Orkhon inscriptions, Ancient stone inscriptions in Orkhon Valley, Mongolia.
The Orkhon inscriptions are two tall stone tablets standing in a remote stretch of valley, showing Old Turkic script and Chinese characters. Each tablet rests on a stone base and carries texts carved into all four sides.
The monuments were raised in the 8th century to commemorate Kül Tigin and Bilge Khagan, two leaders of the Göktürk people. The texts tell of their deeds and the relationship with China under the Tang dynasty.
The names on the tablets honor two brothers who ruled the realm and never forgot their roots in the steppes. You can still see how important the memory of military campaigns and treaties was to the Göktürk people, as they had both carved into stone.
The site lies roughly 50 miles north of Erdene Zuu Monastery in open terrain reached by four-wheel-drive vehicle. Organized tours from Ulaanbaatar simplify the journey and often include a local guide on arrival.
A Danish linguist deciphered the characters in 1893, revealing the oldest known written record of a Turkic language. Before that, no one knew this language had been written down so early.
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