Yugur

The Yugurs, known as the Yellow Uyghurs, are a Turkic-Mongol pastoral people of the Qilian foothills in Gansu. Their Turkic-speaking clans trace to the Old Uyghurs of the Orkhon, and the Yaglakar tribe claims descent from the Uyghur royal house. After the Uyghur Khaganate collapsed in 840, one branch fled south and built the Ganzhou Uyghur Kingdom, overrun by Western Xia in 1036.

After Subutai's conquest they were ruled by Mongol princes, some adopting a Mongolic tongue. Ming guards withdrew inside the Jiayu Pass after defeats, and the Yugurs migrated east; the Qing organized them as seven Yellow Fan tribes.

They kept their Tibetan Buddhist faith, adopting the Gelug order in the late sixteenth century and building Gufo monastery in the late Ming, while retaining shamanist cults of Khan Tengri. The Old Uyghur alphabet remained in religious use until the 1680s.