The Khitan契丹

The state of the Khitan lies east of the Kumo Xi. They and the Kumo Xi are of different stock but of one kind. Both were broken by Murong Huang, and both fled to the region of Songmo. In the Dengguo years Wei broke them utterly, and they scattered in flight and settled apart from the Kumo Xi. After some tens of years they spread little by little and had settlements, and they robbed and plundered several hundred li north of Helong. From Zhenjun on they offered famous horses every year. In the time of Xianwen they sent Mofuhehechen to come and present gifts, and he was given a place at the feast at the end of all the states. When he went back they spoke to one another of the beauty of the state, and their hearts were all glad and full of longing; and at this the many Di of the northeast heard of it, and there was none who did not think of submitting. The tribes of Xiwandan, Hedahe, Fufuyu, Yuling, Rilian, Pijie, Li, and Tuliugan each offered their famous horses and figured hides to the heavenly treasury (天府), and asked at last that it be the rule; and all of them were allowed to trade between Helong and Miyun, and their tribute did not break off. In the third year of Taihe, Goguryeo plotted in secret with the Rouran, wishing to take the Didougan and divide it between them. The Khitan had long borne a grudge for their inroads, and their mohefu Wugan led his settlements, three thousand carts and more than ten thousand people, driving their livestock of all kinds, and asked to come in and submit, and they stopped east of the Bailang River. From this time they came to court with tribute every year. Afterwards they reported a famine, and Xiaowen let them come into the frontier market to buy grain. In the time of Xuanwu and Xiaoming they always sent envoys with the products of their land. In the Xiping years, when the Khitan officer Chuzhen and thirty others were going home, the Empress Dowager Ling, because in their custom blue felt (靑氈) is the upper garment at a wedding, gave each man two bolts of blue felt to reward their loyal heart, and for the rest had them bring tribute by the old form. When Qi received the abdication of the Eastern Wei, it was never broken off.

In the ninth month of the fourth year of Tianbao the Khitan crossed the frontier, and Emperor Wenxuan led the army north against them in person. He came to Pingzhou and then turned west toward Changqian, and he ordered the situ Pan Xiangle to lead five thousand picked horsemen by the eastern road toward Qingshan, and ordered Han Gui, Prince of Ande, to lead four thousand picked horsemen eastward and cut off the road by which the Khitan would flee. The emperor crossed the mountain ridges himself, struck with all his force, and broke them utterly, taking more than a hundred thousand people and several hundred thousand head of livestock of all kinds. Xiangle broke another Khitan tribe at Qingshan as well. The captives taken alive were all divided among the provinces. Afterwards the Khitan were pressed again by the Tujue, and they put ten thousand households in the keeping of Goryeo.

Their customs are the same as the Malgal's, and they love to rob and plunder. One who weeps in grief when his father or mother dies is held to be unmanly. They only set the body in a tree on a mountain, and after three years have passed they gather the bones and burn them. Then they pour out wine and pray, saying, "In the winter months let me eat facing the sun. When I go hunting, let me take many pigs and deer." In their want of manners and their stubborn wildness they are the worst of all the Yi.

In the fourth year of Kaihuang of the Sui they led their mohefu and came to an audience. In the fifth year they brought their whole host in loyalty to the frontier, and Emperor Wen received them and let them live in their old land. He rebuked them, and their country sent an envoy to the palace gate to knock his forehead on the ground and beg pardon. Afterwards Chufu and others of a separate Khitan tribe turned their backs on Goryeo and led their host in to submit. Emperor Wen saw them come and pitied them; but he was then on good terms with the Tujue, and held it a heavy thing to lose the hearts of far-off men, so he had them all given grain and sent back to their own tribe, and charged the Tujue to soothe them and take them in. They refused firmly and would not go. Their settlements grew many little by little, and at last they moved north and followed the water and the grass, two hundred li due north of Liaoxi, and lived leaning on the Tuohechen River, stretching three hundred li from east to west, and divided into ten tribes. The greatest had three thousand soldiers, the least a thousand and more. They follow the cold and the heat and pasture their herds after the water and the grass. When there is a campaign the chiefs come together and take counsel over it, and in raising soldiers and moving the host they fit together like the halves of a tally. Shabolue Kagan of the Tujue sent the tutun Panxie to govern them, and the Khitan killed the tutun and fled. In the seventh year of Daye they sent an envoy to court and offered the products of their land.