Yemek

The Yemek or Kimek were a Turkic tribe constituting the Kimek-Kipchak confederation, whose other six constituent tribes, according to Abu Said Gardizi (d. 1061), were the Imur (or Imi), Tatars, Bayandur, Kipchaks, Lanikaz, and Ajlad.

Minorsky, citing Marquart, Barthold, Semenov and other sources, proposed that the name Kīmāk (pronounced Kimäk) was derived from Iki-Imäk, "the two Imäk", probably referring to the first two clans (Īmī and Īmāk) of the federation. On the other hand, Pritsak attempted to connect the Kimek with the Proto-Mongolic Kumo of the Kumo Xi confederation (庫莫奚; Middle Chinese: kʰuo^H-mɑk̚-ɦei; *qu(o)mâġ-ġay, from *quo "yellowish" plus denominal suffix *-mAk). Peter B. Golden judges Pritsak's reconstruction "highly problematic", as Pritsak did not explain how Quomâġ might have produced Kimek; even so, Golden still considers the connection with the Proto-Mongolic world seriously.

Mahmud al-Kashgari did not mention any Kimek, but Yamāk, and further remarked that Kara-Khanids like him considered Yemeks to be "a tribe of the Kipchaks", though contemporary Kipchaks considered themselves a different party. The ethnonym Yemäk might have been transcribed in the mid 7th century by Chinese authors as 鹽莫 Yánmò < Middle Chinese *jiäm-mâk, referring a Tiele group who initially inhabited northwestern Mongolia before migrating to north of Altay Mountains and Irtysh zone.

Initially, Golden (1992:202, 227, 263) has accepted the identification of Kimeks with Imeks/Yimeks/Yemeks, because the /k/ > ∅, resulting in Kimek > İmek, was indeed attested in several Medieval Kipchak dialects; Golden has also thought Yemeks unlikely to be 鹽莫 *jiäm-mâk > Yánmò in Chinese source. However, Golden later changes his mind; he reasons that, as the Medieval Kipchak dialectal sound-change /k/ > ∅ had not yet happened in the mid-7th century Old Turkic, the identification of Yemeks with Kimeks is disputed. As a result, Golden (2002:660-665) later abandons the Kimeks > Yemeks identification and becomes more amenable to the identification of 鹽莫 Yánmò with Yemeks, by scholars such as Hambis, Zuev, and Kumekov, cited in Golden (1992:202).

According to Tishin (2018), Yemeks were simply the most important of the seven constituent tribes whose representatives met at the Irtysh valley, where the diverse Kimek tribal union emerged, as related by Gardizi.

In the Western Turkic Khaganate two Chuy tribes, Chumukun and Chuban, occupied a privileged position of being voting members of the confederation's Onoq elite, while the Chuyue and Chumi tribes did not. A part of the Chuyue tribe intermixed with the Göktürks' remnants and formed a tribe called Shatuo, which lived in southern Dzungaria, to the west of Lake Barkol. The Shatuo separated from the Chuyue in the middle of the 7th century. (Another component of the Chuyue, the Chigil, were still listed in censuses taken in Tsarist Russia and the early decades of the Soviet Union.)

After the disintegration in 743 AD of the Western Turkic Kaganate, a part of the Chuy tribes remained in its successor, the Uyghur Kaganate (740-840), and another part retained their independence. During the Uyghur period, the Chuy tribes consolidated into the nucleus of the tribes known as Kimaks in the Arab and Persian sources. Lev Gumilyov associated one Duolu Chuy tribe, Chumukun 處木昆 (< *čomuqun "immersed in water, drowned") with the Kimeks as both coincidentally occupied the same territory, i.e. Semirechye, and that Chumukun were known only to Chinese and Kimek only to Persians and Arabs. The head of the Kimek confederation was titled Shad Tutuq, "Prince Governor" (tutuk being from Middle Chinese tuo-tuok 都督 "military governor"); as well as Yinal Yabghu, according to Gardizi. By the middle of the eighth century, the Kimeks occupied territory between the Ural River and Emba River, and from the Aral Sea and Caspian steppes, to the Zhetysu area.

After the 840 AD breakup of the Uyghur Khaganate, the Yemeks headed a new political tribal union, creating a new Kimek state. Abu Said Gardizi (d. 1061) wrote that the Kimak federation consisted of seven tribes: Yemeks (Ar. Yamāk < MTrk *Yemǟk or *(Y)imēk), Eymür, Tatars, Bayandur, Kipchak, Lanikaz and Ajlad. Later, an expanded Kimek Kaganate partially controlled the territories of the Oguz, Kangly, and Bagjanak tribes, and in the west bordered the Khazar and Bulgar territories. The Kimaks led a semi-settled life, as the Hudūd mentioned a town named *Yimäkiya (> Yamakkiyya > ms. Namakiyya); while the Kipchaks, in some customs, resembled the contemporary Oghuzes, who were nomadic herders.