Who Were the Juan-Juan

The Juan-Juan were an ancient nomadic race from Central Asia who had a great impact on ancient Chinese society. Portrayed as barbarians, the Juan-Juan (also spelt Rouran) were a confederation of powerful nomadic tribes who dominated modern Mongolia and northern China during the fifth and first half of the sixth centuries.

The origins of the Juan-Juan (who are considered the ‘real’ Avars from Byzantine sources according to some scholars) lay with a young slave boy. The myth states that at the end of the reign of the T'o-pa emperor Li-wei (pht. Shen-yuan, 174-220-277 CE), some T’o-pa raiders caught a young boy who could not remember his name nor his clan. His master nicknamed him Mu-ku-lu. When he got older, he was able to free himself from his master’s service and join the T’o-pa as a rider. Late for duty one day, he was faced with execution and so fled to Mongolia. There he assembled a band of fugitives like himself and created the foundation of what later became known as the Juan-Juan confederation.

The confederation was originally named Jou-jan, chosen as a designation for the horde by Mu-ku-lu’s son Ch'e-lu-hui. There is much that we do not know about the society; for example, scholars still do not know what language they spoke. One scholar, Professor Pelliot, believes that they spoke Mongol. However, “scanty evidence that we get from Chinese transcriptions of names and titles cannot be taken as conclusive in forming an opinion as to the language of the masses comprising the federation and can serve only as a clue to the speech of the ruling clan”.

The Juan-Juan were seen as barbarians by many of the Chinese rulers and from Chinese literary sources and archaeological remains, we know of many campaigns against them throughout history. The Chinese insultingly called them ‘Ruru’ which translates as the ‘squirming worms’.

In 424, around 60,000 Juan-Juan broke through the Great Wall of China and stormed Shengle. For two years the Wei campaigned against them and finally drove them far back into the desert. In 429, the Wei defeated the Juan-Juan further north and re-settled them on the grassy plains south of the Mongolian desert.

The end of the Juan-Juan came in the mid-sixth century CE. The Juan-Juan had enlisted the help of the Tujue, a powerful tribe, to crush the Gaoche (the ‘tall chariots’ people in western Mongolia). After securing victory for them, the Tujue khan requested a Juan-Juan princess to marry. The Juan-Juan sent envoys back to the Tujue saying no and that they were impudent slaves. In retaliation, the Tujue killed the envoys, secured a marriage alliance with the dynasty ruling over north-west China and led a campaign against the Juan-Juan. By 552 CE, the Juan-Juan were defeated, their leader drive to suicide and the Tujue became the new dominant power on the steppes.

Bibliography:

Boodberg, Peter A. (1939) Marginalia to The Histories of The Northern Dynasties, Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, Harvard-Yenching Institute.