In the history of the Eurasian steppes in the early medieval era, a major role was played by the ancient Turks. They managed to unite Turkic tribes and reached its peak as the First Turkic Kaganate from 552-745 AD. Ruling huge swaths of the Central Asian Steppe they were pressured on one side from the Chinese and from other non-Turkic nomadic tribes on the other. Eventually internall dynastic strife caused the collapse of the Kaganate into Eastern and Western kaganates.