Uriankhai

Uriankhai (traditional Mongolian: , Mongolian Cyrillic: урианхай; урааҥхай; ), Uriankhan (, урианхан) or Uriankhat (, урианхад), is a term of address applied by the Mongols to a group of forest peoples of the North, who include the Turkic-speaking Tuvans and Yakuts, while sometimes it is also applied to the Mongolian-speaking Altai Uriankhai. The Uriankhai included the western forest Uriankhai tribe and the transbaikal Uriankhai tribe, with the former recorded in Chinese sources as 兀良哈 (pinyin: Wùliánghā). The name "Uriankhai' means "uria" (motto, war motto) and khan (lord) in Mongolian. The Mongols applied the name to all the forest peoples and, later, to Tuvans. They were classified by the Mongols as . At the beginning of the Mongol Empire (1206-1368), the Uriankhai were located in central Mongolia. In 13th century Yuan China, Rashid-al-Din Hamadani described the Forest Uriyankhai as extremely isolated Siberian forest people living in birch bark tents and hunting on skis. Despite the similarity in name to the famous Uriyankhan clan of the Mongols, Rashid states that they had no connection. During the Ming dynasty, the Jurchens were known among the Chinese as "forest people" (using the Jurchen word, Woji), and this connotation later transferred to the Chinese rendering of Uriankhai, Wulianghai. In the mid-14th century, they lived in Liaoyang in Northeast China. In 1375, Naghachu, Uriankhai leader of the Mongol-led Northern Yuan dynasty in Liaoyang, invaded the Liaodong Peninsula to restore the Mongols to power. Although he continued to hold southern Manchuria, the Ming military campaign against Naghachu ended with his surrender in 1388. After the rebellion of the northern Uriankhai people, they were conquered by Dayan Khan in 1538 and mostly annexed by the northern Khalkha. Batmunkh Dayan Khan dissolved Uriankhai tumen. The second group of Uriankhai (Uriankhai of the Khentii Mountains) lived in central Mongolia and they started moving to the Altai Mountains in the beginning of the 16th century.