To, with his assistance, ask the Byzantine emperor to let them into the territory of the empire. Soon the Avar embassy, ​​headed by a certain Kandik, arrived in Constantinople. Appearing before the emperor, the ambassador said: The Avars have come to you, the largest and most powerful of the peoples. He can easily repulse and destroy the enemy, so it is beneficial for you to make an alliance with the Avars: you will find reliable defenders in them". Emperor Justinian I concluded an alliance with them in the spring of the year, and sent the Avars against the Kutrigurs, their kindred Utigurs and the Eastern Slavs, with whom they successfully fought. After that, the emperor concluded a new treaty with them of the year, allowing them to settle on the deserted lands of the empire in the Danube region A few years later, the Avars, led by the Khagan Bayan, entered Pannonia, where, after the collapse of the Huns' power, the warring tribes of the Gepids and Lombards settled. The Avars entered into an alliance with the latter in exchange for a promise to leave Pannonia in case of victory. The Gepids were defeated and in the year the Lombards left for Italy, ousting the Byzantines from there.At the same time, Pannonia became the center of the Avar power - the kaganate.

After the fall of the Gepids, the empire immediately occupied their capital at Sirmia, which caused, however, a long Byzantine-Avar strife. Having captured Sirmium in a year, the Avars began to seize the possessions of Byzantium in the Balkans. Emperor Mauritius was forced to start a protracted war against them, which went on with varying success, but on the whole unsuccessfully: the truces concluded from time to time were increasingly unprofitable for the empire. The protracted Byzantine-Persian wars of that time gave the Avars the opportunity to devastate the Balkan lands with almost impunity. Byzantium, after the victory over the Persians in the year, ousted the Avars from the Balkan territories for some time, but at the same time paid them an increasing tribute for peace. In the century, the Byzantines paid tribute to the Khaganate in gold in the total amount of up to 80 thousand gold solidi per year, and starting from the year - up to 100 thousand. At the beginning of the 7th century, the Byzantine emperors paid the Avars annually 120,000 solidi. Up to a year, the Avar Khagan was paid about 6 million solidi (25,000 kg of gold). This myriad of coins did not enter circulation: the Avars probably melted them to make jewelry and vessels; a small part was divided between the leaders and fell into the treasures.

The Avar expansion also went to the west, where, having conquered the Croats and Serbs, in a year, in alliance with the Slovenes, they went to war with the Bavarians, and then with the Franks. The Franks suffered a series of serious defeats from the Avars, so strong that even the king of the Franks Sigibert II was in Avar captivity. He managed to be released only for a promise not to support Christians subject to the kaganate, and to marry his heir Dagobert I to the Avar princess - Rachel. The newlyweds received a seaside town, later named La Rochelle, as their inheritance.

The land was plowed with a wooden plow with an iron coulter. On the territory of Hungary, such a coulter has been known since the century, and in ancient Moravia even earlier. Wheat was reaped with a sickle.

In most of the burials, good quality clay vessels were found, a significant part of which in the late Avar period was made on a potter's wheel. Some vessels were imported from nearby places, not from far away, since clay products do not withstand long transportation.

On the territory of Hungary of that time, the remains of an iron-smelting blast furnace for the manufacture of raw materials for weapons and agricultural implements were also found.

Goods were produced not only to meet their own needs, but also for exchange. In the Avar burials there are many things imported from other places. Among them are gold, silver and bronze earrings, bracelets, rings, buckles, hats, colored glass beads. Obviously, silk fabrics and other material for clothing were brought in, which have not survived to this day. They paid for all this, apparently, with cattle, horses, skins, and wool.

From Latin sources, trading and market places are known, where Avars appeared with their goods - itinerant merchants and artisans. The burial of one of them was found in the vicinity of the village of Kunsentmarton. Among the finds was lamellar chest mail: the roads in the country were not always safe for travelers.

Merchants came to the Avar Khaganate from afar, from the East. According to some reports, important trade routes to the West passed through the Carpathians. According to the custom of all nomadic peoples, the Avars levied a duty on trade caravans. As a result, the prestige of the rulers of certain regions of the country and the kagan himself increased significantly.

The Avars themselves did not mint their own money. Some researchers believe that the Avars were engaged in counterfeiting Byzantine gold coins. However, no more than a dozen such fakes were found throughout the territory of the khanate, and this is not enough to finally resolve the issue, especially since counterfeit money was also found among neighboring peoples.

Writing

Archaeological evidence suggests that the Avars knew the runic script: they carved and scratched out various spells to protect themselves from troubles, and nominal signs of property (tamgas) on various objects. However, there is no evidence that this script was used in correspondence or in the creation of literary monuments.

Little is known about the Avar language. We can get some idea about him only by personal names and titles, although the names and titles could not be of Avar origin. Moreover, few of them survived: the names of the ambassadors were Kandik, Solak, Kok, one of the shamans was called Bocolabra. Probably, these are names of Turkic origin, as well as the titles of kagan, tudun, yugur, tarkhans.

Beliefs

Very little is known about the beliefs of the Avars and other peoples of the Avar Khaganate. One source mentions a chief shaman; another testifies that the Avars were idolaters.

It is clear that the Avars, as it were, doubled the world: in addition to the earthly, they thought for themselves the afterlife. Together with the deceased, food, a horse with weapons, were usually placed in the grave so that the warrior could continue his journey and battles. Otherworld, according to shamanistic beliefs, consisted of several levels located one above the other. The dead could get to the upper level only after various tests. Arrows helped to move upwards - that's why they were placed in a quiver next to the buried.

Before the funeral rite or during it, the grave pits were "cleansed" of evil spirits with the help of fire or burning coals.

Different peoples, according to their beliefs, buried people with their heads to one or another part of the world - towards the center of the world or in the direction from which the resurrection was expected. The Avars did not have a single orientation - they were too diverse; burial took place with the head both to the east and to the west. In many cases, magical acts were performed on the dead. After the burial, the grave was opened, the skull of the buried was taken out and spells were read over it. The fear that the deceased might return from the next world prompted sometimes to bury the dead flat on their stomachs.

In order to preach Christianity among the Avars, a bishopric was established in Salzburg as early as the year. The conversion of the Avars to Christianity accelerates at the end of the 8th - beginning of the century, along with falling under Frankish rule.

Art of the Avar era

The Avars were good bone carvers, on horn plates. As the chronicles testify, they made magnificent carpets, embroideries, fabrics, were engaged in artistic processing silver and wood. None of this has survived to this day, but beautiful metal jewelry has survived - Byzantine-style earrings, bracelets, rings, rings; colored glass beads and necklaces, apparently made in the East. Free warriors - for centuries wore belts decorated with metal plaques. Horse harnesses were covered with the same plaques. In the late Avar period, plaques were made using the artistic casting method. It is difficult to find two identical ones among them. Large cast tips with floral ornaments, figurines of people or depictions of animal struggles were fastened to the waist belts. The swords and quivers of the leaders were covered with gold, ordinary soldiers - with silver. Even the iron stirrups were artistically forged, and some were inlaid with silver.

He calls this city the capital of all the land that he claims and considers his by right.

