Kutadgu

Kutadgu Bilig, commonly translated as The Wisdom That Brings Happiness or The Wisdom of Happiness, is an 11th-century Turkic didactic work attributed to Yusuf Balasaghuni, also known as Yusuf Has Hacip. Composed in Old Turkic during the Karakhanid period, it is dated to roughly 1069–1080 CE and was produced at the court in Balasagun, in Transoxiana. It is one of the earliest major literary works in Turkic and a foundational example of the mirror-for-princes genre in Central Asian and Turkic literatures.

The work presents a frame narrative in which a young prince receives guidance from a wise adviser and other personified virtues. Through dialogue and parables, it addresses governance, ethics, education, justice, piety, and social harmony. The text emphasizes the duties of rulers and the responsibilities of subjects, promoting prudent governance, generosity, humility, and religious tolerance within an Islamic context. It blends Turkic moral philosophy with Persian and Arabic intellectual influences.

Written in Karakhanid Turkic and using the Arabic script, the composition interweaves prose and poetry and is noted for its concise, formal register. Its structured discourse on statecraft, virtue, and social order helped establish norms for leadership and administration in Turkic-speaking realms.

Manuscripts and later reception show that Kutadgu Bilig circulated across Turkic and Persian-speaking worlds. It exerted a significant influence on later Turkic literature and the adab and “mirror for princes” traditions in Central Asia and the Ottoman world, and it has been studied as a key source for early Turkic linguistics and political ethics.