Ашина тайпасы және Түрік қағанатының билеуші әулеті

Ruling dynasty of the Gökturk Khaganate
the Japanese clan

The Ashina (; Middle Chinese: (Guangyun) ) were a tribe and the ruling dynasty of the Göktürks. This clan rose to prominence in the mid 6th century when the leader, Bumin Qaghan (died 552), revolted against the Rouran Khaganate. The two main branches of the family, one descended from Bumin and the other from his brother Istämi, ruled over the eastern and western parts of the Göktürk confederation, respectively, forming the First Turkic Khaganate (552–603).

Primary Chinese sources ascribed different origins to the Ashina tribe. Ashina were first attested to 439, as reported by the Book of Sui: on the 18th day of the 10th month, the Tuoba ruler Emperor Taiwu of Northern Wei overthrew Juqu Mujian of the Northern Liang in eastern Gansu, and 500 Ashina families fled northwest to the Rouran Khaganate near Gaochang. but this is contested. Göktürks were also posited as having originated from an obscure Suo state (索國), north of the Xiongnu. According to the Book of Sui and the Tongdian, they were "mixed barbarians" (雜胡; záhú) from Pingliang. According to some researchers (Duan, Xue, Tang, and Lung) the Ashina tribe was descended from the Tiele confederation, who were likewise associated with the Xiongnu. Like the Göktürks, the Tiele were probably one of many nomadic Turkic peoples on the steppe. However, Lee & Kuang (2017) state that Chinese histories did not describe the Ashina led Göktürks as descending from the Dingling or belonging to the Tiele confederation.

Several researchers, including Peter B. Golden, H. W. Haussig, S. G. Klyashtorny, Carter V. Findley, D. G. Savinov, B. A. Muratov, S. P. Guschin, and András Róna Tas have posited that the term Ashina ultimately descends from an Indo European source, possibly Tocharian or from one of the many Eastern Iranian tribal groups, such as the Saka and Wusun. Jonathan Ratcliffe supports this theory citing numerous academics that the Ashina ethnic core could have been Indo Iranian culturally, speaking Sogdian or variant of Tocharian. Carter V. Findley assumes that the name "Ashina" comes from one of the Saka languages of central Asia and means "blue" (which translates to Proto Turkic *kȫk, whence Old Turkic 𐰚𐰇𐰚‎ kök, and same in all Modern Turkic languages). The color blue is identified with the east, so that Göktürk, another name for the Turkic empire, meant the "Turks of the East"; meanwhile, Peter Benjamin Golden favours a more limited denotation of Göktürks as denoting only the Eastern Turks. This idea is seconded by Hungarian researcher András Róna Tas, who finds it plausible "that we are dealing with a royal family and clan of Saka origin". Findley also said that the term böri, used to identify the ruler's retinue as 'wolves', probably also derived from one of the Iranian languages. H. W. Haussig and S. G. Kljyashtorny suggest an association between the name and the compound "kindred of Ashin" ahşaẽna (in Old Persian). This is so even in East Turkestan; then the desired form would be in the Sogdian 'xs' yn' k ( әhšēnē) "blue, dark"; Khotan Saka (Brahmi) āşşeiņa ( āşşena) "blue", where a long ā emerged as development ahş > āşş ; in Tocharian A āśna "blue, dark" (from Khotan Saka and Sogdian). There is textual support for either of these versions in the Göktürk Orkhon inscriptions, in which the Göktürks are described as the "Blue Turks"; being descended from the marriage between Blue Sky and the Brown Earth. According to Kuastornyj, the perfect translation of "Ashina" as an Indo European word meaning "blue" indicates that the Türks of the First Turkic Khaganate period were aware of the non Türkic origin of the name "Ashina", and of the dual ethnic origin of the early Türks. In the view of Louis Bazin, this knowledge was being suppressed in the Second Turkic Khaganate period by the Türkic nationalist policies of Bilge Qaghan. The name "Ashina" was recorded in ancient Muslim chronicles in these forms: Aś(i)nas (al Tabari), Ānsa (Hudud al 'Alam), Śaba (Ibn Khordadbeh), Śana, Śaya (Al Masudi).

[[File:An Jia with a Turkic Chieftain in Yurt. Xi’an, 579 CE. Shaanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology, Xi’an. jpg|thumb|The Sogdian merchant An Jia conversing with a Turkic Chieftain in his yurt (579 AD). the name "Ashina" is translated by some researchers as "wolf", cf. Tuoba 叱奴 *čino, Middle Mongol činua, Khalkha čono. However, Golden contends that derivation from Mongolic is mistaken. On the Khor Asgat inscription, the form Ašїnas is written and is similar to the Sogdian form Ašinas from the Bugut and Karabalgasun steles and the Arabic forms Ašinās and Ašnās from medieval Islamic sources. Chinese editors usually avoided the coda / s/. Takashi Ōsawa hypothtically derives the family name Ašїnas from their tribal ancestress's name *A ši na and the final element as, which he explains as a plural suffix (similar to the Turkic Käŋäräs < Käŋär "(Kangar / Kangly)" + suffix (ä)s) as proposed by Marquart, Melioranskii and others. He further links *A ši na to the Xiongnu title 閼氏, which was pronounced *′ât zie in Late Middle Chinese, meant "wife of a ruler", and might be derived from *aš / eš, *azhi / *ezhi < *ašïn / *ešin, and *azhïn / *ezhin, further from Tungusic *Aši < *asun / *asi < *hasun < *khasu < *kasun < *katsun and Turko Mongolic *Ači < ačun < *hatun < khatun < katun.