As a result of the events of 602 and subsequent years, the Avar Khaganate for a short time turned out to be the strongest state in at least Eastern Europe. For the nomadic nobility led by the kagan, this in itself meant a signal for action. Not only for the final crushing of enemies, but also for the subjugation of yesterday's allies. Sudden success turned the head of the kaganate. We can observe this in sufficient detail in the example of relations with the Lombards. Very soon, along with the Roman Istria, the Lombard Friul turned out to be the object of aggression of the nomads. But one of the first blows fell on the "allied" kaganate Slavs.
The resettlement of the Slavs beyond the Danube met the interests of the Avars - including in the sense of establishing a stronger power over the "allies". Scattered for the most part, "kinds" that had not yet settled on new lands, naturally, were looking for a unifying principle, powerful patrons. And only Avars could act like that. On the other hand, the resettlement, which began with an excess of people, gradually began to weaken, even bleed the Slavic lands north of the Danube. The Avars quickly noticed that this opened up new opportunities for them.
Even in the first years of the 7th c. (if not earlier) the Avars established tighter control over the Slavic lands north of the Middle Danube. These territories are Pomoravie and southern Slovakia adjacent to it. Here in the 7th century a culture is spreading, called by archaeologists "Avar-Slavic".
The Avars not only imposed tribute on the subject Slavic tribes, but they also made it a habit to spend the winter in the Slavic Danubian lands. During these winterings, they took both daughters and wives of the Slavs to their beds. The khagans intended to use the children from these marriages in their own interests. The monuments of the Avars to the north of the Danube were nomadic burials in Slavic or mixed burial grounds - accompanied by horses, with items of horse harness. They are found everywhere - but in a small amount in relation to the total number of burials. The largest Avaro-Slavic cemeteries appeared in the 7th century. in Pomoravie and Slovakia. In Goliar, 26 Avar riders with horses were buried in an old Slavic burial ground, among the burnings of Slavic community members. Together with them, pottery of the late Roman and Danubian types appears. In Nove Zamka near Nitra, out of 514 burials, 26 were horsemen with horses, in 4 cases with weapons. Founded at the beginning of the 7th century the burial ground in Zhelovtsy (Slovakia), among 870 graves, contained many equestrian burials. In 18 of them, nomadic sabers were found, including one for children, and in 10 - bows. When evaluating these data, it must be borne in mind that the burials were made over a very long time, up to one and a half to two centuries. Avar things are also found on Slavic settlements in Slovakia and South Moravia. Further north, only individual Avars - or Avar objects - penetrated. Rich belt sets, for example, were also appreciated by the Czech nobility.
The Avar horsemen tried to replace the tribal elite with themselves and their semi-Slavic offspring, but their numbers remained insignificant. The local nobility was largely exterminated. The remnants of the tribal "lords" served the conquerors as foremen of the administrative districts of the kaganate, zhup - zhupans. This title for a petty tribal leader-elder later took root among the western and southwestern Slavs. The zhups approximately corresponded (and then began to correspond exactly) to small Slavic tribes, which included several "clans"-communities.
The Slavs provided the conquerors not only with the products of agricultural labor, but also with military force. " When the Huns went on a campaign, writes Fredegar, against any people, the Huns, having gathered their army, stood in front of the camp, while the Vinids fought. If they were able to win, then the Huns would come forward to take the booty. If the Vinids were overcome, then, supported by the Huns, they regained strength ... They went ahead of the Huns, forming a double battle line in the battle". From here came the name of the Slavs in the Avar environment - the Latin-German word "bifulki", "double army". Among other things, Slavic craftsmen made handicrafts for the Avars - including weapons and parts highly valued by the nomadic (and Slavic) nobility of the waist samples brought from the east became an impetus for the further development of Slavic crafts.
In the vast areas conquered by the kaganate, various cultures naturally met and merged. So the Slavic culture on the middle Danube already at the very beginning of the 7th century. intertwined with Romance and Germanic. Previously, this happened mainly in the alpine lands of Norik with their mixed population. now this feature Avaro-Slavic culture of the Danube region. Contributed to the forced relocation of entire tribes and residents of the Danube Roman cities, arranged by the kagans. The tribes of the Balkan Slavs, subject to the kagan, also joined the process. Therefore, the languages ​​of the ancestors of the Czechs and Slovaks (especially the Middle Slovak dialects) became close to the Slavic south.
The northern Slavs adopted the potter's wheel from their new neighbors. In the Slavic environment north of the Danube, the Prague-Korchak stucco was replaced by a new pottery of the so-called Danube type. Born in the central regions of the kaganate, she adopted many features of local dishes from the Slavs. Pottery was decorated with a simple but rich ornament - wavy or linear. Soon, in a matter of years, pottery (like other features of the Avar-Slavic culture) goes beyond the kaganate and spreads among its enemies. The cultural interaction of the Slavs on both sides of the Avar border was not interrupted. In addition, both the Slavs and the Romanesque potters who created Danube ceramics fled to the still free north from Avar Pannonia.
Burials according to the rite of burial appear in the Slavic environment here just under the influence of the conquerors themselves, and not just the peoples they conquered. The Slavs buried the dead in the same cemeteries as the Avars. Slavic graves are distinguished by the western or southwestern orientation of the buried and relatively poor inventory (dishes, individual jewelry). In some of them, like the Avars, - Romanesque influence - they find the remains of wooden coffins or lining of burials with boards. But in general, the Slavs remained faithful to their custom of cremation. By the 7th century includes a number of burial grounds with cremation in Pomoravie and other Slavic lands.
Finally, following their relatives from the Alpine lands, the Slavs of the Middle Danube took over from the Romans the beginning of fortification. The walls of the castles began to be built in places of stone, and wooden palisades, lattices or other additional barriers were arranged on the rampart poured to the walls. This new technique was also quickly adopted by the opponents of the Khaganate. Already in the first decades of the 7th c. castles of a new type are springing up in Bohemia, Moravia, and even between the rivers Laba and Saale.
The intensive urban development that unfolded on both sides of the border is an unambiguous evidence of the strife fomented by the Avars between allied and hostile Slavic tribes. It brought advancing on the lands of the Czech Republic and Slovakia in the 7th century. era the name "Starogorodishchenskaya". This period includes the emergence of a number of future important cities in Moravia (Mikulčice, Stare Mesto, Břeclav-Pohansko, Znojmo, etc.) and Slovakia (Nitra). Their oldest layers are dominated by Prague-Korchak ceramics. Some of them, however, were not yet fortified at that time. But Mikulčice - the oldest and most significant among Moravia's castles - was already protected by a palisade at the first stage of its existence, from the beginning of the 7th century. Here, together with the Slavs, the conquerors-Avars also lived.
The Avars and their subjects often acted as the attacking side. Therefore, most of the castles were built north of the Avar borders. There are especially many of them in Central Bohemia, up to the border with Moravia. But there are also in other areas. The early cities were, first of all, shelters from nomadic raids. Over time, however, a permanent population appears in them. The inhabitants of the towns were engaged in the cultivation of the surrounding lands. But the placement of princes with their retinues in the city attracted craftsmen working to order. So the cities turned into centers of crafts. They were usually protected by a wooden palisade. But at the same time, in the 7th century, the Slavs erected a unique defensive system in the Prachov Rocks. Taking advantage of the mountainous terrain, they restored and expanded the ancient ramparts, turning the nesting place of unfortified villages into a real fortress against nomads.
Grads from the turn of the 6th–7th centuries. the Slavs are building further north, in Silesia. Among the first Silesian cities were Gostyn, Klenica, Pshytok, Popenchytse, Polupin, Kamenets. These are all small tribal refuge fortresses. But some of them were definitely erected as political centers of the tribes.
The Avars did not limit themselves to securing power over the already conquered Slavs of the Middle Danube. The next blow was sent to the east, to the lands of the dulebs. Already at the turn of the VI / VII centuries. The Khaganate established control over the Lower Danube. In the conditions of the outflow of the Slavs from here to the Balkans, this control inevitably strengthened. At the same time, the Dulebs, who gave a lot of their human forces to the great migration to the south, had reason to consider the lands of the Danubians (and perhaps the Transdanubian ones) as their own. This is the most probable cause a direct clash between them and the Avars, which took place at the time of the highest flowering of the kaganate, in the first quarter of the 7th century.
This clash put an end to the Duleb union of tribes under the leadership of the "king" of the Buzhan Musok (Madzhak). Either in connection with the Avar strike, or independently of it (or even involuntarily creating conditions for it), a strife broke out among the Dulebs. The power of the Grand Duke of Buzhan over a vast territory, where the tribes descended from the Buzhans settled, inevitably became illusory - and eventually caused irritation. "Strife" led to the collapse of the union and the emergence of independent tribal "principalities". This event was reflected not only in the Volyn tradition, recorded in the tenth century. Masudi, but also in Russian chronicles. "The Tale of Bygone Years" speaks of the simultaneous emergence of tribal "principalities" among the Drevlyans, Dregovichi and Polyans. True, the Kyiv chronicler preferred to date this event not to the death of the ancient Duleb union (which he speaks of in another connection), but to the death of the founder of Kyiv, Kyi.

