Kingdom of Khazaria Khazar Qağanate 618?–1048? Khazar Khaganate, 650–850 Capital Balanjar (650-820?) Atil (820-ca.967-969) Languages Turkic Khazar Religion Tengriism, Shamanism, Christianity,[1] Slavic Paganism, Judaism,[2] and Islam Political structure Khazar Qağanate Khagan - 618–628 Tong Yabghu - 9th century Obadiah - 9th century Zachariah - 9th century Bulan - 9th century Benjamin - 9th century Aaron - 9th century Khan Tuvan - 10th century Joseph - 10th century Manasseh Historical era Middle Ages - Established 618? - Disestablished 1048? Population - 7th century[3] est. 1,400,000 Currency Yarmaq History of the Turkic peoples Pre-14th century Turkic Khaganate 552–744 Western Turkic Eastern Turkic Avar Khaganate 564–804 Khazar Khaganate 618–1048 Old Great Bulgaria 632–668 Volga Bulgaria Turgesh Khaganate 699–766 Uyghur Khaganate 744–840 Kara-Khanid Khanate 840–1212 Western Kara-Khanid Eastern Kara-Khanid Pecheneg Khanates 860–1091 Kimek Khanate 743–1035 Kipchak Khanates 1067–1239 Oghuz Yabgu State 750–1055 Shatuo Dynasties 923–979 Later Tang Dynasty Later Jin Dynasty Later Han Dynasty (Northern Han) Ghaznavid Empire 963–1186 Seljuq Empire 1037–1194 Khwarezmian Empire 1077–1231 Seljuq Sultanate of Rum 1092–1307 Delhi Sultanate 1206–1526 Mamluk Dynasty Khilji Dynasty Tughlaq Dynasty Cairo Sultanate 1250–1517 Bahri Dynasty Other Turkic Dynasties in Anatolia Artuqid Dynasty Saltuqid Dynasty in Azerbaijan Ahmadili Dynasty Ildenizid Dynasty in Egypt Tulunid Dynasty Ikhshidid Dynasty in The Levant Burid Dynasty Zengid Dynasty This box: view talk edit The Khazars (Greek: Χάζαροι, Hebrew: כוזרים (Kuzarim),[4] Turkish: Hazarlar, Tatar: Xäzärlär, Arabic: خزر (khazar), Russian: Хазары, Persian: خزر,Latin: Gazari[5][6]/Cosri[7]/Gasani[8][9]) were a semi-nomadic Turkic people who created the most powerful Western steppe empire, Khazaria, between the late 7th and 10th centuries. Astride one of the major arteries of commerce between northern Europe and southwestern Asia, Khazaria became one of the foremost trading emporia of the medieval world, commanding the western marches of the Silk Road and played a key commercial role as a crossroad between China, the Middle East, and European Russia.[10][11] For some three centuries (c. 650–965) the Khazars dominated the vast area extending from the Volga-Don steppes to the eastern Crimea and the northern Caucasus[12] Khazaria long served as a buffer state between the Byzantine empire and both the nomads of the northern steppes and the Umayyad empire, after serving as Byzantiums proxy against the Sassanid Persian empire. The alliance was dropped around 900 CE., as Byzantium began to encourage the Alans to attack Khazaria and weaken its hold on Crimea and the Caucasus, while seeking to obtain an entente with the rising Rus power to Khazarias north, which it aspired to convert to Christianity.[13] Between 965 and 969, the Kievan Rus ruler Sviatoslav I of Kiev conquered the capital Atil and destroyed the Khazar state. Beginning in the 8th century, the Khazar royalty and notable segments of the aristocracy converted to Judaism; the populace appears to have been multi-confessional—a mosaic of pagan, Muslim, Jewish and Christian worshippers—and polyethnic.[14] A modern theory, that the core of Ashkenazi Jewry emerged from a hypothetical Khazarian Jewish diaspora, is generally treated with scepticism. This Khazarian hypothesis is sometimes associated with antisemitism and anti-Zionism. Khazars were known as the eastern Turks by Byzantines.[15] Origins and languages Tribal origins and early history Rise of the Khazar stateEdit An embryonic state of Khazaria began to form sometime after 630,[38] when it emerged from the breakdown of the larger Göktürk qağanate. Göktürk armies had penetrated the Volga by 549, ejecting the Avars, who were then forced to flee to the sanctuary of the Hungarian plain. The Āshǐnà clan whose tribal name was ‘Türk’ (the strong one) appear on the scene by 552, when they overthrew the Rourans and established the Göktürk qağanate.