thumb|Bust of Kul Tigin (684–731), an Ashina Prince. According to the Book of Zhou and History of the Northern Dynasties, the Ashina clan was related to the "Yenisei Kyrgyz", who resided near the Pamir mountains and are described as possessing red hair and blue eyes in the New Book of Tang (Xin Tangshu 217b.6147), a description previously used to describe the Wusun. However according to Lee & Kuang (2017), the Göktürks differed from the Qirghiz in their physiognomy and "no comparable depiction of the Kök Türks or Tiele is found in the official Chinese histories." Lee & Kuang state that the most likely explanation for the West Eurasian physiognomy of the Yenisei Kirghiz is a high frequency of the Eurasian Indo European haplogroup R1a Z93. Muqan Qaghan, the third Qaghan of the First Turkic Khaganate, was described by Chinese authors as having an unusual appearance. He had eyes like "colored glazes", he had a red complexion, and his face was wide. However, a complete genetic analysis of Muqan Qaghan's daughter Empress Ashina (551–582) in 2023 by Xiaoming Yang et al. found nearly exclusively Ancient Northeast Asian ancestry (97,7%) next to minor West Eurasian components (2,3%), and no Chinese ("Yellow River") admixture. According to Chinese historian Xue Zongzheng, the original Ashina tribe members had physical features that were quite different from those of East Asian people. However, over time, members of the Ashina tribe intermarried with Chinese nobility, which shifted their physical appearance to a more East Asian one. According to Xue, having a physical appearance like a Sogdian was by the time of Qilibi Khan (Ashina Simo), an eighth generation descendant of Bumin Qaghan (founder of the First Turkic Khaganate), presented as a sign of mixed ancestry among the Ashina. This suggests that the transformation of the physical appearance of the Ashina tribe was almost complete by the mid 7th century AD. Both Shibi Khagan and Chuluo Khagan were doubtful of Qilibi Khan being Ashina and prevented him from being a shad. Turkish historian Emel Esin noted that "the members of the Kök Türk dynasty, and particularly Köl Tigin, had frankly Mongoloid features", probably as a result of repeated marriages.

According to Canadian scholar Joo Yup Lee, it is possible that the Ashina tribe belonged to the paternal haplogroup R1a1. The reasoning for this assumption is that the Ashina tribe was said to be closely related to the Yenisei Kirghiz people, and also to the Iranian Saka. The modern day descendants of the Yenisei Kirghiz, the Kyrgyz people, have one of the highest frequencies of haplogroup R1a Z93. This lineage believed to be associated with Indo Iranians who migrated to the Altai region in the Bronze Age, and is carried by various Türkic groups. American historian Peter Golden has reported that Y DNA genetic testing of the proposed descendants of the Ashina tribe does seem to confirm a link to the Indo Iranians, emphasizing that "the Turks as a whole ‘were made up of heterogeneous and somatically dissimilar populations". The first genetic analysis on an early royal Ashina member (Empress Ashina, the daughter of Mugan Khagan, second son of Bumin Khagan, the founder of the Göktürk Khaganate) in 2023 by Xiaoming Yang et al. found nearly exclusively Northeast Asian ancestry (97.7%) next to a minor West Eurasian component (2.3%). The West Eurasian component corresponded to a single admixture event (possibly Afanasievo related) dating to around 1566 ± 396 years before Ashina's lifetime (ie dating to ). The authors determined that Empress Ashina belonged to the North East Asian mtDNA haplogroup F1d. The Ashina individual was found to be genetically closer to East Asians than Turkic groups and was genetically closest to post‐Iron Age Tungusic and Mongolic Steppe pastoralists, supporting the near exclusively Northeast Asian origin of the Ashina tribe. The ancient Türkic royal family of the Göktürk Khaganate was found to share genetic affinities to post Iron Age Tungusic and Mongolic pastoralists, while having heterogeneous relationships towards various later Turkic speaking groups, suggesting genetic heterogeneity and multiple sources of origin for the later populations of the Turkic empire. This shows that the Ashina lineage had a dominating contribution on Mongolic and Tungusic speakers but limited contribution on Turkic speaking populations. According to the authors, these findings "once again validates a cultural diffusion model over a demic diffusion model for the spread of Turkic languages" and refutes "the western Eurasian origin and multiple origin hypotheses" in favor of an East Asian origin for the royal Ashina family.

Members of the Ashina dynasty also ruled the Basmyls, and Karluk Yabghu's State; and possibly also Khazars and Karakhanids (if the first Karakhanid ruler Bilge Kul Qadir Khan indeed descended from the Karluk Yabghus). According to some researchers, the Second Bulgarian Empire's Asen dynasty might be descendants of Ashina.