The Tale of Bygone Years preserved another Volyn legend - about the Avar yoke now established over the dulebs. " Obry, - the chronicler narrates, - fought with the Slovenes and oppressed the Dulebs, who were Slovenes, and did violence to the Duleb wives. If he went where obrin, did not let him harness either a horse or an ox, but ordered to harness 3, or 4, or 5 wives in a cart and carry the obrin, - so the dulebs were tormented. After all, they were great in body, but proud in mind ..."
As in the Middle Danubian lands - although in very small numbers - Avar governors appeared on the Bug. They drove into the main lands of the Dulebs-Buzhans, into the former center of the tribal union. Their number, we repeat, was extremely small, and they hardly moved away from the river to the east. But the memory of the violence they perpetrated remained strong even after almost half a thousand years.
After the Avar conquest, in the first half of the 7th century. (due to the Avar pogrom or tribal strife) life ceased in the settlement of Zimno - in the capital city of "Madzhaka". The former Duleb union broke up not into four, as one could conclude from the tribal map of the 10th-11th centuries, but into much more more independent tribal "princes". It is not at all necessary that "principles", especially at the first stage, corresponded to a whole tribal union. It is more likely that initially all the "small" princes of individual tribes declared themselves independent. Among them, undoubtedly, are the Drevlyans, the Dregovichi and the Polans, but also the Berzichs, and the Zhereviches, and many other tribes, forgotten by the time the chronicles were created, but known to sources as early as the 9th century. At the same time, many of them were still aware of their Duleb unity (belonged to the same clan?) and continued to title themselves "small" - like the Drevlyansk princes until the end of their tribal principality.
Only the lands of the Buzhan proper along the Western Bug, where Zimno used to stand, passed into direct subordination to the Avars. At the same time, some part of the Duleb nobility left the conquerors to the east, to the lands of the tribal union of the Luchians. At least, one gets the feeling that the author of The Tale of Bygone Years considered the Buzhans (Volhynians) only the territorial successors of the ancient dulebs. " The Dulebs lived along the Bug, where Volynians are now", - it is said in the annals. Judging by the news of Jan Dlugosh, the inhabitants of eastern Volhynia - Luchians considered themselves descendants, peculiar heirs of the Dulebs. This tribal union existed by the 9th century and was one of the strongest in the region. In the 7th century, which Some of the Luchians were subjugated or captivated by the Avars - forming the basis of the later Czech tribe of the Luchians. Further, however, the "obry" hardly advanced. "Dereva" in the west and the Polissya "dregva" in the north, without local help, became an insurmountable obstacle.
If the dulebs were, albeit conditional, but allies of the kaganate, then another tribal group of the then Eastern Slavs - the antes - was always at enmity with the kaganate. The Avar Khagan was preparing a campaign against the Ants back in 602, but then it was interrupted by a rebellion of his subjects. Now, after the collapse of Roman power, the Antes, yesterday's allies of the Empire, were left alone with the Avars. Retribution for helping the Romans was inevitable. And there is every reason to believe that it followed - before or after the conquest of the dulebs.
There are no traces of mass destruction and extermination of the Ants. But the Avars did not set this seriously as their goal. They needed Antian lands with a population, not without. The justified anxiety that seized the Antian retinue nobility at the turn of the 6th / 7th centuries was traced, first of all, by the undiscovered treasures of the Middle Dnieper region - including the famous Martynovsky, which gave its name to this entire group of Antian antiquities. The surviving owners of things fled from the Avars deep into the Left Bank, or further east - to the allied Bulgarian Steppe. For several decades, the Avars turn out to be the western neighbors of the Bulgarians of the Azov Great Bulgaria, and Khan Kuvrat is forced to enter into direct relations with them - hostile at the first stage. The eastern border of the advancement of the Avars at the beginning of the 7th century. notes the local Old Russian name "Obrov" on the Left Bank, in the vicinity of the city of Pereyaslavl.
The new Avar invasion put an end to more than a century of history of the Ants tribal association. It finally fell apart and disappeared from the pages of sources. The last mention of the Antes is a short-term resurrection of the title "Antes" by the Byzantine emperor Heraclius in the short story of 612. There is nothing concrete behind this mention. The magnificent titles of the Eastern Roman emperors, which Heraclius soon completely abandoned, were only a trace of unsupported claims to the heritage of Justinian. Unless it is possible with some degree of probability to assume that Heraclius was already looking for connections with the Serbs and Croats in Central Europe. Anonymous of Ravenna, who wrote on the verge of the 8th century, found the name of the Antes at Jordan did not mean anything, and he gave it as Itites. Thus, the tribes that once kept a large part of Europe in fear left the stage of great history.
However, the Antes themselves remained - they simply lost their political influence. They, apparently, also retained their self-name, forgotten by the rest of Europe. Some of them, on the Left Bank and in the forest-steppe Middle Dnieper, either retained their independence from the Khaganate, or quickly restored it. Like the Dulebs, the Antes were divided into several tribal "principalities" that practically did not attract the attention of those powers that built their policy in the Northern Black Sea region.
The fate of the Dulebs and Ants, who found themselves under the Avar yoke, aggravated not only the Avar oppression. In an effort to provide the center of the kaganate with a taxable agricultural and artisan population, and at the same time to rally the provinces of different tribes into a single whole, the khagans and Eastern Europe were drawn into the whirlpool of their resettlement policy. Many immigrants from the Ants and Duleb regions, torn from their native places, were forcibly resettled in the west. Dulebs settled within the kaganate as whole tribes - in Pannonia, Norik and, above all, in South Bohemia, where they became the main population. By settling alien dulebs to the north of the Danube, in the lands bordering on the hostile Croatian tribal union, the kagan strengthened, rather than weakened, this section of the borders of his state. For this purpose, mainly combat-ready men were evicted, who married local Slavs.
The Dulebs brought to the Czech Republic the barrow burial rite, hitherto unknown on the Middle Danube. It spread among the tribes subject to the kaganate - among those who settled most South Bohemia Dulebs, near the Moravans neighboring them from the east, near part of the northwestern and eastern Slovak "kinds". The same group of tribes dependent on the kaganate included (or descended from them) the Zlichans who lived to the northeast of the Dulebs. Their region, centered on Libice, is shallow but cut between Czech and Croatian proper. The Zlichans were formed as a result of a mixture of Croats and Dulebs that moved north. It was not for nothing that one of the later cities of these places bore the name Dudlebu. The falling away of the Zlichans from the Croatian Union, with the small size of their territory, was a rather significant success of the Avars. He proved the effectiveness of relying on forced migrants-dulebs. It was from the Zlichians that the Croats themselves later adopted the barrow rite - the only tribes hostile to the Avars. However, the pressure of the Avars led to a denser settlement during this period not only in the south, but also in the Croatian north-east of the Czech Republic. Among the settlers, of course, there were also refugees from among the same dulebs. The Avars also conquered part of the Czech Republic west of Laba. Here, along the Ohrzha before its confluence with the Laba, they settled the Lutsk people who were dependent on them.
Traces of the presence of the Slavs resettled by the Avars in Pannonia are quite numerous. At first, the Slavs remained faithful to the original funeral ritual - cremations, enclosing the ashes in urns of the Prague-Korchak type. Then, during the 7th-8th centuries, one can observe the gradual perception of inhumation. Unlike the Avars, the Slavs buried the dead with their heads to the west. Similar burials have been noted at many Pannonian burial grounds of the Avar period (Oroslan, Pokasepetk, etc.). Among the Slavic things found in the burials are finger brooches, ritual knives with a volute-shaped handle. In turn, the Pannonian Slavs, like their relatives in Pomoravia, mastered the potter's wheel and began to make dishes of the Danube type. The assimilation of the Slavs did not happen - with all the interaction with the Avars, Romans, Germans, they retained their originality.
The excess of the Slavic population in the Middle Danubian regions, formed as a result of migrations, allowed the kagans to use the Slavs for the development of other lands. Some of these migrations could occur spontaneously, but others, no doubt, were part of the kagan's policy. In the southeast in the 7th century. the penetration of the Slavs into the lands of Transylvania, previously inhabited by the Gepids and partly by the Vlachs, intensified. At the same time, the Slavs come along with the Avars. They moved from Potissia or from Transcarpathia, along the Somesh River. Upon arrival, they settled on the already existing settlements of Gepids and Romanized natives. In the west, the Slavs, carriers of the Avar-Slavic culture, are gradually mastering the future Lower Austria.
Finally, by the time of the highest power of the Khaganate in the first decades of the 7th century. refers to the penetration of the Slavs from the Middle Danube to the upper Main. Here, at the confluence of the Regnitz River, not far from the modern city of Bamberg, the Knetzgau tract, the "Vinid hill" Vinidsheim and the "princely castle" Knetzburg are known. Numerous fragments of Prague-Korchak ceramics have been found - a clear evidence of the existence here from the first half of the 7th century. Slavic settlements. Their appearance could be explained by the flight of the Slavs (Luchans or their neighbors) from the Avar oppression under the protection of the Frankish state opposing the Avars, closer to its borders. The entrance to the Main could also be simply a natural consequence of the movement of the Czech "kinds" up the Ohře - a movement that, of course, was accelerated both by the Avar onslaught and the resettlement of the Luchians.
On the other hand, there were also return migrations of the Slavs from the Danubian lands to Eastern Europe. The finds at Pastyrsky, at Zimno and at a number of other resettlements testify to the presence here of craftsmen from the Middle Danube. They brought to the south of the East European Plain some new techniques for working on non-ferrous metals, their artistic style, and types of jewelry. Among these settlers there were also Slavs. Craftsmen who worked to order were brought with them by the Avars.
The Slavs, as we see, took a lot of new things into their culture under the rule of the kaganate. At first, it is difficult to see obvious hostility in their relations with the Avars. Slavic warriors not only fought together with the Avars against common enemies - primarily the Romans. They, albeit forcedly, fought against their own, Slavic, relatives, in strife pushed by the kagan. However, all this, of course, does not indicate the humility of the Slavs with the Avar yoke, violent and humiliating - rather, in the end it only increased the feeling of humiliation.
If we talk about cultural interaction, then it happened mainly not with the conquerors, but with the same conquered peoples - the Romans, the Gepids. Traces of close contacts with the Alpine Romans have been preserved in the Proto-Slavic language. The language borrowings that occurred around the Avar era were widely dispersed not only in the alpine lands, but throughout the northern Slavic area, right up to the East Slavic languages. These borrowings mainly (but not exclusively) reflect the interaction in the economy - crop production, metallurgy, etc.
The crushing of the Slavic tribal unions that existed for about a century by the Avars in itself suppressed the will to active resistance among many Slavs. Reasons for the fall of the Antes and Duleb tribal confederations for modern science lie on the surface - first of all, it is their very fragile structure. However, the first generation of eyewitnesses, pagan Slavs, the victory of the Avars in itself made them see in the conquerors some kind of otherworldly force, the struggle against which is useless. The Avars, of course, used to their advantage the ideas of the Slavs themselves about the ritual and social obligations of any conquered to the conquerors. This did not exclude, however, either hatred of the "violators" or passive forms of struggle - first of all, secret assistance to the opponents of the Avars.
One such episode, which took place somewhere in the alpine lands of Noricum after 610, is described by Paul the Deacon. His great-grandfather Lopihiza was taken to Pannonia by the Avars in 610 when the Lombard Duchy of Friul was ravaged with other children. Years later, he managed to escape from captivity. He found shelter in some Slavic village. " When one woman, already elderly, saw him, she immediately realized that he was a fugitive and was suffering from hunger. Moved by pity for him, she hid him in her house and secretly gave him a little food, so as not to destroy him completely if she immediately fed him his fill. In this way, properly, she gave him food, until, having rested, he regained his strength. And when she saw that he was already able to walk, then, having provided him with provisions, she indicated in which direction he should take the path. A few days later he entered Italy and came to the house where he was born.".
It was during these decades of the highest power of the kaganate that the word "obry" - Avars - entered the northern Slavic dialects. For many centuries it remained the designation of the mythical evil giants, theomachists, "barbarians". We find the same idea captured in the annalistic parable about the "images". The meanings of this word best characterize the attitude of the Slavs to the cultural and political "symbiosis" within the framework of the Avar Khaganate. The established Avar yoke from the very beginning caused general hatred. It rested only on the idea of ​​​​the exceptional power of the conquerors, which developed because of their impressive military successes. The overthrow of the Avar domination was a matter of time.

