Khazars
Khazar Khaganate | |||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| c. 650–969 | |||||||||||||||||||||
Khazar Khaganate, 650–850 | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Status | Khaganate | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Capital |
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| Common languages | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Religion | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Qaghan | |||||||||||||||||||||
• c. 650 | Irbis | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 8th century | Bulan | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 9th century | Obadiah | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 9th century | Zachariah | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 9th century | Manasseh | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 9th century | Benjamin | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 10th century | Aaron | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 10th century | Joseph | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 10th century | David | ||||||||||||||||||||
• 11th century | Georgios | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Historical era | Middle Ages | ||||||||||||||||||||
• Established | c. 650 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| 969 | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Area | |||||||||||||||||||||
| 850 est.[4] | 3,000,000 km2 (1,200,000 sq mi) | ||||||||||||||||||||
| 900 est.[5] | 1,000,000 km2 (390,000 sq mi) | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Currency | Yarmaq | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| History of the Turkic peoples pre–14th century |
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The Khazars[a] (/ˈxɑːzɑːrz/) were a semi-nomadic Turkic people who established a major commercial empire in the late 6th century CE spanning modern southeastern Russia, southern Ukraine, and western Kazakhstan.[10] It was the most powerful polity to emerge from the break-up of the Western Turkic Khaganate.[11] Astride a major artery of commerce between Eastern Europe and Southwestern Asia, Khazaria became one of the foremost trading empires of the early medieval world, commanding the western marches of the Silk Road and playing a key commercial role as a crossroad between China, the Middle East, and Kievan Rus'.[12][13] 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.[14]
For most of its history, Khazaria served as a buffer state between the Byzantine Empire, the nomads of the northern steppes, and the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates, having previously been Byzantium's proxy against the rival Sasanian Empire. Around 900, the Byzantines began encouraging the Alans to attack Khazaria; this move aimed to weaken Khazar control over Crimea and the Caucasus and facilitate imperial diplomacy and proselytizing towards the powerful Kievan Rus' in the north.[15] By 969, Sviatoslav I of Kiev, the ruler of Kievan Rus', along with his allies, conquered the Khazar capital of Atil, ushering the decline and disintegration of Khazaria by the mid 11th century.
Although they were likely a confederation of different Turkic-speaking peoples,[16] the precise origins and nature of the Khazars are uncertain, since there is no surviving record in the Khazar language and the state was multilingual and polyethnic. Their native religion is thought to have been Tengrism, like that of the North Caucasian Huns and other Turkic peoples, [17] although their multiethnic population seems to have included pagans, Jews, Christians, and Muslims.[18] Although there is evidence that the ruling elite of the Khazars had converted to Rabbinic Judaism in the 8th century,[19] the scope of the conversion to Judaism within the khanate remains uncertain.[20]
The Khazars are variably believed to have contributed to the ethnogenesis of numerous peoples, including the Hazaras, Hungarians, Kazakhs, the Don and Zaporozhian Cossacks, Kumyks, Krymchaks, Crimean Karaites, Csángós, Mountain Jews, and Subbotniks.[21][22][23] The late 19th century saw the emergence of a theory that the core of today's Ashkenazi Jews are descended from a hypothetical Khazarian Jewish diaspora that migrated westward into modern France and Germany. Linguistic and genetic studies have not supported the theory, and despite occasional support, most scholars view it with considerable scepticism.[24][20] The theory is sometimes associated with antisemitism.[25]
In Oghuz Turkic languages, the Caspian Sea is still named the "Khazar Sea", reflecting the enduring legacy of the medieval Khazar state.
- ^ a b c Golden 2006, p. 91.
- ^ Wexler 1996, p. 50.
- ^ Brook 2010, p. 107.
- ^ Turchin, Adams & Hall 2006, p. 222.
- ^ Taagepera 1997, p. 496.
- ^ Luttwak 2009, p. 152.
- ^ Meserve 2009, p. 294, n. 164.
- ^ Petrukhin 2007, p. 255.
- ^ Golden 2018, p. 294.
- ^ Encyclopedia Britannica: Khazar 2020.
- ^ Sneath 2007, p. 25.
- ^ Noonan 1999, p. 493.
- ^ Golden 2011a, p. 65.
- ^ Noonan 1999, p. 498.
- ^ Noonan 1999, pp. 499, 502–503.
- ^ "Khazar | Origin, History, Religion, & Facts | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 8 September 2025.
- ^ Golden 2007a, p. 131.
- ^ Golden 2007a, p. 28.
- ^ Golden 2007a, p. 149.
- ^ a b Behar et al. 2013, pp. 859–900.
- ^ Kizilov 2009, p. 335.
- ^ Patai & Patai 1989, p. 73.
- ^ Wexler 1987, p. 70.
- ^ Wexler 2002, p. 536.
- ^ Davies 1992, p. 242.
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