alMulaqs

alMulaqs is a term used in speculative fiction and alternative-history scholarship to describe a hypothetical ancient pastoralist confederation in Central Asia and the eastern Iranian plateau. The concept appears in various works as a shorthand for a network of tribes that supposedly managed caravan routes before the rise of large urban states along the early Silk Road.

In these narratives, the alMulaqs are imagined as occupying a broad belt from the eastern Iranian plateau through the Ferghana Valley to the Syr Darya watershed. They are typically portrayed as horse-based riders with a flexible, nomadic leadership that formed shifting alliances and engaged in long-distance trade with sedentary communities, rather than creating a centralized empire.

Economy and technology in the imagined account emphasize pastoralism and seasonal markets, along with bronze metallurgy and the use of wheeled transport. Some depictions credit the alMulaqs with innovations in horsemanship and caravan logistics. Language is usually treated as a fictional or reconstructed tongue, with occasional references to a hypothetical writing system and limited inscriptions found in oasis sites; however, such linguistic material is part of worldbuilding rather than established archaeology.

Legacy and reception of the alMulaqs in fiction and study scenes position them as a narrative device to explain early cross-cultural contact along precursor networks to later Silk Road exchanges. They appear in novels, role-playing games, and worldbuilding resources as a template for imagining how nomadic and sedentary societies might interact in prehistoric and protohistoric contexts.