Khazars

"Khazar" and "Kazar" redirect here. For other uses, seeKhazar (disambiguation).

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(lingua franca) Old Turkic(dynastic, spoken) Alanian(spoken)
Religion	Judaism Judaizers Tengrism Buddhism Christianity Islam Paganism Religious syncretism
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'ssacking and razing of Atil	969
Area
850 est.	3,000,000 km2(1,200,000 sq mi)
900 est.	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

TheKhazars(/ˈxɑːzɑːrz/) were anomadicTurkic peoplethat, in the late 6th-century CE, established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modernEuropean Russia,southern Ukraine,Crimea,andKazakhstan.They created what for its duration was the most powerfulpolityto emerge from the break-up of theWestern Turkic Khaganate.Astride a major artery of commerce betweenEastern EuropeandSouthwestern Asia,Khazaria became one of the foremost trading empires of theearly medievalworld, commanding the westernmarchesof theSilk Roadand playing a key commercial role as a crossroad betweenChina,theMiddle EastandKievan Rus'.For some three centuries (c. 650–965) the Khazars dominated the vast area extending from the Volga-Don steppes to the easternCrimeaand the northernCaucasus.

Khazaria long served as abuffer statebetween theByzantine Empireand both the nomads of the northern steppes and theUmayyad CaliphateandAbbasid Caliphate,after serving as the Byzantine Empire's proxy against theSasanian Empire.The alliance was dropped around 900. Byzantium began to encourage theAlansto attack Khazaria and to weaken its hold on Crimea and the Caucasus and sought to obtain anententewith the rising Rus' power to the north, which it aspired to convert to Christianity.Between 965 and 969, theKievan Rus'ruler,Sviatoslav I of Kiev,as well as his allies, conquered the capital,Atil,and ended Khazaria's independence. The state became the autonomous entity of Rus' and then of Khazar former provinces of (Khwarazmin which Khazars were known as Turks, just as Hungarians were known as Turks in Byzantium) inVolga Bulgaria.

Determining the origins and nature of the Khazars is closely bound with theories oftheir languages,but it is a matter of intricate difficulty since no indigenous records in the Khazar language survived, and the state waspolyglotandpolyethnic.The native religion of the Khazars is thought to have beenTengrism,like that of theNorth Caucasian Hunsand otherTurkic peoples.The polyethnic populace of the Khazar Khaganate appears to have been a multiconfessional mosaic of pagan, Tengrist, Jewish, Christian and Muslim worshippers.Some of the Khazars (namely theKabars) joined the ancient Hungarians in the 9th century. The ruling elite of the Khazars was said byJudah HaleviandAbraham ibn Daudto have converted toRabbinic Judaismin the 8th century,but the scope of theconversion to Judaismwithin the Khazar Khanate remains uncertain.

Where the Khazars dispersed after the fall of the Empire is subject to many conjectures. Proposals have been made regarding the possibility of a Khazar factor in the ethnogenesis of numerous peoples, such as theHazaras,Hungarians,theKazakhs,theCossacks of the Donregion and ofUkraine,the MuslimKumyks,the Turkic-speakingKrymchaksand their Crimean neighbours theCrimean Karaites,theMoldavian Csángós,theMountain Jews,even someSubbotniks(on the basis of their Ukrainian and Cossack origin and others).

The late 19th century saw theemergence of a theorythat the core of today'sAshkenazi Jewsare descended from a hypothetical Khazarian Jewish diaspora which 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 toAshkenazi Jewry.The theory still finds occasional support, but most scholars view it with considerable scepticism.The theory is sometimes associated withantisemitismandanti-Zionism.

InOghuzTurkic languages,theCaspian Seais still named the "Khazar Sea",an enduring legacy of the medieval Khazar state.

Etymology

Gyula Németh,followingZoltán Gombocz,derivedKhazarfrom a hypothetical *Qasar reflecting a Turkicrootqaz-( "to ramble, to roam" ) being an hypotheticalretracted variantofCommon Turkickez-;however,András Róna-Tasobjected that *qaz-is aghost word.In the fragmentaryTes and Terkhin inscriptionsof theUyğur empire (744–840)the formQasaris attested, although uncertainty remains whether this represents a personal or tribal name, gradually other hypotheses emerged.Louis Bazinderived it from Turkicqas-( "tyrannize, oppress, terrorize" ) on the basis of its phonetic similarity to the Uyğur tribal name, Qasar.Róna-Tas connectsqasarwithKesar,thePahlavitranscription of theRoman title Caesar.

D. M. Dunloptried to link the Chinese term for "Khazars" to one of the tribal names of the Uyğur, orToquz Oğuz,namely theQasar(Ch.Cát tátGésà).The objections are that Uyğur cát tátGésà/Qasarwas not a tribal name but rather the surname of the chief of the tư kếtSijietribe (Sogdian:Sikari) of the Toquz Oğuz (Ch. Chín họjĭu xìng),and that inMiddle Chinesethe ethnonym "Khazars" was always prefaced withTūjué,then still reserved forGöktürksand their splinter groups,(Tūjué Kěsà bù:Đột Quyết nhưng tát bộ;Tūjué Hésà:Đột Quyết hạt tát ) and "Khazar's" first syllable is transcribed with different characters ( nhưng and hạt ) than cát, which is used to render the syllableQa-in the Uyğur wordQasar.While it is far from given that the Khazars are not signifying a multi-ethnic and multi-lingual cluster of peoples and clans, some more nomadic, some less, it doesn't exclude that some clans, or splintergroups, or even rulers has identified with the name(s) of the Khazars, in the variety of ways it has been expressed.

After their conversion it is reported that they adopted the Hebrew script,and it is likely that, although speaking a Turkic language, the Khazarchancelleryunder Judaism probably corresponded inHebrew.

Linguistics

Main article:Khazar language

Determining the origins and nature of the Khazars is closely bound with theories oftheir languages,but it is a matter of intricate difficulty since no indigenous records in the Khazar language survive, and the state waspolyglotandpolyethnic.Whereas the royal or ruling elite probably spoke an eastern variety ofShaz Turkic,the subject tribes appear to have spoken varieties ofLir Turkic,such asOğuric,a language variously identified withBulğaric,Chuvash,andHunnish.

The latter based upon the assertion of the Persian historianIstakhrithe Khazar language was different from any other known tongue. Alano-As was also widely spoken. Eastern Common Turkic, the language of the royal house and its core tribes, in all likelihood remained the language of the ruling elite in the same way that Mongol continued to be used by the rulers of the Golden Horde, alongside of theQipčaq Turkicspeech spoken by the bulk of the Turkic tribesmen that constituted the military force of this part of theČinggisidempire. Similarity, Oğuric, like Qipčaq Turkic in the Jočid realm, functioned as one of the languages of government.One method for tracing their origins consists in the analysis of the possible etymologies behind theethnonym"Khazar".

History

Tribal origins and early history

The tribesthat were to comprise the Khazar empire were not an ethnic union, but a congeries of steppe nomads and peoples who came to be subordinated, and subscribed to a core Turkic leadership.Many Turkic groups, such as theOğuric peoples,includingŠarağurs,Oğurs,Onoğurs,andBulğarswho earlier formed part of theTiele (Tiělè) confederation,are attested quite early, having been driven West by theSabirs,who in turn fled theAsian Avars,and began to flow into theVolga–Caspian–Ponticzone from as early as the 4th century CE and are recorded byPriscusto reside in the Western Eurasian steppe lands as early as 463.They appear to stem from Mongolia and South Siberia in the aftermath of the fall of theHunnic/Xiōngnúnomadic polities. A variegated tribal federation led by these Turks, probably comprising a complex assortment ofIranian,proto-Mongolic,Uralic,andPalaeo-Siberianclans, vanquished theRouran Khaganateof the hegemonic central Asian Avars in 552 and swept westwards, taking in their train other steppe nomads and peoples fromSogdiana.

The ruling family of this confederation may have hailed from theĀshǐnà (A sử kia) clanof theWestern Turkic Khaganate,althoughConstantine Zuckermanregards Ashina and their pivotal role in the formation of the Khazars with scepticism.Golden notes that Chinese and Arabic reports are almost identical, making the connection a strong one, and conjectures that their leader may have beenYǐpíshèkuì(Ất bì bắn quỹ), who lost power or was killed around 651.Moving west, the confederation reached the land of theAkatziroi,who had been important allies of Byzantium in fighting offAttila's army.

