Kültöbe Inscription

Kültöbe Inscription is an important archaeological and philological find in the context of Central Asian Turkic history and epigraphy, representing the only known single-line runic Turkic inscription attributed to the early Oghuz Turks and dated to the 9th–10th centuries. The inscription was discovered within the historical Oghuz settlement of Kültöbe, located within the boundaries of the village of Orañğay (Oranğay), in the Sawran district, near the city of Turkistan in southern Kazakhstan. The discovery provides new evidence regarding the early Oghuz use of writing, political relations, and symbolic world.

Image of the Kültöbe Inscription (TRT News)

Discovery and Identification Process

The inscription was found by local students following an illegal excavation at the Kültöbe settlement in the 1990s and subsequently delivered to a small museum within Muḫtar Äwesov Middle School in Orañğay. For a long time, the artifact was not subject to scholarly examination until it was accidentally identified during a field study on 6 August 2025 by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Hayrettin İhsan Erkoç, a faculty member at Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University. It was subsequently introduced to the academic community through detailed epigraphic and historical analyses.

Image of the Kültöbe Inscription (TRT News)

Physical and Technical Characteristics

The Kültöbe Inscription is carved in relief on a square stone measuring approximately 25 × 25 cm, made of local dolomitic limestone. The inscription consists of a single line containing seven letters and one separator symbol. Directly beneath the text is a mark composed of three wavy lines, interpreted as either a seal or a symbolic sign. Due to variations in letter depth and formal variants, reading and interpreting the text remains difficult.

Text, Reading, and Interpretation

The letter transliteration of the inscription is given as l¹wkn¹k¹r / ²zk¹. Based on this, two primary readings have been proposed:

• ḳaz er ḳan ḳul
• ḳazar ḳan ḳul^【1】

The second reading stands out as it may mean “servant of the Khazar Khan.” This interpretation aligns with historical views suggesting that the early Oghuz political structure was connected to the Khazar Khaganate. Nevertheless, the reading and interpretation remain controversial, particularly due to exceptional features in the spelling of the word ḳul, and have not yet achieved consensus.

Seal

The mark composed of three wavy lines beneath the inscription is thought to possibly represent an Oghuz tribal seal. Although it does not exactly match any known classical Oghuz tribal seals, it shows partial similarities to symbols associated with certain historical Turkic tribes.

It has also been suggested that this symbol may represent a pictorial reference to the river flowing near the Kültöbe settlement.

Dating

The dating of the inscription has been established based on its archaeological context and the settlement history of the region. Archaeological studies in the Syr Darya (Seyhun) basin indicate that the Oghuz settled in this area during the 9th century and largely migrated out by the early 11th century. Additionally, the possible reference to the Khazar Khan in the inscription corresponds chronologically with the period of the Khazar Khaganate’s prominence, between the 7th and 10th centuries. For these reasons, the Kültöbe Inscription is generally dated to the 9th–10th centuries.

Historical and Cultural Significance

The significance of the Kültöbe Inscription lies in its concrete demonstration that the Oghuz Turks used Turkic writing prior to the Seljuk and Islamic periods.^【2】 This discovery necessitates a reevaluation of the widespread view that Oghuz Turkic only became a written language in the 13th century. As a primary source of information on the early Oghuz writing culture, political affiliations, and symbolic expressions, the inscription has become a foundational resource for Turkic historiography and epigraphy.