Mysteries of history. Avar Khaganate
The steppes of southern Russia are for the geographer nothing more than a continuation of the steppes of Asia. The same is true for the historian. We have already seen this in antiquity, in relation to the Scythians, Sarmatians, Huns. This fact is also applicable to the period of the early Middle Ages, from the Avars to the Genghis Khans.
The migration of the Avars from Upper Asia to southern Russia is known to us thanks to the Byzantine historian Theophylact Simocatta. Theophylact distinguishes between real Avars and what he calls false Avars. (Pseudo-failures).

Under the former, he sees, as Marcoir notes, those whom we call Zhuan-zhuani, a people of Mongolian origin who were the masters of Mongolia throughout the entire 5th century. before being crushed and forced out in 552 by the Tukyu Turks. And he gives under the "false Avars" who appropriated this formidable name - Avars - the people of our medieval history. These latter consisted of two united hordes, namely, Uar (or Var), whence the name Avar originated, and Kunni or Huni, a name reminiscent of their Hunnic etymology.
The two combined names "Uar" and "Huni" designate Avars and Huns. On the other hand, these Uars and Khunis, from whom the Byzantines derive the Uarkhonitai, were, according to the same Byzantine sources, two tribes of the Ogors, that is, as some Orientalists think, the Uighurs. But the historical Uighurs are Turks, while the Avars of Europe were probably Mongols. In addition, Albert Herrmann, by means of a map from his atlas, proposes to identify the Huars and Khunis with the Juan-Juans, who were certainly Mongols. Finally, as Minorsky notes, the distinction between "real Avars" and "pseudo-Avars" is based on only one Byzantine source, and even then not entirely reliable. In addition, according to the same Herrmann, if the Avars, who emigrated to Europe in the second half of the VI century. were not Juan-Juans, then they must be Hephthalites Huns. Recall that the Hephthalites, who owned the Ili region, Transoxiana and Bactria in the 5th century, and were of Mongol origin, like the Juan-Juan, were defeated and dispersed after them, by 565 by the same opponents-tukyu, who made an alliance against them with the Sassanid Persia.
Regardless of this discussion, it is obvious that by the end of the reign of Justinian (died in 565), the Avars - in Greek: “abares, abaroi”, in Latin: “Avari, Avares” - moved into Europe, pressing on marching ahead of them, as Teofilakt Simokatta says, "Hunnugurs, Sabirs and other Hunnic hordes." The leader of the Alans, called Sarozios by the Byzantines, was able to remain on friendly terms with them. Their appearance reminded the Byzantines of the ancient Huns, except that, unlike the Huns, the Avars braided their hair into two long braids that fell from their backs. We know that they were shamanists; Theophylact mentions one of their sorcerers or "bokolabras" (from the Mong. "god" - a sorcerer). Their ambassador Kandih, when received by Justinian, demanded land and tribute (557). Justinian sent his ambassador Valentine to them (the same one who later visited the tukyu) and persuaded their kagan to go to war with other hordes, the Hunnugurs and Sabirs or Vigury and Sabiri, who were defeated. The Avars also defeated the Huns of the Kutrigurs and the Huns of the Uturgurs, who, both of them, were the descendants of the people of Attila, and who roamed, the first - in the north-west of the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, the second - near the mouth of the Don. The Avars included these Huns in their own horde. Since the Huns in question were Türks, and our Avars, obviously, Mongols, it is certainly clear that each of these two large Turkic-Mongolian groups united within their own empire with representatives of another group. The Avars, acting as the federals of the Byzantine Empire, destroyed these Hunnic kingdoms. In 560, their possessions extended to the territory from the Volga to the mouth of the Danube. Their kagan set up his wagon camp on the northern bank of the Danube. In the north, he defeated the Slavic tribes of the Antes, Slovenes and Wends; in the west he entered Germany and, finally, was defeated in a major battle in Thuringia by the Frankish king of Astrasia - Sigebert, grandson of Clovis (562). The Avars retreated to the Black Sea.
Some time later (about 565), a very capable kagan, named Bayan, whose name, as Pelliot notes, was purely Mongol, entered the Avar throne.
As before him - Attila, and after him - Genghis Khan, he was probably a more prudent and cunning politician than a strategist. In 567, in alliance with the Lombard Germanic peoples who inhabited Pannonia, he defeated the Gepids, another Germanic people (Gothic in origin), located in Hungary and Transylvania.
Hungary was occupied by the Avars, and Bayan placed his royal stations near the old capital of Attila. Thus, on the Hungarian plain, which throughout history figured as a continuation of the Asian steppes, the chain of Turkic-Mongolian empires was restored. The Avars now ruled from the Volga to Austria. This unexpected expansion of the Zhuan-Zhuan-kih or Hephtalite hordes, which avoided clashes with the tukyu army, greatly annoyed the latter. They accused the Byzantines of making an agreement between Justinian and the Avars. When Tardu, the leader of the western tukyu, received the Byzantine ambassador Valentine in 575-576. in the upper reaches of the Yulduz, north of Kucha, he accused him of concluding this treaty. Menander cites his speech: “Let these Varchonitae dare to stand before my cavalry, and simply look at our whips, which will make them flee into the bowels of the earth! We must destroy this nation of slaves without using our swords; we will crush them like miserable ants under the hooves of our horses.” In order to punish the Byzantines for their connections with the Avars, the tukyu was sent to the Russian steppes in 576 by a cavalry detachment under the command of a certain Bokhan, who, together with the last leader of the Uturgur Huns, Anagay, attacked the Byzantine city of Bosporus or Panticapaeum, located near modern Kerch, in the Crimea , at the entrance to the Sea of ​​Azov.
In 582 Bayan started a war against the Byzantines and captured Sirmium (Mitrovitsa), a fortress on the Sava. Under the pressure of the Avars, part of the Bulgars - a people, probably of the Turkic race, descended, perhaps, from the Huns of the Kutrigurs, settled in Bessarabia and Wallachia, from where, after the appearance of the Magyars in these places, they later left for Moesi, subsequently turning it into Bulgaria. In the west, Bayan - "gaganus", as Gregory of Tours renders his Mongol title - resumed, by 570, the fight against the Franks, and this time defeated Sigebert, king of Austasia. Then Bayan attacked the Byzantine Empire again, captured Singidum (Belgrade) and plundered Moesi up to Anchialus (near Burgas). In 587, the Byzantines managed to defeat it near Andrianople. For some time he was inactive. But already in 592, Bayan undertook a new campaign. He managed to capture Anchialus and plunder part of Thrace up to Zurulum (Korlu). The outstanding Byzantine commander Priscus managed to stop the kagan; having crossed the Danube, he imposed a battle in the very heart of the steppe empire, namely, in Hungary. Bayan was finally defeated in the battle off the banks of the Tisza. During this battle four of his sons were killed (601). Bayan himself, unable to bear the shock, died shortly thereafter (602).
The next Avar Khagan turned his troops against Italy, which was dominated by the Lombards. The Avars took advantage of the fact that the Lombards were leaving Pannonia and migrated en masse to Italy. The Avars tried to take over Pannonia. In 610, their kagan captured and plundered Friul. In 619, in connection with a meeting in Heraclea in Thrace (Eregli), he committed a betrayal by attacking the emperor Heraclius. In the future, the siege of Constantinople was planned. But, both of these actions were not implemented. Meanwhile, for the Avars, the contradiction that arose between the ruler of Persia, Khosroes II, and the Byzantine Empire was a good sign. The Persians managed to unite with the Avars in their quest to capture Constantinople. If the first attacked through Asia Minor, the second - through Thrace. In June-July 626, the Persian commander Shahrvaraz, who crossed Asia Minor from end to end, set up his camp at the entrance to the Bosphorus in Calcedon. At the same time, the Avar Khagan settled down in front of the Constantinople fortifications. Due to the absence of Emperor Heraclius, who was on a campaign in the Caucasus, the defense of Constantinople was carried out by the patrician Bonus. The Avars launched an offensive from July 31 to August 4, 626. This was the most serious danger faced by Western civilization in a significant period of time. It is not known what would have happened to this civilization if the Mongol horde had managed to gain a foothold at that time in the capital of Christianity? But the Byzantine flotilla, the mistress of the Bosporus, forced the Persians and Avars to abandon their joint actions. Having suffered huge losses as a result of all attacks, the kagan lifted the siege and returned to Hungary.
This turn of events caused great damage to the prestige of the Avars. After the death of the kagan, who allowed such a development of events, (630), the Bulgars - a people of Turkic origin, who had previously helped the Avars more as an ally than as a subordinate, demanded that the title of kagan pass to their own khan Kubrat, and the Avars were forced to , up in arms, reject these claims to hegemony. However, the Avars were forced to leave the Bulgars to rule in modern Wallachia and "Bulgaria" in the north of the Balkan Mountains, just as they allowed the Slavs (Croats, etc.) to occupy the territory between the Danube and the Sava. They themselves remained on the Hungarian plain until the end of the 8th century.
Charlemagne (Charlemagne) had to complete relations with the Mongol horde. In August 791, during the first campaign, he managed to capture the Avar Khaganate and advance to the confluence of the Danube and Raaba. In 795, his son Pepin, assisted by Erik, Duke of Friol, attacked Rin, the stronghold of the Avars, and seized part of the kagan's treasury, which was spoils of war collected over two centuries of confrontation with Byzantium. In 796, as a result of the third campaign, Pepin destroyed Rin and captured the rest of the treasury. One of the Avar leaders, who bore the ancient Turko-Mongolian title tudun, in 795 converted to the Baptist faith in Aix la Chapelle. In 799, this Tudun rebelled against Frankish influence, but this was his last battle, and after his death, the new Avar ruler named Zodan was forced in 803 to recognize complete submission. In 805 the Avars were dependent on Charlemagne and were ruled by a kagan who took the Christian name Theodore.
After so many defeats, the Avars were unable to defend themselves against the double pressure of the Slavs and Bulgars. At the end of the reign of Charlemagne, and with his permission, they left the northern bank of the Danube to group under their Khagan Theodore in western Pannonia, between Carnuntum and Sabaria. At the end of the ninth century ancient Avaria was divided between (1) the Slavic empire, the so-called Great Moravia, Svyatopolk (died 895), which stretched from Bohemia to Pannonia inclusive, and (2) the Turkic Bulgar Khaganate, which occupied southern Hungary, Wallachia and Bulgaria to the north Balkans. The Bulgar tribes, who probably gave their name to Hungary, namely, Onogundur or Onogur, captured, in particular, the region east and south of the Carpathians.
The Avars had their own art, which is confirmed by archaeological finds in Hungary. This is a branch of steppe art, with motifs of a modified "animal style" and, in addition, plant motifs or spiral geometric shapes, delicately intertwined and creating a solid decorative effect. The finds, mostly bronze, consist of waist plates and plaques decorated with ornaments of armor, hooks, and clasps. Of particular interest is the similarity of the Avar finds from Hungary with similar bronze items found in the Ordos, in the big loop of the Yellow River, dating back to the era of the Xiongnu, Zhuan-Zhuan and Tukyu. Let us note the richest among the Hungarian burials: Kezteli, Ksuni and Nemesvolgi, Pachy-Pushta, Xongrad and Zentes, Scilogi - Somlio, Dunapentele, Ullo and Kizkorosh.
Avar art, as noted by Nandor Fetish, is associated, in particular, with the latest Siberian style of Minusinsk, known as the nomadic horseman. The comparisons made by Fettysh between this style and the finds from Minzent, Fenech, and Push-tatochi are striking. Note that there is a high probability that it was the Avars who taught the West to use the stirrup.

