Good Barbarians

Good Barbarians or Guoyi was an official term used by successive Daxian dynasties to refer to outside peoples who paid tribute but were considered to have no true civilization as the Daxians understood it. Classical studies of Imperial Daxia and its interactions with foreigners by western historians tended to think that Daxian imperial authorities classified all outsiders under the same category of barbarians but more recently discovered imperial historical records and translations of scholarly texts from the Zhong dynasty onwards make clear the distinction of the Guoyi from other foreigners. Some recently recovered imperial tallies include the term alongside the names of Kochok Khan and Desai Khan, the twelfth and sixteenth rulers respectivelly of the Degei Confederation who were known to be vassals of the Zhong dynasty. From this it can be concluded that Daxia not only used the term in its internal communications but also bestowed it as a title or reward to some of its tributaries. It could also be withdrawn during times of tumult, Li Xian's Chronicle of Hunyu recounts the history of the Degei after the death of Darukh Khan and notably in his successors titles, Guoyi is omitted and they are simply mentioned as uncultured barbarians outside of imperial munificence. Levantian and Sarpedonian diplomats who usually came to the empire bearing gifts were often given in return an untranslated wooden tablet awarding them the status of good barbarian subjects and enjoining them to collect and bring more tribute. For obvious reasons this status was never something that could be practically enforced and served mostly to humilliate foreigners.

Historical context

Ancient Daxians saw their civilization as an island among a sea of lesser things, this notion of superiority was rooted in the efficiency of their bureaucratized state that allowed them to operate at a higher level than their neighbors who had different administrative and organizational traditions. In their immediate vicinity, Daxian culture, language and dress came to be emulated to varying degrees and yet those who mimicked them were still seen as ultimately inferior; further proof of the inadequacy of their own cultures. There are even scattered sources of an ancient ranking system used for non-Daxians, that might today be considered little more than a list of slurs. The 'good barbarian' term first emerges in Xie dynasty accounts of their interactions with the Qifu people, these are described as 'very much unlike the cultured Daxian but still these good barbarians are eminently honorable, cordial and of beneficent nature'; importantly a separate document describes in exacting detail the amounts of tribute the Qifu submitted to the imperial court. Conversely the local Tuang people get no such glowing praise and are simply described as a 'morally destitute people, of small minds, weak limbs and treacherous notions', there are no surviving records indicating the Tuang people ever gave tribute or submitted to imperial authority. It follows then that the label of a 'Good Barbarian' during the Xie dynasty was simply a differentiator between those who gave tribute and submitted to Daxia's rule and those who resisted doing so.

The scope of the term was narrowed down during the Zhong dynasty; it was only applied to peoples who were principally nomadic in their lifestyle, settled tributary peoples were no longer considered barbarians. Chief among these nomads were the Degei, the Mangids and the Hurch; these nations held the title of Guoyi for only a few short decades at a time before commencing hostilities or kidnapping imperial officials. There were attempts to 'uplift' the elites of the nomadic peoples by allowing them to intermarry with Daxian nobility and giving them gifts to entice them to settle down. These attempts proved fruitless in the long term as the tribes chafed at being penned in and controlled, only catastrophic military defeat and near ethnic cleansing brought about the imperial desire of changing the 'good barbarians' into more 'civilized' people. A notable characteristic associated to the Guoyi was the paternalistic approach of the empire to towards these subjects. When interacting with Guoyi, the representatives of imperial authority styled themselves as 'ambassadors of the Great Heavenly Father of a million steeds'. Since in these nomad societies the paternal figure was paramount as a source of authority in the familial unit and his station within the wider clan was dictated by how many horses he kept, the empire saw an advantage in giving the emperor a suitably impressive title in all dealings with nomads. As the empire grew in size, the 'Great Heavenly Father' went from ten thousand steeds to a million steeds to reflect the empire's greater power. The giving of gifts was framed as the act of a loving and generous parent giving boons to his own children. Likewise in times of conflict, many nomad rulers took to justfying their hostility as not being directed at the Great Father himself but at malicious counselors and lying ambassadors, once these were gone there would obviously be a great reconciliation with the Great Father. Frequent usage of the term and the usual gift giving were dropped from imperial diplomatic custom after a meeting where the Hurch representatives cursed the emperor as a thrice damned devil and killed his envoys.

Zhong Dynasty

The Zhong dynasty continued the use of the term beyond the Degei in their dealings with nomadic peoples to their north. They gave the title to the Menkukids of the Khingan emirate, a nomadic muslim people who ruled over settled muslims. After the defeat of Darukh Khan, the depletion of Degei military power left a vacuum on the steppe that the Hurch tribes sought to exploit by moving into the lands of their former overlords and taking them over. Facing defeat the surviving Degei clans sought urgent help from the empire and submitted to it and were termed Guoyi, in a 'provisional' arrangement so they would not be attacked or pillaged by imperial forces. The crisis was ended when Zhong envoys were dispatched and paid the Hurch to instead divert their march to the west and attack the Myanga Ayil Khanate. The Hurch were considered to be physically too distant from existing imperial borders to be reliably turned into tribute paying vassals and too wild and disorganized to ever be militarily trusted; paying them off and directing their attention to other prizes was thought a reliable tactic. The failure to deal with the Hurch decisively by defeating them or by bringing them into the imperial fold would backfire later during the Hurch invasion of Tanhai province.

Qian Dynasty

The Qian dynasty stopped the usage of the term in the 19th century during a period of increased chauvisnism and military expansion. Minister Cao Pian under the Chuanwei Emperor is reputed to have said: "We have been too soft and permissive with these crafty goat herders, henceforth they shall be treated as befits their nature". This assertion inaugurated an era of sustained warfare against all the nomad peoples on the periphery of the empire known as the Six Bloody Marches; Qian armies campaigned relentlessly, uprooted several long-lasting nomad dynasties and enacted brutal massacres of civilian populations. The western marches of Guangbei, the former heartlands of the Degei confederation and other fringe areas were heavily depopulated and even the Hurch were forced to flee north for a time as their grasslands were set on fire and their herds slaughtered. The Qian state drew on past experiences with nomadic societies and came to the conclusion that their existence was not compatible with Daxian prosperity and tranquility. Despite the ferocity of the Six Bloody Marches, the Hurch would survive as a distinct ethnicity; they would regroup and counterattack one hundred years later, showcasing that aggressive Qian frontier policies had failed.