[39] By 568, these Göktürks were probing for an alliance with Byzantium to attack Persia. An internecine war broke out between the senior eastern Göktürks and the junior West Turkic Qağanate some decades later, when on the death of Taspar Qağan, a succession dispute led to a dynastic crisis between Taspar’s chosen heir, the Apa Qağan, and the ruler appointed by the tribal high council, Āshǐnà Shètú (阿史那摄图), the Ishbara Qağan. By the first decades of the 7th century, the Āshǐnà yabgu Tong managed to stabilize the Western division, but on his death, after providing crucial military assistance to Byzantium in routing the Sassanid army in the Persian heartland,[40][41] the Western Turkic Qağanate dissolved under pressure from the encroaching Tang dynasty armies and split into two competing federations, each consisting of five tribes, collectively known as the “Ten Arrows” (On Oq). Both briefly challenged Tang hegemony in eastern Turkestan. To the West, two new nomadic states arose in the meantime, the Bulğar conferation, under Qubrat, the Duōlù clan leader, and the Nǔshībì subconfederation, also consisting of five tribes.[42] The Duōlù challenged the Avars in the Kuban River-Sea of Azov area while the Khazar Qağanate consolidated further westwards, led apparently by an Āshǐnà dynasty. With a resounding victory over the tribes in 657, engineered by General Sū Dìngfāng (蘇定方), Chinese overlordship was imposed to their East after a final mop-up operation in 659, but the two confederations of Bulğars and Khazars fought for supremacy on the western steppeland, and with the ascendency of the latter, the former either succumbed to Khazar rule or, as under Asperukh, Qubrat’s son, shifted even further west across the Danube to lay the foundations of the Bulğar state in the Balkans (c. 679).[43][44] The Qağanate of the Khazars thus took shape out of the ruins of this nomadic empire as it broke up under pressure from the Tang dynasty armies to the east sometime between 630-650.[36] After their conquest of the lower Volga region to the East and an area westwards between the Danube and the Dniepr, and their subjugation of the Onoğur -Bulğar union, sometime around 670, a properly constituted Khazar Qağanate emerges,[45] becoming the westernmost successor state of the formidable Göktürk Qağanate after its disintegration. According to Omeljan Pritsak, the language of the Onoğur-Bulğar federation was to become the lingua franca of Khazaria[46] as it developed into what Lev Gumilev called a steppe Atlantis (stepnaja Atlantida/ Степная Атлантида).[47] The high status soon to be accorded this empire to the north is attested by Ibn al-Balḫî’s Fârsnâma (c. 1100), which relates that the Sassanid Shah, Ḫusraw 1, Anûsîrvân, placed three thrones by his own, one for the King of China, a second for the King of Byzantium, and a third for the king of the Khazars. Though anachronistic in retrodating the Khazars to this period, the legend, in placing the Khazar qağan on a throne with equal status to kings of the other two superpowers, bears witness to the reputation won by the Khazars from early times.[48][49] The Khazar state: culture and institutions Khazars and Byzantium Arab–Khazar wars The rise of the Rus and the collapse of the Khazarian state Aftermath: Impact, decline and dispersion Ashkenazi-Khazar theories Genetic studiesEdit See also: Ashkenazi Jews#Genetic origins and Genetic studies on Jews The hypothesis of Khazarian ancestry in Ashkenazi has also been a subject of discussion in the new field of population genetics, wherein claims have been made concerning evidence both for and against it. The general conclusion is that, if traces of descent from Khazars exist in the Ashkenazi gene pool, the contribution would be quite minor,[290][291][292][293][294] or insignificant.[295] Eran Elhaik has recently argued however for a significant Khazar component, using Caucasian populations, Georgians, Armenians and Azerbaijanis, as proxies.[255] According to Nadia Abu El-Haj, the issues of origins are generally complicated by the difficulties of writing history via genome studies and the biases of emotional investments in different narratives, depending on whether the emphasis lies on direct descent or on conversion within Jewish history. The lack of Khazar DNA samples that might allow verification also present difficulties
Posted on: Wed, 27 Nov 2013 16:09:15 +0000