not as in the case of the Turks. He also adds that Turk system of beliefs linking at least some sections of the Turk ruling class to the Sogdians and, beyond them, to the Wusun. Funeral rite The Chronicle of Northern Zhou describes the funeral rites of the Ashina. The deceased were laid to rest in a tent, and animals would be sacrificed around the tent. Relatives of the deceased would ride horses around the tent and ritualistically cut themselves about the face as a display of mourning, or "blood tears". The individual and their belongings would then be incinerated. According to D. G. Savinov, no burials in South Siberia nor Central Asia that are fully consistent with the description of Ashina burials have been found. According to D. G. Savinov this may be for several reasons: Göktürk burial sites in Central Asia and Southern Siberia are not yet open; The source is a compilation in character, and burial rituals and funeral cycle from various sources are listed in a unified manner; Göktürk funeral rites in the form in which they are recorded in written sources, developed later on the basis of the various components present in some of the archaeological sites of Southern Siberia of earlier Turkic cultures. It is thought that the rite of cremation which was adopted by the ruling elite did not spread among the common people of the Qaganate. This may be attributed to the different ethnic origin of the ruling family. Physical appearance According to the Book of Zhou and History of the Northern Dynasties, the Ashina clan was related to the "Yenisei Kyrgyz",Beishi, "vol. 99 - section Tujue" who resided near the Pamir mountains and are described as possessing red hair and blue eyes in the New Book of Tang (Xin Tangshu 217b.6147), a description previously used to describe the Wusun. However according to Lee & Kuang (2017), the Göktürks differed from the Qirghiz in their physiognomy and "no comparable depiction of the Kök Türks or Tiele is found in the official Chinese histories." Lee & Kuang state that the most likely explanation for the West Eurasian physiognomy of the Yenisei Kirghiz is a high frequency of the Eurasian Indo-European haplogroup R1a-Z93. Muqan Qaghan, the third Qaghan of the First Turkic Khaganate, was described by Chinese authors as having an unusual appearance. He had eyes like "colored glazes", he had a red complexion,