Argyn


The Argyn tribe is a constituent of the Kazakh ethnicity. The present-day Argyns of Kazakhstan are generally regarded as descended from a nomadic people known as the Basmyl and both names are said to mean "mixed tribe". The Argyn are a component, of the Orta jüz. Kazakhs historically consisted of three tribal federations: the Great jüz, Middle jüz, and Little jüz.
Argyns are of mixed origins. A historical bilingual, yet steadily Turkicizing, people, Basmyls, likely contributed to the ethnogenesis of Argyns because both Basmyls and Argyns occupied roughly the same geographic location, in Beiting Protectorate, where Basmyls made their first recorded appearace and which is now in western China, and still home to a Kazakh minority. Kara-Khanid scholar Mahmud al-Kashgari wrote that Basmyls spoke their own language besides Turkic.
The name of the Argyns probably corresponds to that of the "Argons" mentioned by Marco Polo in a country called "Tenduc" during the 13th century. Polo reported that this clan who had "sprung from two different races: to wit, of the race of the Idolaters of Tenduc and... the worshippers of Mahommet. They are handsomer men than the other natives of the country, and having more ability, they come to have authority; and they are also capital merchants."
A 2013 study on Argyns genetics identifies twenty Y-chromosome DNA haplogroups: of these, G1a-P20 constitutes 71% of 2186 samples; R1a*-M198 6%, C3c-M48 5%, C3* - M217 3%; and other haplogroups represent less than three percent. The authors noted that "Tribe Argyn took on graph an isolated position, demonstrating the absence of genetic links with other Kazakh tribes."