Aorsoi Soldiers in Ancient China

The Aorsoi people were first mentioned in Chinese history more than 2，000 years ago. In the Records of the Grand Historian by Sima Qian (145-87BC)， a great historian of the Han Dynasty (206BC-220AD)， the ancestors of the Aorsoi people in the distant central Asia were mentioned. When the Huns in the north migrated westward， Aorsoi people followed the Huns to the west. Some reached an area between the Don River and Volga River in Europe whereas some other Aorsoi people stayed in the area north of Caucasus. In the mid 4th century， the Huns conquered the Aorsoi people. In the 5th century， Attila the Hun， a powerful king of the Huns， led an army to conquer Europe. In his army were some Aorsoi soldiers. In 1221， Genghis Khan marched westward. The Mongolian army defeated the resistance of the Aorsoi tribes. In 1253， Aorsoi soldiers were put into the Mongolian army and brought back to China. That was how Aorsoi people came to China.

History says that 30，000 Aorsoi soldiers served as royal guards at Dadu (today’s Beijing)， the capital of the Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368).

Aorsoi soldiers were a key force in the Yuan’s war against the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279). In June， 1275， the Aorsoi soldiers suffered a serious defeat when besieging a city in the northern bank of the lower reaches of the Yangtze River. They were slaughtered after they stepped into a setup. After the Yuan wiped out the Song Dynasty， Emperor Kublai Khan distributed a large sum of taxes from the city as compensation to the families of the dead soldiers.

In 1309， the Aorsoi people in China were divided into two parts. One was relocated to the north of the capital and the other part was sent southward to today’s Datong City in Shangxi Province. It is recorded in history that more than 6，000 Aorsoi soldiers participated in a battle against the Red Turban Army in today’s Fuyang， Anhui Province. The battle became a favorite subject of many Chinese history novelists.

In the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644)， the Aorsoi soldiers retreated with the defeated Mongols to the deserts in the north.

In late July 1935， an official seal of the Yuan Dynasty was found in Tonghua County in Jilin Province in northeastern China. The man who discovered the seal sold it as useless bronze to a businessman. The businessman thought it was an antique and turned it over to the government. The seal is 2 inches in height and weighs 1 kilogram. It is now in the collection of Liaoning Provincial Museum. Experts say that the Chinese characters on the seal refer to a military leader of the Aorsoi tribe.

Mr. Guan Chengxue， an antique collector in Beijing， ran into a seal of an Aorsoi general one day in Panjiayuan， a huge antique market in Beijing. An old man came up to him and said he had a seal to sell but no collector in the market believed him. Guan went with the old man and took a look at the seal. Guan examined the bronze seal and thought it resembled a seal he had seen in a book. He bought the seal for 60，000 yuan. The seal has been authenticated by experts.

Two seals are material witnesses to the existence of the Aorsoi soldiers in China’s Yuan Dynasty.

The official “History of the Yuan Dynasty” (a 334-day 210-volumn government project in the early years of the Ming Dynasty) has detailed records of prominent military deeds of Aorsoi generals. But the Aorsoi people were more than the names mentioned in Chinese history. They made a historical contribution to the Chinese nation.