? Sabir Hun (talk) 19:52, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

That material is not just speculation – it's speculation based on other speculation. Any connection to the Yuezhi is original research. Kanguole 22:08, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

I don't think so. First, you have removed the general understanding that Yuezhi were Indo-Scyths : "According to some scholars the Yuezhi might themselves have been Scythians.[30]", [30]= [15] This is what E. Britannica states about Yuezhi [16] Second, what speculative do you find in this paragraph :

"According to Hyun Jin Kim the nomadic Yuezhi possessed political institutions that closely resemble the Xiongnu and later Hunnic models. The Chinese refer to the five xihou or Lords of the Yuezhi who rule the five tribes of their imperial confederation. According to Pulleyblank the Yuezhi were Indo-Europeans and they spoke a Tocharian type language. The title xihou corresponds in the pronunciation to what would later become the Turkic title yabgu. This originally Yuezhi royal title appears on the coins of their rulers as IAPGU/yavuga and it came to the Xiongnu from the Yuezhi. Among the Turks, the title yabgu gained a new lease of life. In the Turkish inscriptions of Mongolia, it refers to a noble ranking immediately after the qagan. Kuyan/gayan was a "common Uechji" symbol for a terrestrial embodiment for the Moon and Milky Way."

It is well sourced and the cited sources are reliable. Next, since Scythians were not Turks or Mongols, it is more than relevant to explore the possible genetics in the region before its turkization. This information: " the phylogeographic analysis leaves three candidate haplogroups : J2-M172, R1a1a-M17, R1b-M343" is also removed. It is obvious from the context that we cannot tell exactly to which haplogroup Yuezhi belonged - it could be J2, or R1a/R1b, or all of them; readers will understand that. Also, read again the article Tarim mummies - there were 2 Europoid physical types in the region, and the second type share closest affinities with Eastern Mediterranean populations, and according to Mallory and Mair this population introduced the Iranian Saka language into the region between 700 BCE–200 CE. Hence the information is more than relevant. It is based on genetic tests performed on 3826 males and is published by Oxford Journal of Molecular Biology and Evolution.[17] There is no doubt that these three haplogroups were present among the pre-turkic population of Xinjiang/Tarim; to which one Yuezhi belonged or if they had some mongoloid admixture in addition, is a question that we cannot answer for the time being.

Next, the information about Pazyryk burials is also removed; for this I am not sure if it should be on the article, the connection is stated not only by Enoki, but also by Zuev: "In Altai, the memory of Uechjies survived as a group of Pazyryk kurgans with fabulous funeral inventory, which remains for decades a research subject for different scientific specialties. Chronologically, the first of them are dated by the 5th century BC " If this connection is confirmed by other authors, probably it should be put back on the article.

And finally I am not sure what is the purpose of having two almost similar sections as "Early Chinese accounts" and "Early references" ? In my opinion it is better to merge these 2 sections into one to introduce the basic facts about the Yuezhi to the readers, and after that a section on origin/language should be added. Sabir Hun (talk) 11:21, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

The genetic material is certainly secondary speculation. It is not appropriate for a Wikipedia article to perform explorations of this kind. Kanguole 17:28, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

For me it is a good argument but it cites a blog. I am not sure if WP rules allow this, but the blog [18] seems to be run by a professional. The information about the little Yuezhi probably should stay on the article; Pulleyblank cosidered Jie/Chieh to be of tocharian origin, Maenchen Helfen pointed out that in the 4th century 200 000 of them were slain. Even if the number is exaggerated 2-3 times, obviously they were quite numerous. Sabir Hun (talk) 16:33, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