Rise of the Khazar state

SIND

800

UYGHUR KHAGANATE

GURJARA-
PRATIHARAS

RASHTRA-
KUTAS

PALA
EMPIRE

CHAM-
PA

NAN-
ZHAO

TURK
SHAHIS

TANG
DYNASTY

SILLA

Khitans

Jurchens

Tungus

KARLUK
YABGHU

Tatars

CHENLA

DVARA-
VATI

SRIVIJAYA

Kyrgyzs

Paleo-Siberians

Samoyeds

Kimeks

Tanguts

Shatuos

ABBASID CALIPHATE

KHAZAR
KHAGANATE

BYZANTINE
EMPIRE

OGHUZ-
YABGUS

TIBETAN
EMPIRE

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The Khazar Khaganate and contemporary polities circa 800.

An embryonic state of Khazaria began to form sometime after 630,when it emerged from the breakdown of the largerGöktürk Khaganate.Göktürk armies had penetrated the Volga by 549, ejecting the Avars, who were then forced to flee to the sanctuary of theHungarian plain.The Ashina clan appeared on the scene by 552, when they overthrew the Rourans and established theGöktürkQağanate,whose self designation wasTür(ü)k.By 568, these Göktürks were probing for an alliance with Byzantium to attackPersia.Aninternecine warbroke out between the senior eastern Göktürks and the junior West Turkic Khaganate some decades later, when on the death ofTaspar Qağan,asuccession dispute led to a dynastic crisisbetween Taspar's chosen heir, theApa Qağan,and the ruler appointed by the tribal high council, Āshǐnà Shètú ( a sử kia nhiếp đồ ), theIshbara Qağan.

By the first decades of the 7th century, the AshinayabguTongmanaged to stabilise the Western division, but upon his death, after providing crucial military assistance to Byzantium in routing the Sasanian army in the Persian heartland,the Western Turkic Qağanate dissolved under pressure from theencroaching Tang dynasty armiesand 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,Old Great BulgariaunderKubrat,the Duōlù clan leader, and the Nǔshībì subconfederation, also consisting of five tribes.The Duōlù challenged the Avars in theKuban River-Sea of Azovarea while the Khazar Qağanate consolidated further westwards, led apparently by an Ashina dynasty. With a resounding victory over the tribes in 657, engineered byGeneral Sū Dìngfāng ( tô định phương ),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 underAsparukh,Kubrat's son, shifted even further west across the Danube to lay the foundations of theFirst Bulgarian Empirein the Balkans (c. 679).

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 and 650.After their conquest of the lower Volga region to the East and an area westwards between theDanubeand theDniepr,and their subjugation of theOnoğur-Bulğarunion, sometime around 670, a properly constituted Khazar Qağanate emerges,becoming the westernmostsuccessor stateof the formidable Göktürk Qağanate after its disintegration. According toOmeljan Pritsak,the language of the Onoğur-Bulğar federation was to become thelingua francaof Khazariaas it developed into whatLev Gumilevcalled a "steppe Atlantis" (stepnaja Atlantida/ Степная Атлантида).Historians have often referred to this period of Khazar domination as thePax Khazaricasince the state became an international trading hub permitting Western Eurasian merchants safe transit across it to pursue their business without interference.The high status soon to be accorded this empire to the north is attested byIbn al-Balḫî'sFârsnâma(c. 1100), which relates that theSasanianShah,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. Although 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.

Khazar state: culture and institutions

Royal Diarchy with sacral Qağanate

Khazaria developed adual kingshipgovernance structure,typical among Turkic nomads, consisting of ashad/bäkand aqağan.The emergence of this system may be deeply entwined with the conversion to Judaism.According to Arabic sources, the lesser king was calledîšâand the greater kingKhazarxâqân;the former managed and commanded the military, while the greater king's role was primarily sacral, less concerned with daily affairs. The greater king was recruited from the Khazar house of notables (ahl bait ma'rûfīn) and, in an initiation ritual, was nearly strangled until he declared the number of years he wished to reign, on the expiration of which he would bekilled by the nobles.The deputy ruler would enter the presence of the reclusive greater king only with great ceremony, approaching him barefoot to prostrate himself in the dust and then light a piece of wood as a purifying fire, while waiting humbly and calmly to be summoned.Particularly elaborate rituals accompanied aroyal burial.At one period, travellers had to dismount, bow before the ruler's tomb, and then walk away on foot.Subsequently, the charismatic sovereign's burial place was hidden from view, with a palatial structure ( "Paradise" ) constructed and thenhiddenunder rerouted river water to avoid disturbance by evil spirits and later generations. Such a royal burial ground (qoruq) is typical of inner Asian peoples.Both the îšâ and the xâqân converted to Judaism sometime in the 8th century, while the rest, according to the Persian travellerAhmad ibn Rustah,probably followed the old Tūrkic religion.

Ruling elite

The ruling stratum, like that of the laterČinggisidswithin theGolden Horde,was a relatively small group that differed ethnically and linguistically from its subject peoples, meaning theAlano-Asand Oğuric Turkic tribes, who were numerically superior within Khazaria.The Khazar Qağans, while taking wives and concubines from the subject populations, were protected by aKhwârazmianguard corps, orcomitatus,called theUrsiyya.But unlike many other local polities, they hired soldiers (mercenaries) (thejunûd murtazîqainal-Mas'ûdî).At the peak of their empire, the Khazars ran a centralised fiscal administration, with a standing army of some 7–12,000 men, which could, at need, be multiplied two or three times that number by inducting reserves from their nobles' retinues.Other figures for the permanent standing army indicate that it numbered as many as one hundred thousand. They controlled and exacted tribute from 25 to 30 different nations and tribes inhabiting the vast territories between the Caucasus, the Aral Sea, the Ural Mountains, and the Ukrainian steppes.Khazar armies were led by the Qağan Bek (pronounced as Kagan Bek) and commanded by subordinateofficersknown astarkhans.When the bek sent out a body of troops, they would not retreat under any circumstances. If they were defeated, every one who returned was killed.

Settlements were governed by administrative officials known astuduns.In some cases, such as the Byzantine settlements in southernCrimea,atudunwould be appointed for a town nominally within another polity'ssphere of influence.Other officials in the Khazar government included dignitaries referred to byibn FadlanasJawyshyghrandKündür,but their responsibilities are unknown.

Demographics

It has been estimated that 25 to 28 distinct ethnic groups made up the population of the Khazar Qağanate, aside from the ethnic elite. The ruling elite seems to have been constituted out of nine tribes/clans, themselves ethnically heterogeneous, spread over perhaps nine provinces or principalities, each of which would have been allocated to a clan.In terms of caste or class, some evidence suggests that there was a distinction, whether racial or social is unclear, between "White Khazars" (ak-Khazars) and "Black Khazars" (qara-Khazars).The 10th-century Muslim geographeral-Iṣṭakhrīclaimed that the White Khazars were strikingly handsome with reddish hair, white skin, and blue eyes, while the Black Khazars were swarthy, verging on deep black as if they were "some kind ofIndian".Many Turkic nations had a similar (political, not racial) division between a "white" ruling warrior caste and a "black" class of commoners; the consensus among mainstream scholars is that Istakhri was confused by the names given to the two groups.However, Khazars are generally described by early Arab sources as having a white complexion, blue eyes, and reddish hair.The ethnonym in the Tang Chinese annals, Ashina, often accorded a key role in the Khazar leadership, may reflect an Eastern Iranian orTokharianword (Khotanese Sakaâşşeina-āššsena"blue" ):Middle Persianaxšaêna( "dark-coloured" ):Tokharian Aâśna( "blue", "dark" ).The distinction appears to have survived the collapse of the Khazarian empire. Later Russian chronicles, commenting on the role of the Khazars in the magyarisation of Hungary, refer to them as "WhiteOghurs"andMagyarsas "Black Oghurs".Studies of the physical remains, such as skulls atSarkel,have revealed individuals belonging to the Slavic, other European, and a few Mongolian types.

