The HU

‘The HU’ (2016-) of Mongolia fuse nomadic folk music with heavy metal, a style they call Hunnu Rock.  Throat singing with double kick. I usually don’t listen to metal, or Mongolian folk for that matter, but combined it is something else. Over a heavy and hard hitting rhythm, they sing lyrics from Mongolian poetry and battle cries of old. Hey traitor, bow down!

The band:

• Gala – lead throat singer and morin khuur (horsehead fiddle)
• Enkush – lead morin khuur and throat singer
• Jaya – tumor khuur (jaw harp), tsuur (Mongolian flute) and throat singer
• Temka – tovshuur (two stringed, horsetail lute)

All four instruments date back to at least the 1200s. Four extra musicians provide backing vocals, drum and bass.

‘Wolf Totem’, their first single, was released in November 2018. It shot to number one on iTunes and garnered 14 million views on Youtube. Their second single, ‘Yuve Yuve Yu’, has 20 million. A third, ‘Shoog Shoog’ was released in June, and their debut album Gereg is upcoming. Since 2018 the Hu have played 23 shows in Europe and met the Mongolian Prime Minister.  They are the most successful act to ever come from that country.

The HU (not to be confused with the better-known ‘Who’) is the Mongol root-word for ‘human’. In Chinese it means ‘barbarian’ –what their histories dubbed the Mongols, Xiongnu and other steppe peoples.  The Mongols, by the way, called the ancient Xiongnu ‘Hunnu’, yet more evidence they were the Huns.

Music is a key component of life on the steppe. In the 1980s western rock found an audience among the youth of communist Mongolia. When the wall fell, it surged. The Hu seek to preserve and renew the Mongolian musical tradition. They do more than add a Mongol tinge to metal, they make it their own.

See Also:

• The Xiongnu

The Xiongnu

The Xiongnu were the first nomadic empire and the greatest threat China had faced. From 209 BC to AD 89 they ruled a confederacy of nomadic tribes and tributary states across the Asian Steppe. Xiongnu horsemen combined the composite bow and iron stirrups to devastating effect and the echoes of their fall were felt as far as India and Rome.

The Xiongnu’s origin is uncertain. They could have been Turkic, proto-Mongol, Iranian or Siberian. Like other steppe peoples, they were shamanists who worshipped their ancestors, the sun, moon and sky. The only written records come from the Chinese, who viewed them with contempt.

The Xiongnu enter Chinese history as nomads in the Yellow River’s northern bend. Their first known leader, or chanyu, was called Touman. His warriors pillaged China until Qin Shi Huangdi, the first emperor, pushed the Xiongnu into the Gobi Desert and constructed the Great Wall of China to keep them out.

Huangdi died in 210 BC and his dynasty followed. In 209 BC, Touman was murdered by his son Maodun. A ruthless and charismatic figure, Maodun Chanyu united the northern tribes and founded an empire. He expelled the Yuezhi, a rival people, from western China, subjugated the cities of the Tarim Basin, and crushed a Chinese army. Instead of invading, however, he held the country ransom.

The Han Dynasty placated the Xiongnu with gold and princesses. Maodun’s people grew accustomed to southern riches and took to wearing silk and living in Chinese style homes. They built cities, kept slaves and farmed but never lost their warlike edge. Along with Chinese tribute, the Xiongnu controlled the Silk Road, trading horses from Mongolia, furs from Siberia and jade from the Altai Mountains. They left burial mounds full of tapestries and golden ornaments.

The Han-Xiongnu War began in 129 BC. The humiliating treaties cost China dearly and were often ignored by Xiongnu raiders. Defeating them in battle, however, required matching the Xiongnu strategy. China had few horses of its own.

Emperor Wu dispatched explorer Zhang Qian westward to propose an alliance with the Yuezhi, now based in Afghanistan. They refused. Next, he contacted the city Dayuan, hitherto unknown and far to the west. Its inhabitants were Greek speakers, remnants of Alexander’s conquest, and they bred powerful steeds.

In the War for Heavenly Horses, Emperor Wu acquired 3,000 mounts from Dayuan (and conquered the Tarim Basin). With them he equipped a new cavalry corps, armed with bows and lances in the Xiongnu style.

Buttressed by their ‘Heavenly Horses’, a 40,000 strong Han army thrust into the Xiongnu heartland and defeated them in 119 BC during a sandstorm. The Xiongnu collapsed into civil war and the Han gained the upper hand.

The southern branch were conquered In AD 89. They arose again in the 300s, settled in China and assimilated.

The northern Xiongnu, meanwhile, were forced west. They are mentioned once more then disappear from the pages of history.

Or did they? Three centuries later the nomadic Huns appeared on the fringes of Europe. Could they, the despoilers of Rome, have been a Xiongnu remnant, their proud history lost in the long migration west?  Since Joesph de Guignes in the 17^th century, scholars have thought so, though many disagree.

Roman, Buddhist and Hindu writers all report nomadic invasions after the fall of the Xiongnu. Each group may or may not have been their descendants:

• 89 – Northern Xiongnu leave Mongolia
• 153 – Northern Xiongnu in western China
• 350 – Xionites invade Persia
• 370 – Huns invade Europe
• 440 – Svetta Huna (White Huns) invade Central Asia
•  470 – Svetta Huna invade India

Sources: Encyclopaedia Iranica, John Man – Attila: The Barbarian King Who Challenged Rome, Silkroad, Wikimedia Commons

See Also:

• Steppe People
  
• Attila the Hun