See WP:BLOGS. Besides, he's talking about the Tocharians, the farmers of the Tarim oases, not the pastoralist Yuezhi. Some have suggested that the two are connected, but that is another speculation. Kanguole 17:25, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

yep, very good point. We don't know who brought these haplogroups to north-west China. It could be anyone - farmers searching for new lands, nomadic groups, Yuezhi were not the only nomadic group, there were Wusuns and others. We only know that they were transmitted to north-west China by someone. But lets see where are the origins of these haplogroups, take for example J2-M172. Its origins are in Anatolia [19]. And if we examine now our possible theories about the Yuezhi, we see that this is exactly the homeland of the Guti people of Henning. Could this be a coincidence? Hardly. Further if we read carefully Y. Zuev we see that he compares and traces the origin of the fertility goddess Mother-queen Sivanmu of the Yuezhi with the fertility goddess Cybele from Anatolia. Again coincidence? Y. Zuev passed away 2006 and probably he knew nothing about genetic tests. So, this "coincidence" is hardly possible if we add the argument of similar ceramics of Henning. If I flip a coin only 7 times what are the chances of me getting heads every time? They are almost 0 : (1/2)^7 = 0.7% Of course, all this information doesn't mean that eqn Getae->Massagetae->Yuezhi is wrong. It could well substantiate, at least partially, the presence of haplogroups R1a/R1b in pre-turkic nort-west China. To summarize my point, it is quite possible that Guti people of Henning to have merged with Getae at the begging of 1st millennium BC somewhere in Kazakhstan where later we observed Massagetae, and these people moving to north-west China to be seen as the second (Eastern Mediterranean) Europoid physical type in the Tarim basin/Xinjiang by Mallory and Mair. Some of them could have been farmers, and some of them - nomads. The difference between these two type of groups is not in the genetics but in their mode of living. Anyway, probably most of these is not appropriate for WP article, but when someone is interested in a topic he can hardly restrain himself of making such observations. Sabir Hun (talk) 00:30, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Kanguole, this same WP:SYNTH arguments and two-three sources (mainly by Zuev and Pulleyblank, which are minor theories, as well new by Kim, in which every Turkic tribe is wrongly determined as Hunnic) was copied on the talk pages (even articles) of Huns, Bulgars, Kutrigurs, Utigurs, Zabergan among others by sock-puppets of blocked User:PavelStaykov. Sabir Hun is probably a sock-puppet account, whose intention is basically to present Turkic tribes like Huns and people related to them as Indo-Europeans like Yuezhi.--Crovata (talk) 12:48, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

These articles are beyond your grasp, before 5th century there were no turks. Read Peter Golden and shut up. Sabir Hun (talk) 15:02, 23 November 2016 (UTC) Only when you can explain why the (western) Huns used metal and bone arrowheads at the same that time you will have some understanding. It a "hard" question though. Sabir Hun (talk) 15:20, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

References

The Yuezhi

In reply to the query above by: Sabir Hun

The Yuezhi are nowadays usually considered to have been a confederation of a number of nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes probably made up of more than one language group, and possibly of more than one ethnic background.

I will include here some brief notes I wrote on the origin of the Yuezhi for the second edition of my book: Through the Jade Gate: China to Rome, Vol, I, (2015), pp. 327-328.

I have included references to the works of a few of the many scholars who have discussed this contentious issue over the years. I have only included ones who have written in English to make it easier for WP editors to check.

I will give a short list of references to their work at the end of my notes in case any of you want to follow them up further. Here is my summary of the subject:

“For over a century there have been arguments about the ethnic and linguistic origins of the Da Yuezhi (大月氏), Kushans (貴霜), and the Tochari, and there is still little consensus.

“Another group of early Xinjiang inhabitants appears in Chinese sources of the second century BCE as the Yuezhi (Yueh-chih). The identity and movements of this group have posed one of the great questions of ancient Central Asian history: who were the Yuezhi originally, and what eventually became of them? Many scholars believe the Yuezhi and the Tokharians may be one and the same people. Mallory and Mair argue that the ancestors of the Yuezhi lived first in the region of the Altai mountains and Yenesi River basin, where they formed what is known as the Afansevo slab-grave culture, before migrating south to Gansu and Xinjiang; A.K. Narain, on the other hand, suggests the Yuezhi may have been indigenous inhabitants of the region around Dunhuang and the Qilian (Ch’i-lien) Mountains of Gansu long before they enter historical accounts―there is a continuous cultural tradition in this area west of the Chinese central plains from as early as can be ascertained archaeologically. In any case, the earliest of the Tarim mummies―that is, the Bronze and Iron Age inhabitants of southern Xinjiang―may have been the ancestral or proto-Yuezhi.” Millward (2007), Eurasian Crossroads: A History of Xinjiang. James A. Millward. Columbia University Press, New York, p. 14.

