ABSTRACT
In the course of their expansion into Central Asia the Muslims came into contact with Turks, either settled and Iranized or else nomadic and marauding in their mode of life. Trade relations between Muslim and Turk, however, continued and, through these relations as well as through other contacts of Turks with Muslims, Islamic influences, found their way to the Turks. This penetration was especially important in relation to the Northern Turks with whom the Muslims did not have the same contacts that they had with the Western Turks. Turkish language prevailed over the local ones; owing to their use of the Turkish language even non-Turks came to be considered as Turks. The sources, in one respect alone, seem to have some awareness of a relation between the Turks of Mutasim and the Turks in general—an awareness not that the former were the heralds of the Turkish wave, but an awareness of them as fearless, dangerous, and uncivilized nomads.