Russ of the Middle Ages and the Avar Khaganate.

Today, there are two theories of the ethnogenesis of the Rus - Norman and Khazar. The Norman theory arose in the 18th century on the instructions of Peter the Great and its authors are German historians hired by him and other rulers from the Romanov dynasty, and the Khazar theory arose in the 90s of the 20th century . Both theories have a lot of inconsistencies that their refutation is not difficult. I do not set the goal of this article to criticize these theories, but I propose for discussion the theory of the Avar origin of the Rus. To do this, we will analyze the history of the emergence and collapse of the Avar Khaganate on the basis of the works already available on this topic, both contemporaries of the events and researchers of this issue by our contemporaries.

Avars and the Avar Khaganate.

Modern historiography knows little about the Avars and the Avar Khaganate. At the same time, the Avar Khaganate is a state that existed since 562 on 823 on the territory of modern Hungary, Austria, Switzerland(partially), Slovakia, Croatia, Romania, Serbia, Poland, Ukraine.

Based Avar kagan bayan, and was one of the most influential states of its time, controlling the entire Eastern Europe, including part of the lands of the later Kievan Rus.

Avars appear on the arena of world history in 555 how oppressed ancient Turks nomadic people to the west. Then they still wandered in the steppes of the western Kazakhstan. AT 557 their camps are transferred to the western bank of the Volga in the steppes North Caucasus where they enter into an alliance with Alans against Savirs and Utigurs. A tribe related to the Avars mentioned in Byzantine sources Zabender, possibly related to the emergence of the city Semender in the Caspian Dagestan.

AT 558 year the ambassadors of the Avars arrive in Constantinople to the emperor's court Justinian with the aim of settling within Byzantium, however, this was denied to them, but was concluded alliance treaty. Thus, the empire left the Antes, who were fighting under an allied treaty against the "Huns" to protect the borders of the empire, alone. But then their political vector changes, they entered into a political alliance with Kutrigurami, attacking Antes, conquer them and send them to the Bulgaro-Sclaven army Kutrigursky ruler Zabergana, which stormed the walls of the Byzantine capital.

AT 565 -566 years of the Avars, rounding from the north Carpathians, make a long-range predatory raid in Thuringia and Gaul. According to Gregory of Tours, with the help of magic, they break the army of the Franks and capture their king Sigibert I.

AT 567 Avars in alliance with Lombards win Gepids, who were assisted by Byzantium, and take possession of the valley Yews. A year later, after the departure of the Lombards to Italy, Avars, led by their kagan Bayan I, become masters of the entire Transdanubia, which turns into the main focus of their attacks on Byzantine possessions.

AT 578, after the appeal of the Emperor of Byzantium Tiberius II, the Avar Khagan Bayan, with the help of the imperial commander John, makes a campaign against the Sclavens .. According to Menander, Bayan Khagan transported more than 60 thousand horsemen in armor and defeated the Sclaven detachments, whose main armed forces at that time were on a campaign against Greece. AT 581 Avars and Emperor Tiberius II conclude a peace treaty on the terms of paying tribute to the Avars in exchange for their waging war against the Sclavens to protect Byzantium from their onslaught.

Settling on the Middle Danube in pannonia, the Avars founded a state in which they themselves took the place of a military aristocracy. Relying on hringi (wooden fortresses), they kept the Sclaven and Slavic tribes in subjection, the spread of which to Dalmatia, Illyria and Thrace themselves contributed a lot.

AT 623 the year of the Slavens under the leadership Samo raise an uprising against the Avars and free themselves from their power.

AT 627 year, the Avars suffered a serious defeat from the Byzantines, which led to an uprising kuturgurs. AT 631 year, the Avars defeated the Kuturgurs.

To 640 The Croats drove the Avars out of Dalmatia.

The Avars turned out to be a serious opponent francs that inflicted on them in 796 tangible impact. In the end 797 Avar ambassadors swore allegiance Charlemagne.

At the beginning 9th century the territory of the Avar Khaganate was divided among themselves Germans and Bulgars. Under the onslaught of the Sclaves-Karantans on the Avars in 811 In the year the Franks were forced to come to the defense of the Avars.