Economy

The import and export of foreign wares, and the revenues derived from ta xing their transit, was a hallmark of the Khazar economy, although it is said also to have producedisinglass.Distinctively among the nomadic steppe polities, the Khazar Qağanate developed a self-sufficient domesticSaltovoeconomy, a combination of traditional pastoralism – allowing sheep and cattle to be exported – extensive agriculture, abundant use of the Volga's rich fishing stocks, together with craft manufacture, with diversification in lucrative returns from ta xing international trade given its pivotal control of major trade routes.

TheKhazar slave tradeconstituted one of the two great furnishers of slaves tothe Muslim markettoslavery in the Abbasid Caliphate(the other being theIranian Sâmânid amîrs), supplying it with captured Slavs and tribesmen from the Eurasian northlands.It profited from the latter which enabled it to maintain a standing army of Khwarezm Muslim troops. The capital Atil reflected the division: Kharazān on the western bank where the king and his Khazar elite, with a retinue of some 4,000 attendants, dwelt, and Itil proper to the East, inhabited by Jews, Christians, Muslims and slaves and by craftsmen and foreign merchants.

The Khazar Khaghanate played a key role in the trade between Europe and the Muslim world in the early middle ages. People taken captive during the viking raids in Europe, such as Ireland, could be transported toHedebyorBrännöin Scandinavia and from there via theVolga trade routeto Russia, where slaves and furs were sold to Muslim merchants in exchange for Arab silverdirhamandsilk,which have been found inBirka,WollinandDublin;during the 8th- and 9th-century this trade route between Europe and theAbbasid Caliphatepassed via the Khazar Kaghanate,until it was supplanted in the 10th-century by the route ofVolga Bulgaria,Khwarazm,and theSamanid slave trade.

The ruling elite wintered in the city and spent from spring to late autumn in their fields. A large irrigated greenbelt, drawing on channels from the Volga river, lay outside the capital, where meadows and vineyards extended for some 20farsakhs(c. 60 miles).While customs duties were imposed on traders, and tribute and tithes were exacted from 25 to 30 tribes, with a levy of one sable skin, squirrel pelt, sword, dirham per hearth or ploughshare, or hides, wax, honey and livestock, depending on the zone. Trade disputes were handled by a commercial tribunal in Atil consisting of seven judges, two for each of the monotheistic inhabitants (Jews, Muslims, Christians) and one for the pagans.

Khazars and Byzantium

See also:Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628andThird Perso-Turkic War

Byzantine diplomatic policy towards the steppe peoples generally consisted of encouraging them to fight among themselves. ThePechenegsprovided great assistance to the Byzantines in the 9th century in exchange for regular payments.Byzantium also sought alliances with theGöktürksagainst common enemies: in the early 7th century, one such alliance was brokered with the Western Tűrks against the PersianSasaniansin theByzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628.The Byzantines called KhazariaTourkía,and by the 9th century referred to the Khazars as "Turks".During the period leading up to and after thesiege of Constantinoplein 626,Heracliussought help via emissaries, and eventually personally, from a Göktürk chieftainof the Western Turkic Khaganate,Tong Yabghu Qağan,inTiflis,plying him with gifts and the promise of marriage to his daughter,Epiphania.Tong Yabghu responded by sending a large force to ravage the Persian empire, marking the start of theThird Perso-Turkic War.A joint Byzantine-Tűrk operation breached theCaspian gatesand sackedDerbentin 627. Together they then besiegedTiflis,where the Byzantines may have deployed an early variety oftraction trebuchets(ἑλέπόλεις) to breach the walls. After the campaign, Tong Yabghu is reported, perhaps with some exaggeration, to have left some 40,000 troops behind with Heraclius.Although occasionally identified with Khazars, the Göktürk identification is more probable since the Khazars only emerged from that group after the fragmentation of the former sometime after 630.Some scholars argued that Sasanian Persia never recovered from the devastating defeat wrought by this invasion.

Khazar Khaganate and surrounding states, c. 820 (area of direct Khazar control in dark blue, sphere of influence in purple).

Once the Khazars emerged as a power, the Byzantines also began to form alliances with them, dynastic and military. In 695, the lastHeraclian emperor,Justinian II,nicknamed "the slit-nosed" (ὁ ῥινότμητος) after he was mutilated and deposed, was exiled toChersonin theCrimea,where a Khazar governor (tudun) presided. He escaped into Khazar territory in 704 or 705 and was given asylum by qağanBusir Glavan(Ἰβουζῆρος Γλιαβάνος), who gave him his sister in marriage, perhaps in response to an offer by Justinian, who may have thought a dynastic marriage would seal by kinship a powerful tribal support for his attempts to regain the throne.The Khazarian spouse thereupon changed her name toTheodora.Busir was offered a bribe by the Byzantine usurper,Tiberius III,to kill Justinian. Warned by Theodora, Justinian escaped, murdering two Khazar officials in the process. He fled to Bulgaria, whose KhanTervelhelped him regain the throne. Upon his reinstalment, and despite Busir's treachery during his exile, he sent for Theodora; Busir complied, and she was crowned as Augusta, suggesting that both prized the alliance.

Decades later,Leo III(ruled 717–741) made a similar alliance to co-ordinate strategy against a common enemy, theMuslim Arabs.He sent an embassy to the Khazar qağanBiharand married his son, the futureConstantine V(ruled 741–775), to Bihar's daughter, a princess referred to asTzitzak,in 732. On converting to Christianity, she took the name Irene. Constantine and Irene had a son, the futureLeo IV (775–780),who thereafter bore the sobriquet, "the Khazar".Leo died in mysterious circumstances after his Athenian wife bore him a son,Constantine VI,who on his majority co-ruled with his mother, the dowager. He proved unpopular, and his death ended the dynastic link of the Khazars to the Byzantine throne.By the 8th century, Khazarsdominated the Crimea(650–c. 950), and even extended their influence into the Byzantine peninsula of Cherson until it was wrested back in the 10th century.Khazar andFarghânian (Φάργανοι)mercenaries constituted part of the imperial ByzantineHetaireiabodyguard after its formation in 840, a position that could openly be purchased by a payment of seven pounds of gold.

Arab–Khazar wars

Main article:Arab–Khazar wars

During the 7th and 8th centuries, the Khazars fought a series of wars against theUmayyad Caliphateand itsAbbasidsuccessor. The First Arab-Khazar War began during the first phase ofMuslim expansion.By 640, Muslim forces had reached Armenia; in 642 they launched their first raid across the Caucasus underAbd ar-Rahman ibn Rabiah.In 652 Arab forces advanced on the Khazar capital,Balanjar,but weredefeated,suffering heavy losses; according to Persian historians such asal-Tabari,both sides in the battle usedcatapultsagainst the opposing troops. A number of Russian sources give the name of a Khazar khagan from this period asIrbisand describe him as a scion of the Göktürk royal house, the Ashina. Whether Irbis ever existed is open to debate, as is whether he can be identified with one of the many Göktürk rulers of the same name.

Due to the outbreak of theFirst Muslim Civil Warand other priorities, the Arabs refrained from repeating an attack on the Khazars until the early 8th century.The Khazars launched a few raids into Transcaucasian principalities under Muslim dominion, including a large-scale raid in 683–685 during theSecond Muslim Civil Warthat rendered much booty and many prisoners.There is evidence from the account of al-Tabari that the Khazars formed a united front with the remnants of the Göktürks in Transoxiana.

Caucasus region, c. 740

The Second Arab-Khazar War began with a series of raids across the Caucasus in the early 8th century. The Umayyads tightened their grip on Armenia in 705 after suppressing a large-scale rebellion. In 713 or 714, the Umayyad generalMaslamahconquered Derbent and drove deeper into Khazar territory. The Khazars launched raids in response intoAlbaniaandIranian Azerbaijanbut were driven back by the Arabs underHasan ibn al-Nu'man.The conflict escalated in 722 with an invasion by 30,000 Khazars into Armenia inflicting a crushing defeat. CaliphYazid IIresponded, sending 25,000 Arab troops north, swiftly driving the Khazars back across the Caucasus, recovering Derbent, and advancing on Balanjar. The Arabsbroke through the Khazar defenceand stormed the city; most of its inhabitants were killed or enslaved, but a few of them managed to flee north.Despite their success, the Arabs had not yet defeated the Khazar army, and they retreated south of the Caucasus.