“The ethnic origin of the Yuezhi is unknown, and there is even no firm evidence as to their relationship with the various ethnic groups mentioned by Classical sources. We are neither certain about the exact route followed by the Yuezhi. What is clear, however, is that the trek of the Yuezhi from Inner Central Asia to the banks of the Amu Darya brought about an avalanche of other migrating tribes. Waves of migrants penetrated from the north down onto the plains of Bactria. Most of them, including the Sakaraukai and the Saiwang, were descendants of the Scythians and Iranians who had remained in Central Asia while their kinsmen moved south centuries earlier. Others, including the Yuezhi, may have belonged to other ethnic groups. We simply do not know.” Vogelsang (2002), The Afghans. Willem Vogelsang. Blackwell Publishers. Oxford, pp. 137-138.

Some scholars claim the Yuezhi were mainly of Caucasoid origin, others Mongolic, yet others suggest they were a confederation of tribes of different ethnic and linguistic backgrounds. Some believe they originally spoke a “Tocharian” language, and others that they spoke an eastern Iranic or proto-Turkic language, or a mix of languages. Even the connection between the Da Yuezhi and the later Great Kushan kings is contested. For further discussions of the origins of the Yuezhi and their migrations, see: Benjamin (2007), pp. 1-44; Mallory and Mair (2000), esp. pp. 94-99; Yu (1998), esp. pp. 47-66; Enoki, et al. (1994), pp. 171-189; Xu (1996), pp. 2-3; 272-273; Maenchen-Helfen (1945), p. 80, n. 110; Brough (1970b), pp. 87-88; Sims-Williams (undated), p. 345; Zuev (2002), pp. 10, 21, 23, 29-30, 33-34; Vigne (1842), p. 362; Laufer (1917), pp. 8-9; Franke (1916/1918), p. 84.

References

Benjamin (2007): The Yuezhi: Origin, Migration and the Conquest of Northern Bactria. Craig G. R. Benjamin. Silk Road Studies XIV. Brepols, Belgium. Brough (1970b): “Nugae Indo-Sericae.” John Brough. In: W. B. Henning Memorial Volume. Editors: Mary Boyce and Ilya Gershevitch. London, 1970, pp. 81-88; Enoki, et al. (1994): “The Yüeh-chih and their migrations.” K. Enoki, G. A. Koshelenko and Z. Haidary. HCCA Vol. II, pp. 171-189. Franke (1916/1918): “Einige Bemerkungen zu F.W.K. Müllers ‘Toχrï und Kuišan (Küšän)’.” Otto Franke. In: Osteasiatische Zeitschrift, Fünter und Sechster Jahrgang, Berlin, pp. 83-86; Laufer (1917): The Language of the Yüe-chi or Indo-Scythians. Berthold Laufer. Chicago. R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company, pp. 3-14. Reprinted in: Kleinere Schriften von Bethold Laufer. Teil 2: Publikationen aus der Zeit von 1911 bis 1925. Hartmut Walravens (ed.). Franz Steiner Verlag, Wiesbaden. 1979, pp. 1107-1118] Maenchen-Helfen (1945): “The Yüeh-chih Problem Re-examined.” Otto Maenchen-Helfen. JAOS, Vol. 65, No. 2 (Apr. – Jun. 1945), pp. 71-81; Mallory and Mair (2000): The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West. J. P. Mallory and Victor H. Mair. Thames & Hudson. London; Sims-Williams (undated): ): “Bactrian Language.” N. Sims-Williams. In: Encyclopaedia Iranica, pp. 344-349. Downloaded from: http://www.iranica.com/articlenavigation/index.html on 20 April 2007; Vigne (1842): Travels in Kashmir, Ladak, Iskardo, the Countries Adjoining the Mountain-course of the Indus, and the Himalaya, North of the Panjab. 2 Vols. Godfrey Thomas Vigne. H. Colburn, London; Yu (1998): A Study of Saka History. Taishan Yu. Sino-Platonic Papers No. 80. July, 1998. Dept. of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Pennsylvania; Xu (1996): “The Tokharians and Buddhism.” Xu Wenkan, In: Studies in Central and East Asian Religions 9, pp. 1-17 (1996). Downloaded on June 14, 2003, from: http://61.54.131.141:8010 /Resource/Book/Edu/JXCKS/TS010057/0001_ts010057.htm; Zuev (2002): Rannie tyurki. Ocerki istorii i ideologii. Üry Aleksey Zuev. Daik-Press, Almaty, Kazakhstan. In Russian. English title: Early Türks: Essays of History and Ideology. (Draft translation by Norm Kisamov). — Preceding unsigned comment added by John Hill (talk • contribs) 07:09, 13 November 2016 (UTC)