DIED AKI RETURNED...Such a saying has long existed in Russia - according to the testimony of the author of The Tale of Bygone Years, who further adds: "They have no tribe or heir." This people really disappeared, although not quite as it seemed to the chronicler more than three hundred years after the events. The Eastern Slavs had little encounter with images (usually called Avars), because after their conquest, the foremen of the Slavic tribes followed the instructions of the Avar Khagans to send tribute and soldiers for the war with the Byzantines. -sklaves are known not only in Volyn, but also in the Czech Republic, in Hungary. And they, as well as the Serbs, Croats, Byzantines, Franks and other peoples, had to deal with the Avars for a long time - almost two and a half centuries. None of the Asian peoples that came to Europe in the era of the Great Migration, in the 5th-8th centuries, had such a lasting influence on European history. Glory, although not good, the Avars earned hardly less than the Huns, and they have never been deprived of the attention of historians. . Most often, perhaps, the Avars are called Turks, considering this for some reason as something taken for granted. Sometimes, however, they are identified as Iranians, although this does not fit in with what is known about them from sources. The view of the Avars as a mixed, Turkic-Mongolian-Iranian group is also widespread. . The question of the origin of the Avars proper remains open. The prevailing until recently (at least in the West) was the version of the origin of these nomads from the fragments of a large association of Jujans that dominated the steppes of Central Asia in the 5th-6th centuries. The basis for such an idea (which appeared as early as the 18th century) was the fact that in 552-555. the Jujans were defeated by the Turks, and the Avars appeared in Europe in 558 (more precisely, in that year their embassy arrived in Constantinople). The Jujans are recognized by the language as Mongols, although they consisted of the remnants of the Xiongnu Turks, the Mongol Xianbei and Chinese deserters. From this, the conclusion was made that the Avars were Mongol-speaking. However, the Byzantine author of the 7th century Theophylact Simokatta unambiguously calls the Avars only the Turks. At the same time, the Mongol language of that period is the Turkic-Tungus language of the times of the Xiongnu empire. Another argument is related to the fact that the ruler of the Avars bore the title of kagan, which first appeared among the Rourans and was considered Mongol in origin. However, not a single Mongol state of a later period had a ruler with such a title. The kagans were only among the Turkic peoples. Yes, and the hairstyle of the Avars, especially noted by the Byzantines, is also quite characteristic: long hair, divided into strands and braided. Supported this version and other data. So, the famous German scientist K.G. Menges determined that the Slavic words cart and banner are of Mongolian origin. Since all other nomads of the early Middle Ages were Turks or Mongols, it is determined by the method of elimination that the Slavs could borrow these words only from the Avars. Finally, the Russian ethnonym itself with a characteristic substitution of vowels (obry-Avars) indicates the origin of the word from the Altaic (in the broad sense) languages. This theory, however, had two weak links: a very small time gap (three years) between the defeat of the Rourans in Asia and the appearance of the Avars in Europe, and the inconsistency with the data of the Byzantine historian Theophylact Simocatta (7th century), who reports that the Avars arrived from the Middle Asia, and not from more eastern areas. Although none of the researchers of the times of the USSR considers the territory of the Irtysh region (Novosibirsk, Omsk, Kemerovo regions, the north of Kazakhstan and Altai) as the land where the main events of the war of the buzzers and kyok of the Turks of the Khagan Bumyn unfolded Predominantly on the information gleaned from Theophylact, another version is based, which has become widely known in the presentation of L.N. Gumilyov. According to this historian, the question of the origin of the Avars is solved very simply. There were de formidable abars in Dzungaria (Chinese Turkestan), about which nothing is really known, nevertheless they are declared to be the ancestors of the Karakalpaks. (Here it is not clear why the Turks conquered the “terrible” Abars, apparently without any problems and only mentioned them; what then, in fact, their “terribleness” consisted of? And why did the Karakalpaks come from the Abars, and not any other ethnos?) And in Central Asia lived the Chionites known to the Byzantines, a sedentary people of Sarmatian origin, also called Hephthalites and called White Huns by Procopius of Caesarea. Simokatta writes about them as two tribes - Huar and Hunni, together they were also called Varhonites. They fled from the Turks to the Volga and the Don, declared themselves to be those very Abars, everyone believed them (it is not known - why would they?), and they, having instilled fear in everyone, came to Europe not as Varhonites, but as Avars. Therefore, following Simokatta, we must consider them pseudo-Avars, not to confuse both, which historians often do, falling into one more mistake: they consider these pseudo-Avars to be nomads. After all, the Byzantine explained everything: in fact, there was a settled people of Chionites (Hunni), and the Uar is just an epithet, a word from the Hun language, meaning river (however, earlier L.N. Gumilyov believed that the Uar were an Ugric tribe). Chionites lived, according to Gumilyov, either in the lower reaches of the Syr Darya, or between the Aral and the Ural River (in the latter case, it is not clear where at that time they could live settled there). And the Hephthalites, another people, lived to the south, near the borders of Persia. This is how, according to Gumilyov, the solution of an equation with two unknowns (Avars and Abars) looks like. Simple and clear. The trouble, however, is that there really is no solution here, and it is still far from simplicity and clarity. And there are more than two unknowns in the equation. For example, in some such "Hunnish" language, uar means river? L.N. Gumilyov, by the way, considers this language - without any reason - to be Turkic, and since such a word is unknown in it, he declares it archaism (presumably, it disappeared safely and in time, so that this situation could neither be refuted nor prove). But if we remember that the Byzantines called anyone the Huns, then we get an unsolvable puzzle. However, the version about the arrival of the Avars from Central Asia has recently become more and more popular in the light of new facts, which, however, do not at all confirm the constructions of L.N. Gumilyov. These facts are connected with the so-called Hephthalite problem. Ephthalites is, strictly speaking, the name of a dynasty, not a people. Now the opinion is more and more asserted that the ethnos was called Chionites. But then they could not live between the Aral Sea and the Ural River - their lands were adjacent to Persia. It is difficult to determine the boundaries of the Hephthalites, but it is known that, in addition to the territories in Central Asia, it also included part of Chinese Turkestan. It is widely believed that the Ephthalites are Iranians by language (Iranian personal names - Eftal, Ghatfar and others are common with them), a settled people, of a Caucasoid type. that the Ephthalites are White Huns, somewhat different from the more northern Huns. Here is what he writes: “III.Subsequently, the Persian king Peroz 21 started a war over the border lands with the Hunnic tribe of Ephthalites, who are called whites. Gathering an impressive army, he marched against them. (2) The Ephthalites are a Hunnic tribe and are called Huns, however, they do not mix and do not communicate with those Huns that we know about, since they do not border with them and are not located near them, but they adjoin the Persians at their northern limits, where, on the outskirts of Persia, there is a city named Gorgo 22 .( 22 Gorgo, Gorga, Dzhorzhdan (among ancient authors - Irkania, Vrkan), modern. Gorgan; located near the southeastern part of the Caspian Sea.) “So the theory about some kind of Iranian-speaking Ephthalites is easily broken by a message from Procopius of Caesarea. In addition, Theophylact Simokatta directly and unequivocally in his “History”, book 4, indicated that the Hephthalites are a Turkic people, also called the Huns “…... Then Kavad, taking advantage of such a change in his plight that was beneficial for him and putting on clothes wife, came out of prison, leaving his wife there, dressed in his clothes. 10. Taking with him the most prominent of his friends, Seos, he went to the tribe of the Huns, whom our history has repeatedly called the Turks. Then, received in the most friendly way by the king of the Hephthalites and having gathered very significant forces, having defeated his opponents in battle, he again took (power into his own hands and returned to the palace. 11 "(http://www.inslav.ru/resursy/elektronnaya-biblioteka/1175--qq-1957

(Theophylact Simocatta. "History" / Introductory article by N. V. Pigulevskaya; translation by S. P. Kondratiev; notes by K. A. Osipova. Editor-in-chief N. V. Pigulevskaya. M .: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1957. (Series "Monuments of the medieval history of the peoples of Central and Eastern Europe") PAGE 102

At the same time, Theophylact Simokatta in his work calls the Avars only the Turks and never mentions the presence of Persians among them. And the Byzantines of the 7th century knew the Persians very well, for they waged constant wars with them. Therefore, one should speak of the Avars only as a Turkic people. Considering the options for the arrival of the Avars from the lands east of the Volga or from the banks of the Syr Darya and Amu Darya, there is strong evidence of the Turkic-speaking Avars, which I have given.

At the same time, the Syrian author of the VI century. Zecharia Rhetor includes the Avars and Ephthalites among the northern peoples living in tents, living in cattle breeding, hunting, fishing, along with the Alans, Bulgarians and Khazars. And the Alans, Khazars and Bulgarians are Turkic peoples. Personal names cannot serve as serious evidence - they are easily borrowed for a variety of reasons (the modern Russian personal name is based on Greek-Latin, the Huns often had Gothic names, etc.). Caucasoid appearance... But, strictly speaking, it is not known how long the Hephthalites had already been in contact with the peoples of the corresponding anthropological type by the time information about them got into the pages of the chronicles. The type of face over the centuries could change significantly. The Chionites, judging by their name, could well have descended from the Xiongnu who used to live near China (according to the reconstruction, their self-name should have sounded - in an approximate Russian transmission - like something like huong-na). Although not everyone agrees with the version of the origin of the Chionites from the Xiongnu, it is more logical to assume, nevertheless, that the Chionites and Hephthalites are not synonyms, that the Chionites were one of the ethnic groups that made up the association known as the Hephthalites. In other words, the Hephthalites, also called the White Huns, are called by the name of the dynasty because we are talking about a conglomeration of tribes