In 724, the Arab generalal-Jarrah ibn Abdallah al-Hakamiinflicted a crushing defeat on the Khazars in a long battle between the riversCyrusandAraxes,then moved on to captureTiflis,bringingCaucasian Iberiaunder Muslim suzerainty. The Khazars struck back in 726, led by a prince namedBarjik,launching a major invasion of Albania and Azerbaijan; by 729, the Arabs had lost control of northeastern Transcaucasia and were thrust again into the defensive. In 730, Barjik invaded Iranian Azerbaijan anddefeatedArab forces atArdabil,killing the generalal-Djarrah al-Hakamiand briefly occupying the town. Barjik was defeated and killed the next year atMosul,where he directed Khazar forces from a throne mounted with al-Djarrah's severed head.In 737, Marwan Ibn Muhammad entered Khazar territory under the guise of seeking a truce. He then launched a surprise attack in which The Qaghan fled north and the Khazars surrendered.The Arabs did not have enough resources to influence the affairs of Transcaucasia.The Qağan was forced to accept terms involving his conversion to Islam, and subject himself to the rule of the Caliphate, but the accommodation was short-lived because a combination of internal instability among the Umayyads and Byzantine support undid the agreement within three years, and the Khazars re-asserted their independence.The suggestion that the Khazars adoptedJudaismas early as 740 is based on the idea that, in part, it was, a re-assertion of their independence from the rule of both regional powers, Byzantium and the Caliphate, while it also conformed to a general Eurasian trend to embrace aworld religion.

Whatever the impact of Marwan's campaigns was, warfare between the Khazars and the Arabs ceased for more than two decades after 737. Arab raids continued to occur until 741, but their control of the region was limited because maintaining a large garrison at Derbent further depleted their already overstretched army. Athird Muslim civil warsoon broke out, leading to the Abbasid Revolution and the fall of the Umayyad dynasty in 750.

In 758, theAbbasidCaliphal-Mansurattempted to strengthen diplomatic ties with the Khazars, orderingYazid ibn Usayd al-Sulami,one of his nobles and themilitary governor of Armenia,to take a royal Khazar bride.Yazid married a daughter of Khazar KhaganBaghatur,but she died inexplicably, possibly during childbirth. Her attendants returned home, convinced that some members of another Arab faction had poisoned her, and her father was enraged. The Khazar generalRas Tarkhaninvaded regions which were located south of the Caucasus in 762–764, devastating Albania, Armenia, and Iberia, and capturing Tiflis.Thereafter, relations between the Khazars and the Abbasids became increasingly cordial, because the foreign policies of the Abbasids were generally less expansionist than the foreign policies of the Umayyads, relations between the Khazars and the Abbasids were ultimately broken by a series of raids which occurred in 799, the raids occurred after another marriage alliance failed.

Khazars and Hungarians

Around 830, a rebellion broke out in the Khazar khaganate. As a result, threeKabartribesof the Khazars (probably the majority of ethnic Khazars) joined the Hungarians and moved throughLevediato what the Hungarians call theEtelköz,the territory between theCarpathiansand theDnieper River.The Hungarians faced their first attack by thePechenegsaround 854,though other sources state that an attack by Pechenegs was the reason for their departure to Etelköz. The new neighbours of the Hungarians were theVarangiansand the easternSlavs.From 862 onwards, the Hungarians (already referred to as theUngri) along with their allies, the Kabars, started a series of raids from the Etelköz into the Carpathian Basin, mostly against theEastern Frankish Empire(Germany) andGreat Moravia,but also against theLower Pannonian principalityandBulgaria.Then they together ended up at the outer slopes of Carpathians, and settled there.

Rise of the Rus' and the collapse of the Khazarian state

Trade routes of the Black Sea region, 8th–11th centuries

By the 9th century, groups ofVarangian Rus',developing a powerful warrior-merchant system, began probing south down the waterways controlled by the Khazars and their protectorate, theVolga Bulgarians,partially in pursuit of the Arab silver that flowed north for hoarding through the Khazarian-Volga Bulgarian trading zones,partially to trade in furs and ironwork.Northern mercantile fleets passing Atil were tithed, as they were at ByzantineCherson.Their presence may have prompted the formation of a Rus' state by convincing theSlavs,Merjaand theChud' to unite to protect common interests against Khazarian exactions of tribute. It is often argued that aRus' Khaganatemodelled on the Khazarian state had formed to the east and that the Varangian chieftain of the coalition appropriated the title of qağan (khagan) as early as the 830s: the title survived to denote the princes ofKievan Rus',whose capital,Kiev,is often associated with a Khazarian foundation.The construction of theSarkel fortress,with technical assistance from Khazaria's Byzantine ally at the time, together with the minting of an autonomous Khazar coinage around the 830s, may have been a defensive measure against emerging threats from Varangians to the north and from theMagyarson the eastern steppe.By 860, the Rus' had penetrated as far as Kiev and, via theDnieper,Constantinople.

Site of the Khazar fortress at Sarkel (aerial photo from excavations conducted byMikhail Artamonovin the 1950s).

Alliances often shifted. Byzantium, threatened by Varangian Rus' raiders, would assist Khazaria, and Khazaria at times allowed the northerners to pass through their territory in exchange for a portion of the booty.From the beginning of the 10th century, the Khazars found themselves fighting on multiple fronts as nomadic incursions were exacerbated by uprisings by former clients and invasions from former allies. Thepax Khazaricawas caught in a pincer movement between steppe Pechenegs and the strengthening of an emergent Rus' power to the north, both undermining Khazaria's tributary empire.According to theSchechter Text,the Khazar rulerKing Benjamin(ca.880–890) fought a battle against the allied forces of five lands whose moves were perhaps encouraged by Byzantium.Although Benjamin was victorious, his sonAaron IIfaced another invasion, this time led by theAlans,whose leader had converted to Christianity and entered into an alliance with Byzantium, which, underLeo VI the Wise,encouraged them to fight against the Khazars.

By the 880s, Khazar control of the MiddleDnieperfrom Kiev, where they collected tribute from Eastern Slavic tribes, began to wane asOleg of Novgorodwrested control of the city from the Varangian warlordsAskold and Dir,and embarked on what was to prove to be the foundation of a Rus' empire.The Khazars had initially allowed the Rus' to use thetrade routealong the Volga River, and raid southwards. SeeCaspian expeditions of the Rus'.According toAl-Mas'udi,the qağan is said to have given his assent on the condition that the Rus' give him half of the booty.In 913, however, two years after Byzantium concluded a peace treaty with the Rus' in 911, aVarangianforay, with Khazar connivance, through Arab lands led to a request to the Khazar throne by the Khwârazmian Islamic guard for permission to retaliate against the large Rus' contingent on its return. The purpose was to revenge the violence the Rus'razziashad inflicted on their fellow Muslim believers.The Rus' force was thoroughly routed and massacred.The Khazar rulers closed the passage down the Volga to the Rus', sparking a war. In the early 960s, Khazar rulerJosephwrote toHasdai ibn Shaprutabout the deterioration of Khazar relations with the Rus': "I protect the mouth of the river (Itil-Volga) and prevent the Rus arriving in their ships from setting off by sea against theIshmaelitesand (equally) all (their) enemies from setting off by land toBab."

Sviatoslav I of Kiev(in boat), destroyer of the Khazar Khaganate.

The Rus' warlords launched several wars against the Khazar Qağanate, and raided down tothe Caspian sea.TheSchechter Letterrelates the story of a campaign against Khazaria byHLGW(recently identified as Oleg of Chernigov) around 941 in which Oleg was defeated by the Khazar generalPesakh.The Khazar alliance with the Byzantine empire began to collapse in the early 10th century. Byzantine and Khazar forces may have clashed in the Crimea, and by the 940s emperorConstantine VII Porphyrogenituswas speculating inDe Administrando Imperioabout ways in which the Khazars could be isolated and attacked. The Byzantines during the same period began to attempt alliances with the Pechenegs and the Rus', with varying degrees of success. A further factor undermining the Khazar Qağanate was a shift in Islamic routes at this time, as Muslims in Khwarazmia forged trade links with the recently converted Volga Bulgarian Muslims, a move which may have caused a drastic drop, perhaps up to 80%, in the revenue base of Khazaria, and consequently, a crisis in its ability to pay for its defence.