well, some of this information is new for me, for example the slab-grave culture, I need some time to read about it. But actually all this information does not prove that eqn Yuezhi=Massagetae is wrong. It only proves that there is no consensus among scholars. Indeed Enoki states that this eqn cannot be maintained, but he doesn't give any arguments why. Which irritates me. As someone who is doing research in more rigorous area I know that in every scientific quest some basic principles should be observed. Obviously Massagetae were quite numerous people since they were able to fight Persians. Where they have gone? I don't believe that large groups of people can appear/disappear without a good reason. As in physics matter/energy do not appear/disappear from/into nothingness. Do you really believe that 300 000 people can disappear from Kazakhstan in 5 c.BC, and 300 000 people appear in Chinese chronicles in 4-3 c.BC (shortly after "disappearance" of Massagetae) and between them there is no connection? What is your personal opinion? What about Wusuns? Who were they and could they be the former Issedones? For me the answer is simple: the expansion of the First Persian Empire in 5-4 century BC simply pushed all these Indo-Scythians into East over Altai, south Siberia, Mongolia and Tarim. Yuezhi were not of Mongol stock and they didn't come from Manchuria. I intentionally leave aside the question about their language simply because language!=nationality. But everything points out that initially Yuezhi spoke mixture of Iranian and unknown European language, later Turkic and even Mongolian substratum was added. With all my respect to Pulleyblank, but in this particular case he is wrong, the name of the Tocharian language indeed is a misnomer. There is no evidence that Yuezhi spoke Tocharian, positing linguistic continuity over a time lap of 1000 years is not an appropriate default position when direct evidence is absent. So, I don't mind if you add the above information on the article, the more information on it the better. My only remark is that many of these sources are not available for free reading, and this will probably irritate some readers. Sabir Hun (talk) 01:10, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

Horses paragraph

I have again reverted this addition, because it is speculation, its connection with the Yuezhi is tenuous (Li Bai lived in the 8th century), and it is offtopic for a section about the Yuezhi in "Sima Qian and the Book of Han". Kanguole 17:18, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

I agree that the paragraph is put on wrong place and it should be moved probably in a separate section down the article. I cant agree that it is a speculation. The hole story is discussed by Edwin G. Pulleyblank here [20](p.31) and it is a link in mythology between China and Indo-Europeans/Tocharians, hence it has its own merits as academic topic. As you can read on page 32 Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen also argued that the chieftains of Altai were of Tocharian origin. ( Tocharian=part of the Yuezhi, not the speakers of Tocharian language) People as Edwin G. Pulleyblank and Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen wouldn't bother to discuss something if it wasn't important. Instead of deleting the paragraph you can help me to write it in a proper way. --Sabir Hun (talk) 15:01, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

Tocharian

I have again reverted the addition of Tocharian to the infobox. The three books linked are all references to Pulleyblank's suggestion that the Yuezhi originally spoke Tocharian. However, this is not widely accepted accepted, and Pulleyblank himself said (in "The peoples of the steppe frontier in early Chinese sources", 1999, p. 52), "Direct linguistic evidence for this, or any other, identification of the Yuezhi language is admittedly slight." Such speculative identification belongs in the "Proposed links to other groups" section, not in the infobox. Kanguole 23:47, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

For the same reason, I have also again reverted the addition of Category:Tocharians. We know that the nomadic Yuezhi are not the same people as the Tocharians of the Tarim city-states. We know they spoke Bactrian when they were in Bactria, and although some claim they may have spoken Tocharian earlier, there is no evidence of this. Kanguole 21:02, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Name

