Kyrgyz people

The Kyrgyz people (also spelled Kyrghyz and Kirghiz) are a Turkic nation that live primarily in Kyrgyzstan.

Etymology

There are several theories on the origin of ethnonym Kyrgyz. It can be derived from the Turkic word kyrk ("forty"), with -iz being an old plural suffix, so Kyrgyz literally means "a collection of forty tribes".

Kyrgyz also means "imperishable", "inextinguishable", "immortal", "unconquerable" or "unbeatable", presumably referring to the epic hero Manas, who – as legend has it – unified the forty tribes against the Khitans.

The Chinese transcription Tse-gu (Gekun, Jiankun) allows to restore the pronunciation of the ethnonym as Kirkut (Kirgut) and Kirkur (Kirgur). Both forms go back to the earliest variation Kirkün (Chinese Tszyan-kun) of the term "Kyrgyz", meaning "Field People", "Field Huns".

By the Mongol epoch, the initial meaning of the word Kirkun was already lost, evidenced by differing readings of the earlier reductions of the Yuán Shǐ. The change of ethnonym produced a new version of an origin, and the memory about their steppe motherland, recorded in the Yuán Shǐ, survived only as a recollection of the initial birthplace of forty women. Subsequently, however, that recollection was also lost.