Sviatoslav Ifinally succeeded in destroying Khazar imperial power in the 960s, in a circular sweep that overwhelmed Khazar fortresses likeSarkelandTamatarkha,and reached as far as the Caucasian Kassogians/Circassiansand then back to Kiev.Sarkel fell in 965, with the capital city ofAtilfollowing, c. 968 or 969.

In the Russian chronicle, the vanquishing of the Khazar traditions is associated with Vladimir's conversion in 986.According to thePrimary Chronicle,in 986 Khazar Jews were present atVladimir'sdisputationto decide on the prospective religion of the Kievan Rus'.Whether these were Jews who had settled in Kiev or emissaries from some Jewish Khazar remnant state is unclear. Conversion to one of the faiths of the people of Scripture was a precondition to any peace treaty with the Arabs, whose Bulgar envoys had arrived in Kiev after 985.

A visitor to Atil wrote soon after the sacking of the city that its vineyards and garden had been razed, that not a grape or raisin remained in the land, and not even alms for the poor were available.An attempt to rebuild may have been undertaken, sinceIbn Hawqalandal-Muqaddasirefer to it after that date, but byAl-Biruni's time (1048) it was in ruins.

Aftermath: impact, decline and dispersion

Although Poliak argued that the Khazar kingdom did not wholly succumb to Sviatoslav's campaign, but lingered on until 1224, when theMongols invaded Rus',by most accounts, the Rus'-Oghuz campaigns left Khazaria devastated, with perhaps many Khazarian Jews in flight,and leaving behind at best a minorrump state.It left little trace, except for some placenames,and much of its population was undoubtedly absorbed in successor hordes.Al-Muqaddasi,writing ca.985, mentions Khazar beyond the Caspian sea as a district of "woe and squalor", with honey, many sheep and Jews.Kedrenosmentions a joint Rus'-Byzantine attack on Khazaria in 1016, which defeated its rulerGeorgius Tzul.The name suggests Christian affiliations. The account concludes by saying, that after Tzul's defeat, the Khazar ruler of "upper Media", Senaccherib, had to sue for peace and submission.In 1024Mstislav of Chernigov(one of Vladimir's sons) marched against his brother Yaroslav with an army that included "Khazars and Kassogians" in a repulsed attempt to restore a kind of "Khazarian" -type dominion over Kiev.Ibn al-Athir's mention of a "raid of Faḍlūn the Kurd against the Khazars" in 1030 CE, in which 10,000 of his men were vanquished by the latter, has been taken as a reference to such a Khazar remnant, butBartholdidentified this Faḍlūn asFaḍl ibn Muḥammadand the "Khazars" as eitherGeorgiansorAbkhazians.A Kievian prince namedOleg, grandson of Jaroslavwas reportedly kidnapped by "Khazars" in 1079 and shipped off toConstantinople,although most scholars believe that this is a reference to theCumans-Kipchaksor other steppe peoples then dominant in the Pontic region. Upon his conquest ofTmutarakanin the 1080s Oleg Sviatoslavich, son of a prince of Chernigov, gave himself the title "Archonof Khazaria ".In 1083 Oleg is said to have exacted revenge on the Khazars after his brother Roman was killed by their allies, thePolovtsi/Cumans. After one more conflict with these Polovtsi in 1106, the Khazars fade from history.By the 13th century they survived in Russian folklore only as "Jewish heroes" in the "land of the Jews". (zemlya Jidovskaya).

By the end of the 12th century,Petachiah of Ratisbonreported travelling through what he called "Khazaria", and had little to remark on other than describing itsminim(sectaries) living amidst desolation in perpetual mourning.The reference seems to be to Karaites.The Franciscan missionaryWilliam of Rubrucklikewise found only impoverished pastures in the lower Volga area where Ital once lay.Giovanni da Pian del Carpine,the papal legate to the court of theMongolKhanGuyukat that time, mentioned an otherwise unattested Jewish tribe, theBrutakhi,perhaps in the Volga region. Although connections are made to the Khazars, the link is based merely on a common attribution of Judaism.

ThePontic steppes,c. 1015 (areas in blue possibly still under Khazar control).

The 10th centuryZoroastrianDênkartregistered the collapse of Khazar power in attributing its eclipse to the enfeebling effects of "false" religion.The decline was contemporary to that suffered by theTransoxianaSāmānidempire to the east, both events paving the way for the rise of theGreat Seljuq Empire,whose founding traditions mention Khazar connections.Whatever successor entity survived, it could no longer function as a bulwark against the pressure east and south of nomad expansions. By 1043,KimeksandQipchaqs,thrusting westwards, pressured theOğuz,who in turn pushed thePechenegswest towards Byzantium's Balkan provinces.

Khazaria nonetheless left its mark on the rising states and some of their traditions and institutions. Much earlier,Tzitzak,the Khazar wife ofLeo III,introduced into the Byzantine court the distinctive kaftan or riding habit of the nomadic Khazars, the tzitzakion (τζιτζάκιον), and this was adopted as a solemn element of imperial dress.The orderly hierarchical system of succession by "scales" (lestvichnaia sistema:лествичная система) to theGrand Principate of Kievwas arguably modelled on Khazar institutions, via the example of theRus' Khaganate.

The proto-Hungarian Pontic tribe, while perhaps threatening Khazaria as early as 839 (Sarkel), practiced their institutional model, such as the dual rule of a ceremonialkende-kündüand agyulaadministering practical and military administration, as tributaries of the Khazars. A dissident group of Khazars, theQabars,joined the Hungarians in their migration westwards as they moved intoPannonia.Elements within the Hungarian population can be viewed as perpetuating Khazar traditions as a successor state. Byzantine sources refer to Hungary asWestern Tourkiain contrast to Khazaria, Eastern Tourkia. The gyula line produced the kings of medieval Hungary through descent fromÁrpád,while the Qabars retained their traditions longer, and were known as "black Hungarians" (fekete magyarság). Some archaeological evidence fromČelarevosuggests the Qabars practised Judaismsince warrior graves with Jewish symbols were found there, includingmenorahs,shofars,etrogs,lulavs,candlesnuffers, ash collectors, inscriptions in Hebrew, and a six-pointed star identical to theStar of David.

Seal discovered in excavations at Khazar sites. However, rather than having been made by Jews, these appear to be shamanistic sun discs.

The Khazar state was not the only Jewish state to rise between thefall of the Second Temple(67–70 CE) and theestablishment of Israel(1948). Astate in Yemenalso adopted Judaism in the 4th century, lasting until the rise of Islam.

The Khazar kingdom is said to have stimulated messianic aspirations for a return to Israel as early asJudah Halevi.In the time of the Egyptian vizierAl-Afdal Shahanshah(d. 1121), one Solomon ben Duji, often identified as a Khazarian Jew,attempted to advocate for a messianic effort for the liberation of, and return of all Jews to, Palestine. He wrote to many Jewish communities to enlist support. He eventually moved toKurdistanwhere his sonMenachemsome decades later assumed the title ofMessiahand, raising an army for this purpose, took the fortress ofAmadiyanorth ofMosul.His project was opposed by the rabbinical authorities and he was poisoned in his sleep. One theory maintains that the Star of David, until then a decorative motif or magical emblem, began to assume its national value in late Jewish tradition from its earlier symbolic use by Menachem.

The word Khazar, as an ethnonym, was last used in the 13th century by people in the North Caucasus believed to practice Judaism.The nature of a hypothetical Khazardiaspora,Jewish or otherwise, is disputed.Avraham ibn Daudmentions encountering rabbinical students descended from Khazars as far away asToledo, Spainin the 1160s.Khazar communities persisted here and there. Many Khazar mercenaries served in the armies of the Islamic Caliphates and other states. Documents from medieval Constantinople attest to a Khazar community mingled with the Jews of the suburb ofPera.Khazar merchants were active in both Constantinople and Alexandria in the 12th century.