The name is Rouzhi, not Yuezhi. --Chinyen Lu (talk) 13:46, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

Chinyen Lu This just shows the English language scholarship on Yuezhi is fundamentally flawed, down to the most basic things such as pronunciation of the word.QN35max (talk) 18:02, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Introductory sentence

The proposed introductory sentence:

Yuezhi (...) is the common name for a people known only from their Chinese language exonym.

is an example of the problems discussed at WP:ISATERMFOR. Because Wikipedia is not a dictionary, the topic of the article should be not the name but the people, and that is what the opening sentence should describe. In addition, Henning's proposed name Üe-ṭşi has seen little use, and does not justify the prominence given it. Kanguole 22:43, 29 November 2018 (UTC)

@Kanguole, your reference to WP:NOTDIC is a good point. However, in this case the name of the people concerned is pivotal. Also significant are the points that:

• Yuezhi is not the native name;
• there are alternate transliterations of the Old Chinese name like Yueh-chih (apart from Üe-ṭşi), and;
• Rouzhi is the modern Chinese pronunciation.

In other words, the names are not a mere footnote and in any case WP:NOTPAPER

Grant | Talk 08:22, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

The name is hardly central – it's probably appropriate to cover it in the article body, but it ought not to derail the introduction. Also, we know it was the Chinese name, but its origin is obscure. Thierry, for example, believes that it is derived from the native name. Kanguole 22:24, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

@Kanguole Yes, you and I know these things, but we're not just writing for ourselves – see WP:MTAU: "An article may disappoint ... because it wrongly assumes the reader is familiar with the subject or field, or ... is not comprehensive." Grant | Talk 04:37, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Cannot Edit the Title

Hi:

The entry is Yuezhi, but it should be Rouzhi. I made almost 140 changes from Yuezhi to Rouzhi, but could not edit the Title. It's still Yuezhi, which is incorrect. Can anyone help? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wmhu2000 (talk • contribs) 02:45, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

If you want to change the title, the process is described at Wikipedia:Requested moves. However, this may not be successful, because these people are not called Rouzhi in the English-language literature. For the same reason, I have also reversed your name changes in the article. The modern Chinese pronunciation of Ròuzhī is mentioned within the article. Kanguole 02:53, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Why should English literature be considered reliable sources for the Chinese Rouzhi / Yuezhi?QN35max (talk) 18:04, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Per WP:NAMINGCRITERIA: "Article titles are based on how reliable English-language sources refer to the article's subject." Kanguole 18:17, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Yuezhi spoke a Qiangic language

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Yuezhi&type=revision&diff=944668794&oldid=944668056

The following information was added (with citations):

According to ancient Chinese sources, the Yuezhi were Sino-Tibetan peoples (Qiangic). The Book of the Later Han says that the Yuezhi spoke the same language as the Qiang, part of the Sino-Tibetan languages. Modern Chinese scholars believe the Yuezhi were Sino-Tibetan. Also modern archaeological research shows that while the Tocharians and Qiang had some contact, they likely had separate origins.

However, User:Wario-Man has removed this well-cited info without explaining why. Would User:Wario-Man care to explain? Thanks. Unless there is a serious flaw with these facts, I propose keeping it on the wiki.

Also, it should be noted that on matters concerning the Yuezhi 月氏，an ancient ethnic group of China, first hand Chinese sources are likely going to be much more reliable than third hand point of view studies by westerners. It helps to be open minded about other people's perspectives, especially when they are authoritative historical documents. Musical mosaic (talk) 07:11, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Your label of "Western scholars" cannot be applied to A. K. Narain.

You have cited two sources, the second of which does not mention the Qiang at all. That leaves the passage in the Treatise on the Western Qiang (chapter 87 of the Book of the Later Han) saying that the Huangzhong Yuezhi (i.e. some of the descendents of the Xiao Yuezhi) spoke a language similar to the Qiang (among whom they lived) in the Eastern Han period. It might be useful to mention this in the "Later references to the Lesser Yuezhi" section, but it is not proof that the unified Yuezhi of the 2nd century BC spoke the same language, just as the fact that the Da Yuezhi spoke Bactrian around the Eastern Han period does not prove that they always did.

