Khazars

Khazar Khaganate
c. 650–969
Khazar Khaganate, 650–850
Status	Khaganate
Capital	Balanjar (c. 650 – c. 720) Samandar (720–750) Atil (750 – c. 965–969)
Common languages	Oghuric[1] (lingua franca) Old Turkic[1] (dynastic, spoken) Alanian[1] (spoken)
Religion	Judaism[2] Judaizers Tengrism Buddhism Christianity Islam Paganism Religious syncretism[3]
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
• Sviatoslav's sacking and razing of Atil	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
Preceded by Succeeded by Western Turkic Khaganate Old Great Bulgaria Cumania Pechenegs Kievan Rus' Durdzuks Volga Bulgaria Alania

History of the Turkic peoples pre–14th century
Turkic peoples Onogurs Oghuz Turks Saragurs Utigurs Bulgars Sabir Kutrigurs Karluks Kimek Kipchaks Cherniye Klobuki Uyghurs Tatars Kumyks Yakuts Dolgans Krymchaks Crimean Karaites
Turkic Languages Turkish Azerbaijani Uzbek Kazakh Uyghur Turkmen Tatar Kyrgyz Bashkir Chuvash Qasgqai Karakalpak Sakha Kumyk Karachay-Balkar Tuvan Gagauz Karaim Krymchak
Turkic Mythology Belief system: Tengrism and Shamanism Chief gods and goddesses: Kayra and Ülgen Epics and heroes: Ergenekon and Asena Major concepts: Sheka and Grey wolf
Pre-14th century Yenisei Kyrgyz People 202 BCE–13th CE Yenisei Kyrgyz Khaganate Dingling 71 BC–?? AD Tiele (Gaoche) Göktürks First Turkic Khaganate 552–581 Western Turkic Khaganate 581–657 (Tokhara Yabghus, Turk Shahis) Eastern Turkic Khaganate 581–650 Second Turkic Khaganate 682–744 Sabiri People Khazar Khaganate 618–1048 Xueyantuo 628–646 Kangar Union 659–750 Turk Shahi 665-850 Türgesh Khaganate 699–766 Kimek–Kipchak Confederation 743–1035 Uyghur Khaganate 744–840 Oghuz Yabgu State 750–1055 Karluk Yabgu State 756–940 Kara-Khanid Khanate 840–1212 Western Kara-Khanid Eastern Kara-Khanid Ganzhou Uyghur Kingdom 848–1036 Qocho 856–1335 Pecheneg Khanates 860–1091 Ghaznavid Empire 963–1186 Seljuk Empire 1037–1194 Sultanate of Rum Cuman–Kipchak Confederation 1067–1239 Khwarazmian Empire 1077–1231 Kerait Khanate 11th century–13th century Atabegs of Azerbaijan 1136–1225 Delhi Sultanate 1206–1526 Mamluk dynasty Khalji dynasty Tughlaq dynasty Qarlughid Kingdom 1224–1266 Golden Horde 1242–1502 Mamluk Sultanate (Cairo) 1250–1517 Bahri dynasty Ottoman State 1299–1922
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The Khazars^[a] (/ˈxɑːzɑːrz/) were a nomadic Turkic people that, in the late 6th century CE, established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modern European Russia, southern Ukraine, Crimea, and Kazakhstan.^[10] They created what, for its duration, 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]

Khazaria long served as a buffer state between the Byzantine Empire, the nomads of the northern steppes, and the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates, having previously served as the Byzantine Empire's proxy against the Sasanian Empire. The alliance was dissolved around the year 900 when Byzantium began encouraging the Alans to attack Khazaria. This move aimed to weaken Khazaria's control over Crimea and the Caucasus, for the Empire sought an entente with the rising power of the Kievan Rus’ in the north—a region they hoped to convert to Eastern Christianity.^[15] Between 965 and 969, Sviatoslav I of Kiev, the ruler of Kievan Rus', along with his allies, conquered the capital, Atil, thus ending Khazaria's independence.

Determining the origins and nature of the Khazars is closely bound with theories of their languages. Still, it is a matter of intricate difficulty since no indigenous records in the Khazar language survived, and the state was polyglot and polyethnic. The native religion of the Khazars is thought to have been Tengrism like that of the North Caucasian Huns and other Turkic peoples.^[16] The polyethnic populace of the Khazar Khaganate appears to have been a multiconfessional mosaic of pagan, Tengrist, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim worshippers.^[17] Some of the Khazars (namely, the Kabars) joined the ancient Hungarians in the 9th century. The ruling elite of the Khazars was said by Judah Halevi and Abraham ibn Daud to have converted to Rabbinic Judaism in the 8th century,^[18] but the scope of the conversion to Judaism within the Khazar Khanate remains uncertain.^[19]

Where the Khazars dispersed after the fall of the Khanate is subject to many conjectures. Proposals have been made regarding the possibility of a Khazar factor in the ethnogenesis of numerous peoples, such as the Hazaras, Hungarians, the Kazakhs, the Cossacks of the Don region and Ukraine, the Muslim Kumyks, the Turkic-speaking Krymchaks and their Crimean neighbours the Crimean Karaites, the Moldavian Csángós, the Mountain Jews, and even some Subbotniks (based on their Ukrainian and Cossack origin).^[20][21][22]

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 from modern-day Russia and Ukraine into modern-day France and Germany. Linguistic and genetic studies have not supported the theory of a Khazar connection to Ashkenazi Jewry. The theory still finds occasional support, but most scholars view it with considerable scepticism.^[23][19] The theory is sometimes associated with antisemitism^[24] and anti-Zionism.^[25]

In Oghuz Turkic languages, the Caspian Sea is still named the "Khazar Sea", an enduring legacy of the medieval Khazar state.

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