Religion

Tengrism

Main article:Tengrism

Direct sources for the Khazar religion are not many, but in all likelihood they originally engaged in a traditional Turkic form of religious practices known asTengrism,which focused on thesky godTengri.Something of its nature may be deduced from what we know of the rites and beliefs of contiguous tribes, such as the North Caucasian Huns.Horse sacrificeswere made to this supreme deity. Rites involved offerings to fire, water, and the moon, to remarkable creatures, and to "gods of the road" (cf. Old Türkyol tengri,perhaps a god of fortune). Sun amulets were widespread as cultic ornaments. A tree cult was also maintained. Whatever was struck by lightning, man or object, was considered a sacrifice to the high god of heaven. The afterlife, to judge from excavations of aristocratic tumuli, was much a continuation of life on earth, warriors being interred with their weapons, horses, and sometimes with human sacrifices: the funeral of onetudrunin 711-12 saw 300 soldiers killed to accompany him to the otherworld.Ancestor worshipwas observed. The key religious figure appears to have been ashaman-likeqam,and it was these (qozmím) that were, according to the Khazar Hebrew conversion stories, driven out.

Many sources suggest, and a notable number of scholars have argued, that the charismatic Ashina clan played a germinal role in the early Khazar state, although Zuckerman dismisses the widespread notion of their pivotal role as a "phantom". The Ashina were closely associated with the Tengri cult, whose practices involved rites performed to assure a tribe of heaven's protective providence.The qağan was deemed to rule by virtue ofqut,"the heavenly mandate/good fortune to rule."

Christianity

Khazaria long served as abuffer statebetween theByzantine empireand both the nomads of the northern steppes and theUmayyad empire,after serving as Byzantium's proxy against theSasanian Persian empire.The alliance was dropped around 900. Byzantium began to encourage theAlansto attack Khazaria and weaken its hold on Crimea and the Caucasus, while seeking to obtain an entente with the rising Rus' power to the north, which it aspired to convert to Christianity.

On Khazaria's southern flank, both Islam and Byzantine Christianity were proselytising great powers. Byzantine success in the north was sporadic, although Armenian and Albanian missions fromDerbendbuilt churches extensively in maritimeDaghestan,then a Khazar district.Buddhismalso had exercised an attraction on leaders of both the Eastern (552–742) and Western Qağanates (552–659), the latter being the progenitor of the Khazar state.In 682, according to the Armenian chronicle ofMovsês Dasxuranc'i,the king ofCaucasian Albania,Varaz Trdat,dispatched a bishop, Israyêl, to convert Caucasian "Huns" who were subject to the Khazars, and managed to convince Alp Ilut'uêr, a son-in-law of the Khazar qağan, and his army, to abandon their shamanising cults and join the Christian fold.

The Arab Georgian martyrSt Abo,who converted to Christianity within the Khazar kingdom around 779–80, describes local Khazars as irreligious.Some reports register a Christian majority atSamandar,or Muslim majorities.

Judaism

The Khazar "Moses coin" found in theSpillings Hoardand dated c. 837/8 CE (223AH). It is inscribed with "Moses is the messenger of God" instead of the usual Muslim text "Muhammad is the messenger of God".

Conversion to Judaism is mentioned in theKhazar Correspondenceand medieval external sources. The authenticity of the former was long doubted and challenged,but the documents are now widely accepted by specialists as either authentic or as reflecting internal Khazar traditions.Archaeological evidence for conversion, on the other hand, remains elusive,and may reflect either the incompleteness of excavations, or that the stratum of actual adherents was thin.Conversion of steppe or peripheral tribes to auniversal religionis a fairly well attested phenomenon,and the Khazar conversion to Judaism, although unusual, would not have been without precedent.

Jews from both the Islamic world and Byzantium are known to have migrated to Khazaria during periods of persecution underHeraclius,Justinian II,Leo III,andRomanus Lakapēnos.ForSimon Schama,Jewish communities from the Balkans and the Bosphoran Crimea, especially fromPanticapaeum,began migrating to the more hospitable climate of pagan Khazaria in the wake of these persecutions, and were joined there by Jews from Armenia. TheGeniza fragments,he argues, make it clear the Judaising reforms sent roots down into the whole of the population.The pattern is one of an elite conversion preceding large-scale adoption of the new religion by the general population, which often resisted the imposition.One important condition for mass conversion was a settled urban state, where churches, synagogues or mosques provided a focus for religion, as opposed to the free nomadic lifestyle of life on the open steppes.A tradition of the IranianJudeo-Tatsclaims that their ancestors were responsible for the Khazar conversion.A legend traceable to the 16th-century Italian rabbiJudah Moscatoattributed it toYitzhak ha-Sangari.

Both the date of the conversion, and the extent of its influence beyond the elite,often minimised in some scholarship,are a matter of dispute,but at some point between 740 and 920 CE, the Khazarroyaltyandnobilityappear to have converted toJudaism,in part, it is argued, perhaps to deflect competing pressures from Arabs and Byzantines to accept either Islam or Orthodoxy.

The conversion of the Khazars to Judaism is an emotionally charged topic in Israel,and two scholars,Moshe Gil(2011) andShaul Stampfer,(2013) have challenged the authenticity of the medieval Hebrew documents and argue that the conversion of the Khazar elite to Judaism never happened.Alex M. Feldman is critical of Stampfer and Gil's dismissal of "overwhelming textual and archaeological evidence" of Khazarian Judaism, though agrees it is unlikely that Ashkenazim are descended from Khazarian Jews, he posits "a middle ground which can simultaneously accept Khazarian Judaism and doubt the Khazar-Ashkenazi descent theory advanced in dubious genetic studies."

History of discussions about Khazar Jewishness

The earliest surviving Arabic text that refers to Khazar Jewishness appears to be that which was written byibn Rustah,a Persian scholar who wrote an encyclopedic work on geography in the early tenth century.It is believed that ibn Rustah derived much of his information from the works of his contemporaryAbu al Jayhanibased in Central Asia.

The 10th centuryKievian LetterhasOld Turkic(Orkhon) inscription word-phraseOKHQURÜM,"I read (this or it)".

Christian of Stavelotin hisExpositio in Matthaeum Evangelistam(c. 860–870s) refers toGazari,presumably Khazars, as living in the lands ofGog and Magog,who were circumcised andomnem Judaismum observat—observing all the laws of Judaism.New numismatic evidence of coins dated 837/8 bearing the inscriptionsarḍ al-ḫazar(Land of the Khazars), orMûsâ rasûl Allâh(Moses is the messenger of God,in imitation of the Islamic coin phrase:Muḥammad rasûl Allâh) suggest to many the conversion took place in that decade.Olsson argues that the 837/8 evidence marks only the beginning of a long and difficult officialJudaizationthat concluded some decades later.A 9th-century Jewish traveller,Eldad ha-Dani,is said to have informed Spanish Jews in 883 that there was a Jewish polity in the East, and that fragments of the legendaryTen Lost Tribes,part of the line ofSimeonand half-line ofManasseh,dwelt in "the land of the Khazars", receiving tribute from some 25 to 28 kingdoms.Another view holds that by the 10th century, while the royal clan officially claimed Judaism, a non-normative variety of Islamisation took place among the majority of Khazars.

By the 10th century, theletter of King Josephasserts that, after the royal conversion, "Israel returned (yashuvu yisra'el) with the people of Qazaria (to Judaism) in complete repentance (bi-teshuvah shelemah). "Persian historianIbn al-Faqîhwrote that "all the Khazars are Jews, but they have been Judaized recently".Ibn Fadlân,based on his Caliphal mission (921–922) to the Volga Bulğars, also reported that "the core element of the state, the Khazars, were Judaized",something underwritten by theQaraitescholarYa'kub Qirqisânîaround 937.The conversion appears to have occurred against a background of frictions arising from both an intensification of Byzantine missionary activity from the Crimea to the Caucasus, and Arab attempts to wrest control over the latter in the 8th century CE,and a revolt, put down, by theKhavarsaround the mid-9th century is often invoked as in part influenced by their refusal to accept Judaism.Modern scholars generallysee the conversion as a slow process through three stages, which accords with Richard Eaton's model of syncreticinclusion,gradualidentificationand, finally,displacementof the older tradition.