But who were the Hephthalites themselves? The English scholar E.J. Pullyblank provided strong evidence that they spoke the language of the Mongolian group and were a detached part of the Wuhuan people, who penetrated west either in the footsteps of the Xiongnu, or together with one of their groupings (Chionites) in the first centuries AD .e. The Chinese, for example, noted that the Ephthalites' female hairstyle was of the type that, according to other sources, was known to the Mongols as early as the 13th century, and the language was the same as that of one of the nomadic groups of Chinese Turkestan, now defined as Mongol-speaking. There are reasons to assume a direct connection between the Hephthalites and the Avars. The point is not only that the Turkic inscriptions mention the people or the country of Apar, but among the ancient Bulgarians, who also experienced Avar domination, as well as among the Khazars, tribal divisions called Avars were recorded. The modern city of Kunduz in Afghanistan was once called (in Arabic transmission) Var-Valiz, which is translated as the City of Avars. In addition, as a result of the revision of data from Byzantine sources, it was found that the message about “pseudo-Avars” at Simokatta is most likely just a version of ancient origin (the Byzantines often used ancient data when they did not have enough of their own). The conclusion suggests itself: what we call the Hephthalites is not a single entity, but a multi-tribal association, which included groups of various types of economy, settled and nomadic tribes, etc. conditions - the most common and natural phenomenon. This reconstruction appears to reconcile conflicting sources. In addition, the artificial problem of “true” and “false” Avars is removed, and it can be assumed that there really are two (as Simokatta wrote) tribes - Var (Avar, obviously dominant) and Hunni during the offensive to the west of the Turks stood out from the composition Hephthalites and went to Europe. By the way, contrary to L.N. And here everything happened differently: in 557 the Turks smashed the power of the Hephthalites, and in 558 Constantinople was already meeting the Avar embassy. Perhaps nowhere in history can one find examples of farmers changing their habitats so briskly. In addition, all sources depict the Avars as typical nomadic pastoralists. And all their further activities only confirm this characteristic. LN Gumilyov made, with reference to the data of Hungarian archaeologists, the following calculation: 20% of the Avars were of a weakly Mongoloid Western Siberian type, the rest were Caucasoids. Experience suggests, however, that, alas, the information given by this author cannot be taken for granted. In the course of checking a clear division of the Avars into parts, it was not possible to find - as well as the Avars of the West Siberian anthropological type. Hungarian anthropologists really define the Avars as Caucasoids (in the majority) and note that a small stratum, apparently the dominant one, retained a pronounced Mongoloid type, such as that of modern Buryats and Mongols. However, even more often among representatives of the same dominant group, the so-called Turanian (Central Asian) type of facial structure was noted. But all these data refer already to the Avars of the Danube; during the period of their resettlement, the ratio of components could be different. The successful advance of the Avars to the west was helped a lot by Byzantium, which tried to use the newcomers to secure its border along the Danube, in line with the traditional policy of playing nomads against each other. Already in the first two years of their stay in the Black Sea region (558-560), the Avars defeated the opponents of Byzantium - the Savir Huns and the Antian tribal union, then moved to the mouth of the Danube, attacked the Sclaven tribes of the Croats and Dulebs in the Carpathian region, subjugated part of the so-called Proto-Bulgarians. But in the Black Sea region, the Avars, apparently, did not feel very comfortable - both because of their own small numbers, and because of the continued Turkic threat from the east. Apparently, they failed to subjugate the local tribes. Then they make an alliance with the Lombard Germans. They helped the Avars to defeat their relatives, the Gepids, while they themselves went to Italy. As a result, the Avars get (in 567) an ideal refuge on the outskirts of the steppe belt - the territory of modern Hungary: the mountains cover the approaches from the north and east, the Danube - from the south. You can engage in cattle breeding - nomadic and transhumance (in the mountains). But the main thing is that the local settled population was conquered: the remnants of the Gepids and the Slavs, mostly Dulebs. This population could be used for military purposes and exploited, which the Avars did. It is no coincidence that it is here, in the Danube region, that the Avar Khaganate is taking shape. No matter what they say about the “mutually beneficial” symbiosis of nomads and settled peoples, in those conditions, in the presence of farmers in the neighborhood, the nomads had one goal: to sit on their necks. This provided huge benefits, first of all, it made it possible to provide themselves with food: you never know what can happen to pastures (even if there are enough of them) or to livestock. .. What is missing must be obtained, and there are only two ways: exchange (when there is something to change) or robbery. Therefore, nomads cannot do without farmers, but they feel great without them. The Avars, as archeology shows, tried in every possible way to preserve their way of life and their dominance over their neighbors, which is vital to them in these conditions. However, it is unlikely that they retained power in the Black Sea region after they left these lands (although there are supporters of the opposite opinion). Most likely, some of the tribes were listed there as dependent on the Avars, paid some kind of tribute, took part in campaigns. It was hardly possible for the kagan to maintain real power in conditions when the Avars constantly moved, fought with neighbors or started civil strife. Why did the Sclavens for so long (more than two centuries) endure domination over themselves by a generally small enemy? Partly, probably because part of the Sklavens were not subjects of the Avar Khagan, but his allies. The difference in military traditions also affected: the Sclaveni fought on foot, almost without defensive weapons. This way it was possible to defeat the Byzantine infantry, but not the Avars, who were accustomed to horse warfare at home both in the steppe and in the mountains - they had shells, powerful combat bows, and stirrups, which allowed riders to successfully use against infantry along with a long sword with a spear, and later (from the 7th century) a saber. As a result, the Sclavens had to participate in all the military campaigns of the Avars, and they did not sit idle: raids on Byzantium, independent Slavs, and Franks became commonplace. During such expeditions, the actions of the Avar cavalry and the Sclaven infantry or river fleet were skillfully combined. In 595, the Avars helped their Slavic allies to defeat the Bavarians, to attack the lands up to the Adriatic, to Italy. However, this cooperation was bound to end sooner or later. In 602, the Avars finally defeated the Antes, who had previously been part of the Venedian alliance along with the Sclavens, but they could not keep the Black Sea region under control. This was prevented by the Proto-Bulgarians, supported by Byzantium. And Byzantium itself, the object of almost annual Avar raids, managed in 626 to inflict a decisive defeat on the nomads near the walls of Constantinople. After that, campaigns against the empire had to be stopped. Successfully fought off the Avars and Sklavens of the Lower Danube. The reduction in income caused by these events could not but lead to increased exploitation of the conquered Sclavens and to attempts to subjugate yesterday's allies. The pressure on the Serbs and Croats, on the Czech and Polish tribes is intensifying (it is not for nothing that almost all Slavic languages ​​\u200b\u200bpreserved the word arr in the meaning of a giant, which was also reflected in the Tale of Bygone Years: .."; one can doubt the “giantness” of the Avars, but the figurative meaning of the word is clearly a strong opponent). And what did it mean to “be under the Avars” (even if we consider the words of the Russian chronicler as a fairy tale that the Avars harnessed Slavic women to carts instead of horses) - this is reported by the Frankish chronicle as far back as the 6th century: annually the Avars went to their Slavic subjects for wintering, for everything ready, raped women, took full, robbed. And this is in addition to tribute. Naturally, such a "symbiosis" did not suit the Sklaven. Gradually, in the struggle against the Avars, a state was formed on the western outskirts of the Sclaven world, headed by Samo (620-650s), but it did not outlive its founder. The Avars still defeated the Serbs and Croats, but due to civil strife in the Khaganate, its Proto-Bulgarian component became unreliable - in the 7th century. several nomadic hordes that made up it left Avaria. The kagans are increasingly orienting their raids on Italy, Bavaria, on the lands of present-day Slovenia and Austria, where the Horutans (ancestors of the Slovenes) lived. Here the Avars, it would seem, were helped by the struggle of the Bavarians with the Franks. But it all ended with the fact that the kaganate, weakened by uprisings and wars, having lost many possessions and located on a territory hardly much larger than modern Hungary (where the Avars, stubbornly maintaining a nomadic lifestyle, could not live without robbing their neighbors) - this kaganate he opposed himself to the powerful Frankish power of Charlemagne, who had his own views on Italy, and on Bavaria, and on the adjacent Slavic and Slavic lands. Italy and Bavaria submitted to Charles, the Horutans became his allies. The Avars, who under these conditions made another raid on the Frankish possessions (788), led Charles, the "defender of the Christian West", to the conclusion that it was time to put an end to the Avars. The Franks had the necessary forces for this - battle-tested plate cavalry. In 791, Karl sent two armies against the kaganate (he led one himself) and Slav allies. A number of Avar fortifications (hrings) were destroyed. In 796, a decisive blow fell on the Khaganate, torn by civil strife. The capital fell, the hring headquarters of the kagan. And by 803, the last attempts at resistance were broken, and the modern Hungarian, Austrian and Slovenian lands west of the Danube were under the control of the Franks, where the border region was formed - the Eastern Mark of the Frankish Empire. It was then, apparently, that the proverb "Die like a brother" was born in the Slavic environment. The nobility and the military class of the Avars themselves were, apparently, really basically exterminated. But it is hardly possible to say the same about the agricultural population (including, perhaps, part of the Avars who settled on the ground), as well as about the remnants of the nomads who scattered over the mountains and forests. They became Frankish subjects, and in 811 the Franks even had to defend them from the onslaught of their Slavic allies. But it was no longer possible to stop the assimilation of the defeated and subordinated Avars who fell into completely new conditions for them. The last time the Avars are mentioned in the Frankish chronicle was under 822. Later, obviously, on the lands conquered by the Franks and Bulgarians, they were absorbed by the Slavic and German colonists and the Hungarians who occupied the former lands of the Avar Khaganate

RUSSIANS

As mentioned above, the Avar Khaganate territorially occupied or controlled the lands from the Danube to the Don, from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, and consisted of three main peoples - 1. Actually, the Avars, who arrived from the lands east of the Volga, 2. - descendants of the ready and the Huns of the time of the empire of Attila, with whom they entered into allied relations, and the 3. tribes of the Sclaves from the Venedian association, whom they first conquered, but then, as the Sclaven tribes strengthened, they were in allied relations with the Avars.

If the enemy attacks from the south, and in the north and west there are unfriendly tribes and territory unsuitable for the usual way of managing, and in the east there are practically free lands that were previously controlled and that are suitable for nomadic life, and there are tribes that can be taxed tribute, and the neighboring eastern state is weakened and will not be able to resist, then, naturally, these tribes will move to the east .. In addition, on the lands east of the Dnieper, the Avars who previously controlled this territory remained. This is exactly what happened to the Avars, who, under pressure from the Franks and Bulgarians of the Danube, advancing from the south, withdrew to the east and occupied the lands east of the Dnieper in the face of the weakening of the influence of the Khazar Khaganate on the lands west of the Don.

The remnants of the Avar Khaganate withdrew to the Black Sea and were divided along tribal lines. This is a natural process that occurs in cases of weakening of the leading tribe. And this tribe in the Avar Khaganate was the Avars. The tribes of the Avar Khaganate could not penetrate deep into the territory of the Crimean peninsula, since the positions of the Khazar merchants and Greeks were strong in the coastal lands of the peninsula. But in the center and north of the peninsula in the steppe regions, they were able to gain a foothold and even create a semblance of a state with a center in the Mankup fortress. In the Black Sea region, the remnants of the tribes of the Avar Khaganate, under pressure from the Pechenegs, were forced to leave to the north.

The term Russ (dews) has not yet been identified and there are many hypotheses. Based on the foregoing, the meaning of this word should be sought in the languages ​​​​of the tribes of the Avar Khaganate, which denoted the most powerful tribe or military association of the 9th century. It is quite possible that this term denoted the tribes of the Avar Khaganate, who occupied the lands east of the Dnieper.

Arab and Persian travelers and merchants encountered the Rus in the 9th-10th centuries and they ended up on the pages of their annals. Let's study them.

DIED AKI RETURNED...