In general though, it's preferable to cite modern historians instead of relying on wikipedians' interpretation of ancient sources. Kanguole 11:33, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi, there are a number of serious flaws with Kanguole's version of the article. It cites classical Greek sources but says little about the most important Chinese quote on the Yuezhi, which states that 被服饮食言语略与羌同 or that they spoke a Qiangic language. Much of the non-Chinese scholarship in this article is completely oblivious to this fact. When Roux says "They are believed by most scholars to have been an Indo-European people[6]" that excludes all Chinese scholarship, which unanimously agree that the Rouzhi were Qiangic, only later on possibly adopting aspects of Tocharian customs. This is an example of double standards and giving undue weight to certain ideas.

The pronunciation of the name is wrong. It should be Rouzhi not Yuezhi.

Also "wikipedians' interpretation of ancient sources" includes much of Kanguole's own WP:POV on the Yuezhi.

User:Kanguole seems to have been very protective of this article, reverting many people's constructive edits. His attempts to obfuscate certain facts is contrary to the spirit of a free encyclopedia.

QN35max (talk) 18:14, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Languages

Regarding this edit: the infobox is for summarizing consensus data, not controversy. Everyone agrees that the Kushans spoke Bactrian when they were is Bactria – we have texts that they wrote. Some scholars argue that they formerly spoke Tocharian when they were in Gansu, while others say we have no evidence of what they spoke then. Even Pulleyblank, whose 1966 arguments are repeatedly cited, says (1999) "Direct linguistic evidence for this, or any other, identification of the Yuezhi language is admittedly slight." The issue is discussed in the "Proposed links to other groups" section.

The other part is a citation of the Rabatak inscription (twice) in support of a suggestion that the Kushans formerly used Greek. This is a good illustration of why Wikipedia policy discourages the use of primary sources. The text is cited as saying "the Kushan king Kanishka the Great (c. 127 AD), discarded Greek (Ionian) as the language of administration and adopted Bactrian ("Arya language")". The translation of this passage by Sims-Williams (2004) is "And he issued a Greek edict [and] then he put it into Aryan." So it doesn't support the claim at all. Citing the same passage in support of the Tocharian claim is even more incongruous: it doesn't refer to anything that could be construed as Tocharian, and nor does Falk mention Tocharian. Kanguole 19:47, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

I see the talk page and i see many people commenting and giving their opinion with the references but i guess you seem to reject all their sources and references. You cannot just remove the fact that Yuezhi migrated from Gansu which was inhabited by Tocharian speaking people. They migrated to the current Bactria and adopted the language as mentioned in several sources. They were not originally from Bactria which means they spoke another language when they arrived here. I see you have given the same argument to all other people in the talk page. Also as you mentioned Kushans spoke Bactrian when they were in Bactria indicates that before that they were speaking some other language. Also you mentioned that some Scholars argue that they formerly spoke Tocharian is indicative of the fact that the information should be part of the article clearly. I sincerely believe you cannot reject the sources to your own will.

This should be part of this article clearly not like in Proposed links as you mention.

The following line clearly is against the sources as if this is to be mentioned then it should be written as the Kushans started speaking Bactrian when they migrated to Bactria.

"The Kushana spoke Bactrian, an Eastern Iranian language"

Kami2018 (talk) 20:16, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

The article does say that the Yuezhi migrated from Gansu. What they spoke when they were there is a matter of conjecture, as not a single word of their language is recorded. Tocharian come not from Gansu, but the oases of the Tarim Basin.

There is no evidence that they changed their language, though several have conjectured it.

These conjectures are presented in the article. They do not belong in the infobox, because that is supposed to be a summary of generally agreed facts.