Sometime between 954 and 961,Ḥasdai ibn Shaprūṭ,fromal-Andalus(Muslim Spain), wrote a letter of inquiry addressed to the ruler of Khazaria, and received a reply fromJoseph of Khazaria.The exchanges of thisKhazar Correspondence,together with theSchechter Letterdiscovered in theCairo Genizaand the famousplatonizing dialoguebyJudah Halevi,Sefer ha-Kuzari( "Book (of) The Khazari" ), which plausibly drew on such sources,provide us with the only direct evidence of the indigenous traditionsconcerning the conversion.King Bulanis said to have driven out the sorcerers,and to have received angelic visitations exhorting him to find the true religion, upon which, accompanied by his vizier, he travelled to desert mountains of Warsān on a seashore, where he came across a cave rising from the plain of Tiyul in which Jews used to celebrate the Sabbath. Here he was circumcised.Bulan is then said to have convened a royal debate between exponents of the threeAbrahamic religions.He decided to convert when he was convinced of Judaism's superiority. Many scholars situate this c. 740, a date supported by Halevi's own account.The details are both Judaicand Türkic: a Türkic ethnogonic myth speaks of an ancestral cave in which the Ashina were conceived from the mating of their human ancestor and a wolf ancestress.These accounts suggest that there was a rationalising syncretism of native pagan traditions with Jewish law, by melding through the motif of the cave, a site of ancestral ritual and repository of forgotten sacred texts, Türkic myths of origin and Jewish notions of redemption of Israel's fallen people.It is generally agreed they adopted Rabbinical rather thanQaraite Judaism.

Ibn Fadlanreports that the settlement of disputes in Khazaria was adjudicated by judges hailing each from his community, be it Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Pagan.Some evidence suggests that the Khazar king saw himself as a defender of Jews even beyond the kingdom's frontiers, retaliating against Muslim or Christian interests in Khazaria in the wake of Islamic and Byzantine persecutions of Jews abroad.Ibn Fadlan recounts specifically an incident in which the king of Khazaria destroyed the minaret of a mosque in Atil as revenge for the destruction of a synagogue in Dâr al-Bâbûnaj, and allegedly said he would have done worse were it not for a fear that the Muslims might retaliate in turn against Jews.Ḥasdai ibn Shaprūṭ sought information on Khazaria in the hope he might discover "a place on this earth where harassed Israel can rule itself" and wrote that, were it to prove true that Khazaria had such a king, he would not hesitate to forsake his high office and his family in order to emigrate there.

Albert Harkavynoted in 1877 that anArabiccommentary onIsaiah 48:14 ascribed toSaadia Gaonor to the Karaite scholarBenjamin Nahâwandî,interpreted "The Lord hath loved him" as a reference "to the Khazars, who will go and destroyBabel"(i.e.,Babylonia), a name used to designate the country of the Arabs. This has been taken as an indication of hopes by Jews that the Khazars might succeed in destroying theCaliphate.

Islam

In 965, as the Qağanate was struggling against the victorious campaign of the Rus' prince Sviatoslav, the Islamic historianIbn al-Athîrmentions that Khazaria, attacked bythe Oğuz,sought help fromKhwarezm,but their appeal was rejected because they were regarded as "infidels" (al-kuffâr;pagans). Save for the king, the Khazarians are said to have converted to Islam in order to secure an alliance, and the Turks were, with Khwarezm's military assistance, repelled. It was this that, according to Ibn al-Athîr, led the Jewish king of Khazar to convert to Islam.

Genetics

Nine skeletons dating to the 7th–9th centuries excavated from elite military burial mounds of the Khazar Khaganate (in the modernRostovregion) were analyzed in two genetic studies (from 2019 and 2021). According to the 2019 study, the results "confirm the Turkic roots of the Khazars, but also highlight their ethnic diversity and some integration of conquered populations". The samples did not show a genetic connection to Ashkenazi Jews, and the results do not support the hypothesis of Ashkenazi Jews being descendants of the Khazars.In the 2021 study the results showed both European and East Asian paternal haplogroups in the samples: three individuals carriedR1aY-haplogroup, two hadC2b,and the rest carried haplogroupsG2a,N1a,Q,andR1b,respectively. According to the authors, "The Y-chromosome data are consistent with the results of the craniological study and genome-wide analysis of the same individuals in the sense that they show mixed genetic origins for the early medieval Khazar nobility".Their facial features were of mix of East Asian and European, with East Asian type dominating (70%) in the early Khazars.

Claims of Khazar ancestry

Claims of Khazar origins of peoples, or suggestions that the Khazars were absorbed by them, have been made with regard to theKazakhs,theHungarians,theJudaizingSlavicSubbotniks,the MuslimKarachays,theKumyks,theAvars,theCossacks of the Donand theUkrainian Cossacks(seeKhazar hypothesis of Cossack ancestry), the Turkic-speakingKrymchaksand their Crimean neighbours theKaraites,Mishar Tatars,the MoldavianCsángósand others.Turkic-speakingCrimean Karaites(known in theCrimean Tatar languageasQaraylar), some of whom migrated in the 19th century from theCrimeato Poland and Lithuania have claimed Khazar origins. Specialists in Khazar history question the connection.Scholarship is likewise sceptical of claims that theTatar-speaking Krymchak Jewsof the Crimea descend from Khazars.

Crimean Karaites and Krymchaks

Main articles:Crimean KaraitesandKrymchaks

In 1839, theKaraimscholarAbraham Firkovichwas appointed by the Russian government as a researcher into the origins of the Jewish sect known as theKaraites.In 1846, one of his acquaintances, the Russian orientalist Vasilii Vasil'evich Grigor'ev (1816–1881), theorised that the Crimean Karaites were of Khazar stock. Firkovich vehemently rejected the idea,a position seconded by Firkovich, who hoped that by "proving" his people were of Turkic origin, would secure them exception from Russian anti-Jewish laws, since they bore no responsibility for Christ's crucifixion.This idea has a notable impact in Crimean Karaite circles.It is now believed that he forged much of this material on Khazars and Karaites.Specialists in Khazar history also question the connection.Brook's genetic study of European Karaites found no evidence of a Khazar or Turkic origin for any uniparental lineage but did reveal the European Karaites' links to Egyptian Karaites and to Rabbinical Jewish communities.

Another Turkic Crimean group, theKrymchakshad retained very simple Jewish traditions, mostly devoid ofhalakhic content,and very much taken with magical superstitions which, in the wake of the enduring educational efforts of the great Sephardi scholarChaim Hezekiah Medini,came to conform with traditional Judaism.

Though the assertion they were not of Jewish stock enabled many Crimean Karaites to survive the Holocaust, which led to the murder of 6,000 Krymchaks, after the war, many of the latter, somewhat indifferent to their Jewish heritage, took a cue from the Crimean Karaites, and denied this connection in order to avoid the antisemitic effects of the stigma attached to Jews.

Ashkenazi-Khazar theories

Main article:Khazar hypothesis of Ashkenazi ancestry

Several scholars have suggested that instead of disappearing after the dissolution of their Empire, the Khazars migrated westward and eventually, they formed part of the core of the laterAshkenazi Jewishpopulation of Europe. This hypothesis is greeted with scepticism or caution by most scholars.

The German OrientalistKarl Neumann,in the context of an earlier controversy about possible connections between the Khazars and the ancestors of theSlavic peoples,suggested as early as 1847 that emigrant Khazars might have influenced the core population of Eastern European Jews.

The theory was then taken up byAlbert Harkaviin 1869, when he also claimed that a possible link existed between the Khazars and the Ashkenazim,but the theory that Khazar converts formed a major proportion of the Ashkenazim was first proposed to the Western public in a lecture which was delivered byErnest Renanin 1883.Occasional suggestions that there was a small Khazar component in East European Jews emerged in works byJoseph Jacobs(1886),Anatole Leroy-Beaulieu,a critic of antisemitism (1893),Maksymilian Ernest Gumplowicz,and by the Russian-Jewish anthropologistSamuel Weissenberg.In 1909,Hugo von Kutscheradeveloped the notion into a book-length study,arguing that the Khazars formed the foundational core of the modern Ashkenazim.Maurice Fishbergintroduced the notion to American audiences in 1911.The idea was also taken up by the Polish-Jewish economic historian andGeneral ZionistYitzhak Schipperin 1918.Israel Bartalhas suggested that from theHaskalahonwards, polemical pamphlets against the Khazars were inspired bySephardiorganizations which opposed the Khazaro-Ashkenazim.

Scholarly anthropologists, such asRoland B. Dixon(1923), and writers such asH. G. Wells(1920) used it to argue that "The main part of Jewry never was inJudea",a thesis that was to have a political echo in later opinion.

