Hūrga

The Hūrga, also called Kurka in Chinese records, were Tungusic clans of the Wild, or Haidong, Jurchens, named after the Hurka River. In the fourteenth century they ranged forests and marshes from the middle Sungari and Mudan valley to the Ussuri and Amur.

They lived by fishing and hunting, dressed in sewn fish skins like their Nanai kinsmen, kept pigs with little agriculture, and followed a shamanic religion centred on the bear and the tiger.

The Hūrga kept apart from the Ming tribute system longer than the Jianzhou and Haixi Jurchens, and after Nurhaci began unifying the Jurchens, his banners campaigned against them from the 1590s; Amur Hūrga clans fought under their own chiefs before submitting to Hong Taiji in 1631. Many captives and submitted clans were moved south into Manchu banners, while those who stayed became the Nanai, Udege and Oroqen.