How is "The Kushana spoke Bactrian, an Eastern Iranian language" contrary to the sources? Kushana is what they were called when they were in Bactria, and all agree on what they spoke there. If the problem is "Eastern Iranian language", that doesn't mean a language from eastern Iran, but a branch of the Iranian languages, which were spoken throughout central Asia, with some of the speakers moving to what is now Iran. Kanguole 21:30, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Well not all agree with what language they spoke when they were in Bactria. If you look at the source that i mentioned it clearly states that Kanishka who was not even the first king changed the administrative language from Greek to Bactrian which means before Kanishka Bactrian was not even administrative language. Bactria was a region where people spoke Bactrian, Kushans being Yuezhi migrated from Gansu not part of Bactria although started speaking Bactrian after Kanishka language shift. What language they spoke before Kanishka is also important and should be mentioned in the article. I would appreciate if the edits are elaborated and Tocharian is added to the article as its not something i am making up rather there are sources and i guess Wikipedia depends upon references not one's perception of those sources. Kami2018 (talk) 00:29, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

The paper by Falk (2001) is available here[21]. It is a fascinating paper that certainly makes use of the Rabatak inscription in its objective to find an absolute date for the inthronization of Kanishka, but: I can find nothing in it on page 133 or on any other page that says "Kanishka the Great (c. 127 AD), discarded Greek (Ionian) as the language of administration and adopted Bactrian ("Arya language")". Maybe there is a source that translates the sentence in the Rabatak inscription that way, but using Falk's paper as source for this statement is deceptive. –Austronesier (talk) 18:42, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi (Austronesier) " Before i just have to state this that we actually dont know what language the dynast who became the royal line spoke originally, as kujula was not part of the royal line before he destroyed the 4 other "vassal-clans" and hence being one of them himself you can presume he was also not his own overlord . As "Kara" (this is the karen/karny parthian title) is used as a title on the first coins of any kushan ruler, and as he share (kujula is the name used for 2 previous Saka rulers in ghandara) more evidence points that the guishang "Xihou" Family were not part of the tocharian-speakers, and seeing how tocharian if used in those hundred years was forgoten its actually more likely none of those 4 other families but the vanqished ruling house spoke tocharian nativly,and for it to disapear the tocharians couldent be more then 25 % of the population. In fact, the only thing we know about kujulas clan is that they share same tamgha,title, and name as a family of previous rulers , who seemed to be related to the saka family ruling in afghanistan aswell.

So i dont get why you are hung up on this phrase ""Kanishka the Great (c. 127 AD), discarded Greek (Ionian) as the language of administration and adopted Bactrian ("Aryan ")"",since you cant have missed greek being used ever since alexander so i dont know what there is deceptive about that ?

"nobasto s(a)gōndi bagano sindado otēia i iōnaggo oaso ozoasto tadēia ariao ōs" is the third line and the marked part is what you are looking for .

"sindado=(sent) o-tēia=(He in) i iōnaggo)=(Ionaian) oaso=(and he) ozoasto)=(put ) tadēia=(it in) ariao ōs=(Iranian)" = And he sent commands using the greek letters to write in Iranian

It means that he was the one who instituted the tradition of using the greek letters to write in a venacular Iranian dialect instead, and wich all who took the title kushan-shah followed. Before they were using greek and some prakrit dialect as all other rulers in the area. I dont edit wikipedia but writing so you dont edit that away, there are alot of shameless scholars publishing the dumbest shit ever that have ruined so many wiki pages that Falk is not one of them with this statment.

Bennanak88 (talk) 04:14, 22 January 2021 (UTC)

Beckwith's reconstruction

I have reverted the addition of Beckwith's "Old northern Chinese" reconstruction of 月氏 as Tok^war-ke as undue weight to fringe material. Reviews of Beckwith's book are heavily critical of his linguistic speculations and his tendency to present controversial ideas as consensus positions. As Hitch says of the relevant appendix, "In each section his arguments partly rely on idiosyncratic forms which he claims to have established in other places, so that their plausibility is hard to verify." In this case Beckwith is proposing a reading *tokwar of 月, which was ngjwot in Middle Chinese and usually reconstructed as *ŋʷjat in Old Chinese, citing another article where he reconstructed it as *nokwet. Kanguole 12:01, 22 November 2020 (UTC)

@Kanguole: Hmmm. Thanks for the heads-up! पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 12:07, 22 November 2020 (UTC)

References