In 1932,Samuel Kraussventured the theory that the biblical Ashkenaz referred to northernAsia Minor,and he identified it as the ancestral homeland of the Khazars, a position which was immediately disputed by Jacob Mann.Ten years later, in 1942,Abraham N. Polak(sometimes referred to asPoliak), later professor for the history of the Middle Ages atTel Aviv University,published a Hebrew monograph in which he concluded that the East European Jews came from Khazaria.D.M. Dunlop,writing in 1954, thought that very little evidence supported what he considered a mere assumption, and he also argued that the Ashkenazi-Khazar descent theory went far beyond what "our imperfect records" permit.In 1955,Léon Poliakov,who assumed that the Jews of Western Europe resulted from a "panmixia" in the first millennium, asserted that it was widely assumed that Europe's Eastern Jews were descended from a mixture of Khazarian and German Jews.Poliak's work found some support inSalo Wittmayer BaronandBen-Zion Dinur,but was dismissed by Bernard Weinryb as a fiction (1962).Bernard Lewiswas of the opinion that the word inCairo Genizainterpreted as Khazaria is actuallyHakkariand therefore it relates to theKurdsof the Hakkari mountains in southeastTurkey.

The Khazar-Ashkenazi hypothesis came to the attention of a much wider public with the publication ofArthur Koestler'sThe Thirteenth Tribein 1976,which was both positively reviewed and dismissed as a fantasy, and a somewhat dangerous one. Israeli historian Zvi Ankori argued that Koestler had allowed his literary imagination to espouse Poliak's thesis, which most historians dismissed as speculative.Israel's ambassador to Britain branded it "an anti-Semitic action financed by thePalestinians",whileBernard Lewisclaimed that the idea was not supported by any evidence whatsoever, and it had been abandoned by all serious scholars.Raphael Patai,however, registered some support for the idea that Khazar remnants had played a role in the growth of Eastern European Jewish communities,and several amateur researchers, such asBoris Altschüler(1994),kept the thesis in the public eye. The theory has been occasionally manipulated to deny Jewish nationhood.Recently, a variety of approaches, from linguistics (Paul Wexler)to historiography (Shlomo Sand)andpopulation genetics(Eran Elhaik,a geneticist from theUniversity of Sheffield)have emerged to keep the theory alive.In a broad academic perspective, both the idea that the Khazars converteden masseto Judaism and the suggestion they emigrated to form the core population of Ashkenazi Jewry, remain highly polemical issues.One thesis held that the Khazar Jewish population went into a northern diaspora and had a significant impact on the rise ofAshkenazi Jews.Connected to this thesis is the theory, expounded by Paul Wexler, dissenting from the majority of Yiddish linguists, that the grammar ofYiddishcontains a Khazar substrate.

Use in antisemitic polemic

According toMichael Barkun,while the Khazar hypothesis generally never played any major role in the development ofanti-Semitism,it has exercised a noticeable influence on American antisemites since therestrictions on immigration were imposed in the 1920s.Maurice Fishberg and Roland B. Dixon's works were later exploited inracistand religious polemical literature, particularly in literature which advocatedBritish Israelism,both in Britain and the United States.Particularly after the publication ofBurton J. Hendrick'sThe Jews in America,(1923)it began to enjoy a vogue among advocates of immigration restriction in the 1920s; racial theoristssuch asLothrop Stoddard;antisemitic conspiracy-theorists such as theKu Klux Klan'sHiram Wesley Evans;and some anti-communist polemicists such asJohn O. BeatyandWilmot Robertson,whose views influencedDavid Duke. According toYehoshafat Harkabi(1968) and others,it played a role in Arabanti-Zionistpolemics, and took on an antisemitic edge.Bernard Lewis,noting in 1987 that Arab scholars had dropped it, remarked that it only occasionally emerged in Arab political discourse.It has also played some role in Soviet antisemiticchauvinismand Slavic Eurasian historiography; particularly, in the works of scholars likeLev Gumilev,it came to be exploited by thewhite supremacistChristian Identity movementand even by terrorist esoteric cults likeAum Shinrikyō.The Kazar hypothesis was further exploited by esoteric fascists such asMiguel Serrano,referring to a lostPalestinabuchby the German Nazi-scholarHerman Wirth,who claimed to have proven that the Jews descended from a prehistoric migrant group parasiting on the Great Civilizations.The phrase "Khazar kaghanate" gained new traction in 2000s among antisemitic nationalists in Russia, such asYan Petrovsky.

Genetic studies

See also:Ashkenazi Jews § Genetic origins,Genetic studies on Jews,andKhazar hypothesis of Ashkenazi ancestry § Genetics and the Khazar theory

The hypothesis of Khazarian ancestry in Ashkenazi has also been a subject of vehement disagreements in the field ofpopulation genetics,wherein claims have been made concerning evidence both for and against it. Eran Elhaik argued in 2012 for a significant Khazar component in the admixture of Ashkenazi Jews using Caucasian populations—Georgians, Armenians andAzerbaijani Jews—as proxies.The evidence from historians he used has been criticised byShaul Stampferand the technical response to such a position from geneticists is mostly dismissive, arguing that, if traces of descent from Khazars exist in the Ashkenazi gene pool, the contribution would be quite minor,or insignificant.One geneticist,Raphael Falk,has argued that "national and ethnic prejudices play a central role in the controversy." According toNadia 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. At the time of her writing, the lack of Khazar DNA samples that might allow verification also presented difficulties.

In literature

TheKuzariis an influential work written by the medievalSpanishJewishphilosopher and poet RabbiYehuda Halevi(c. 1075–1141). Divided into five essays (ma'amarim), it takes the form of a fictional dialogue between the pagan king of the Khazars and aJewwho was invited to instruct him in the tenets of theJewish religion.The intent of the work, although based on Ḥasdai ibn Shaprūṭ's correspondence with the Khazar king, was not historical, but rather to defend Judaism as a revealed religion, written in the context, firstly of Karaite challenges to the Spanish rabbinical intelligentsia, and then against temptations to adaptAristotelianismand Islamic philosophy to the Jewish faith.Originally written inArabic,it was translated into Hebrew byJudah ibn Tibbon.

Benjamin Disraeli's early novel Alroy (1833) draws on Menachem ben Solomon's story.The question of mass religious conversion and the indeterminability of the truth of stories about identity and conversion are central themes ofMilorad Pavić's best-selling mystery storyDictionary of the Khazars.

H.N. Turteltaub'sJustinian,Marek Halter'sBook of AbrahamandWind of the Khazars,andMichael Chabon'sGentlemen of the Roadallude to or feature elements of Khazar history or create fictional Khazar characters.

Cities associated with the Khazars

Cities associated with the Khazars includeAtil,Khazaran,Samandar;in theCaucasus,Balanjar,Kazarki,Sambalut,andSamiran;inCrimeaand theTamanregion,Kerch,Theodosia,Yevpatoria(Güzliev),Samkarsh(also calledTmutarakan,Tamatarkha), andSudak;and in theDonvalley,Sarkel.A number of Khazar settlements have been discovered in theMayaki-Saltovoregion. Some scholars suppose that the Khazar settlement of Sambat on theDnieperrefers to the laterKiev.

See also

• List of Khazar rulers
• Hormizd IVhis mother was a Khazar princess.
• Leo IV the Khazar(Byzantineemperor,r. 775–780, born in 750 to EmperorConstantine Vand EmpressTzitzak,a Khazar Turkic princess, daughter ofBiharKhagan)
• List of Turkic Khaganates
• List of Jewish states and dynasties
• History of the Jews in Central Asia
• Turkish Jews
• Red Jews
• History of Kyiv
• Rus' Khaganate
• Rus'–Byzantine War (860)
• Rus'–Byzantine War (907)
• Rus'–Byzantine War (941)
• Rus'–Byzantine War (968-971)

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External links

• The Kievan Letter scanin theCambridge University Librarycollection.
• KhazariaArchived21 December 1997 at theWayback Machine
• Resources – Medieval Jewish History – The KhazarsThe Jewish History Resource Center, Project of the Dinur Center for Research in Jewish History, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
• Khazar Historic Mapsat theWayback Machine(archived 26 October 2009)
• The Kitab al-Khazari of Judah Hallevi, full English translation at sacred-textsArchived6 January 2010 at theWayback Machine
• Ancient lost capital of the Khazar kingdom foundArchived10 August 2017 at theWayback Machine