Nicholas Kerrer

Such a saying has long existed in Russia - according to the testimony of the author of The Tale of Bygone Years, who further adds: "They have no tribe or heir."
This people really disappeared, although not quite as it seemed to the chronicler more than three hundred years after the events. However, the Eastern Slavs had little encounter with images (they are usually called Avars). The source of the plot about the images that "tormented" the Dulebs is most likely Western: the Slavic Dulebs are known not only in Volyn, but also in the Czech Republic, in Hungary. And they, as well as the Serbs, Croats, Byzantines, Franks and other peoples, had to deal with the Avars for a long time - almost two and a half centuries. None of the Asian peoples that came to Europe in the era of the Great Migration, in the 5th-8th centuries, had such a lasting influence on European history.
Glory, although not good, the Avars earned hardly less than the Huns, and they have never been deprived of the attention of historians. However, many key questions: who, in fact, are the Avars, why they were able to hold out in Europe for so long, what are the boundaries of their state (or habitat) and how they "died" - all this is still a matter of controversy.
The problem of the origin of the Avars is not entirely clear either.
There is no shortage of opinions here. Most often, perhaps, the Avars are called Turks, considering this for some reason as something taken for granted. Sometimes, however, they are identified as Iranians, although this does not fit in with what is known about them from sources. The view of the Avars as a mixed, Turkic-Mongolian-Iranian group is also widespread. But this judgment can rather be attributed to the composition of the Avar horde already during the invasion of Europe. The question of the origin of the Avars proper remains open.
The prevailing until recently (at least in the West) was the version of the origin of these nomads from the fragments of a large association of Jujans that dominated the steppes of Central Asia in the 5th-6th centuries. The basis for such an idea (which appeared as early as the 18th century) was the fact that in 552-555. the Jujans were defeated by the Turks, and the Avars appeared in Europe in 558 (more precisely, in that year their embassy arrived in Constantinople).
The Jujans are recognized by the Mongols by language; hence the conclusion was made about the polylingualism of the Avars. Another argument is related to the fact that the ruler of the Avars bore the title of kagan, which first appeared among the Jurans and is now considered to be of Mongolian origin. And the hairstyle of the Avars, especially noted by the Byzantines, is also quite characteristic: long hair, divided into strands and braided.
Supported this version and other data. So, the famous German scientist K.G. Menges determined that the Slavic words cart and banner are of Mongolian origin. But these borrowed words came to the Slavs early - they were already used by the author of The Tale of Igor's Campaign, so the Mongols themselves have nothing to do with it.
Since all other nomads of the early Middle Ages were Turks or Ugrians, it is determined by the method of elimination that the Slavs could borrow these words only from the Avars. Finally, the Russian ethnonym itself with a characteristic substitution of vowels (obry-Avars) indicates the origin of the word from the Altaic (in the broad sense) languages.
This theory, however, had two weak links: a very small time gap (three years) between the defeat of the Rourans in Asia and the appearance of the Avars in Europe, and the inconsistency with the data of the Byzantine historian Theophylact Simocatta (7th century), who reports that the Avars arrived from the Middle Asia, and not from more eastern areas.
Predominantly on the information gleaned from Theophylact, another version is based, which has become widely known in the presentation of L.N. Gumilyov. According to this historian, the question of the origin of the Avars is solved very simply. There were de formidable abars in Dzungaria (Chinese Turkestan), about which nothing is really known, nevertheless they are declared to be the ancestors of the Karakalpaks. (Here it is not clear why the Turks conquered the “terrible” Abars, apparently without any problems and only mentioned them; what then, in fact, their “terribleness” consisted of? And why did the Karakalpaks come from the Abars, and not any other ethnos?)
And in Central Asia lived the Chionites known to the Byzantines, a settled people of Sarmatian origin, also called Hephthalites. Simokatta writes about them as two tribes - Huar and Hunni, together they were also called Varhonites. They fled from the Turks to the Volga and the Don, declared themselves to be those very Abars, everyone believed them (it is not known - why would they?), and they, having instilled fear in everyone, came to Europe not as Varhonites, but as Avars.
Therefore, following Simokatta, we must consider them pseudo-Avars, not to confuse both, which historians often do, falling into one more mistake: they consider these pseudo-Avars to be nomads. After all, the Byzantine explained everything: in fact, there was a settled people of Chionites (Hunni), and the Uar is just an epithet, a word from the Hun language, meaning river (however, earlier L.N. Gumilyov believed that the Uar were an Ugric tribe).
Chionites lived, according to Gumilyov, either in the lower reaches of the Syr Darya, or between the Aral and the Ural River (in the latter case, it is not clear where at that time they could live settled there). And the Hephthalites, another people, lived to the south, near the borders of Persia. This is how, according to Gumilyov, the solution of an equation with two unknowns (Avars and Abars) looks like. Simple and clear.
The trouble, however, is that there really is no solution here, and it is still far from simplicity and clarity. And there are more than two unknowns in the equation. For example, in some such "Hunnish" language, uar means river?
L.N. Gumilyov, by the way, considers this language - without any reason - to be Turkic, and since such a word is unknown in it, he declares it archaism (presumably, it disappeared safely and in time, so that this situation could neither be refuted nor prove). But if we remember that the Byzantines called anyone the Huns, then we get an unsolvable puzzle.
However, the version about the arrival of the Avars from Central Asia has recently become more and more popular in the light of new facts, which, however, do not at all confirm the constructions of L.N. Gumilyov. These facts are connected with the so-called Hephthalite problem.

Ephthalites is, strictly speaking, the name of a dynasty, not a people. Now the opinion is more and more asserted that the ethnos was called Chionites. But then they could not live between the Aral Sea and the Ural River - their lands were adjacent to Persia. It is difficult to determine the boundaries of the Hephthalites, but it is known that, in addition to the territories in Central Asia, it also included part of Chinese Turkestan.
It is widely believed that the Hephthalites are Iranians by language (Iranian personal names - Eftal, Ghatfar and others - are common among them), a settled people, of the Caucasoid type. However, the Syrian author of the VI century. Zechariah Rhetor includes the Avars and Ephthalites among the northern peoples living in tents, living in cattle breeding, hunting, fishing, along with the Alans, Bulgarians and Khazars.
Personal names cannot serve as serious evidence - they are easily borrowed for a variety of reasons (the modern Russian personal name is based on Greek-Latin, the Huns often had Gothic names, etc.). Caucasoid appearance... But, strictly speaking, it is not known how long the Hephthalites had already been in contact with the peoples of the corresponding anthropological type by the time information about them got into the pages of the chronicles. The type of face over the centuries could change significantly.
In addition, the historian Ammian Marcellinus, who first wrote about the Chionites in the 4th century, reports that he saw only one or two representatives of this ethnic group. Two centuries later, the Byzantine Procopius of Caesarea reported that the Hephthalites - the only ones of all the Huns - were white in body and not ugly in face. At the same time, Procopius claims that the Hephthalites are a settled people. Why are they still Huns for him (in the collective sense, of course)? Or did he know something about their language? This assumption is unprovable. Unfortunately, the meaning of the word Huns has not been studied by Procopius.
The Chionites, judging by their name, could well have descended from the Xiongnu who used to live near China (according to the reconstruction, their self-name should have sounded - in an approximate Russian transmission - like something like huong-na).
Although not everyone agrees with the version of the origin of the Chionites from the Xiongnu, it is more logical to assume, nevertheless, that the Chionites and Hephthalites are not synonyms, that the Chionites were one of the ethnic groups that made up the association known as the Hephthalites. In other words, the Hephthalites, also called the White Huns, are called by the name of the dynasty because we are talking about a conglomeration of tribes. It certainly had to include the Iranians - the Central Asian population (subjugated or allied).
But who were the Hephthalites themselves? The English scholar E.J. Pullyblank provided strong evidence that they spoke the language of the Mongolian group and were a detached part of the Wuhuan people, who penetrated west either in the footsteps of the Xiongnu, or together with one of their groupings (Chionites) in the first centuries AD .e. The Chinese, for example, noted that the Ephthalites' female hairstyle was of the type that, according to other sources, was known to the Mongols as early as the 13th century, and the language was the same as that of one of the nomadic groups of Chinese Turkestan, now defined as Mongol-speaking.
There are reasons to assume a direct connection between the Hephthalites and the Avars. The point is not only that the Turkic inscriptions mention the people or the country of Apar, but among the ancient Bulgarians, who also experienced Avar domination, as well as among the Khazars, tribal divisions called Avars were recorded.
The modern city of Kunduz in Afghanistan was once called (in Arabic transmission) Var-Valiz, which is translated as the City of Avars. In addition, as a result of the revision of data from Byzantine sources, it was found that the message about “pseudo-Avars” at Simokatta is most likely just a version of ancient origin (the Byzantines often used ancient data when they did not have enough of their own).
The conclusion suggests itself: what we call the Hephthalites is not a single entity, but a multi-tribal association that included groups various types households, settled and nomadic tribes, etc. This association was formed, obviously, from the Mongol-speaking Avars (Abars, descendants of the Huns-Xiongnu) and Iranians, possibly with the participation, already at a late stage, of some Turkic-speaking groups. Symbiosis within the framework of one political organism of the nomadic and sedentary population in Central Asian conditions is the most common and natural phenomenon.
This reconstruction appears to reconcile conflicting sources. In addition, the artificial problem of “true” and “false” Avars is removed, and it can be assumed that there really are two (as Simokatta wrote) tribes - Var (Avar, obviously dominant) and Hunni during the offensive to the west of the Turks stood out from the composition Hephthalites and went to Europe. By the way, contrary to L.N. And here everything happened differently: in 557 the Turks smashed the power of the Hephthalites, and in 558 Constantinople was already meeting the Avar embassy. Perhaps nowhere in history can one find examples of farmers changing their habitats so briskly. In addition, all sources depict the Avars as typical nomadic pastoralists. And all their further activities only confirm this characteristic.

In the course of their flight, the Avars would inevitably be overgrown with nomads of various origins who joined them (in addition to those already listed earlier, even the Ugrians could be among them), which strengthened the tribal alliance. Usually they write that 20 thousand Avars fled to the west, while 30 thousand came to Europe. This horde consisted mainly of people of the Caucasoid anthropological type (which is not at all surprising after centuries of miscegenation).
LN Gumilyov made, with reference to the data of Hungarian archaeologists, the following calculation: 20% of the Avars were of a weakly Mongoloid Western Siberian type, the rest were Caucasoids. Experience suggests, however, that, alas, the information given by this author cannot be taken for granted. In the course of checking a clear division of the Avars into parts, it was not possible to find - as well as the Avars of the West Siberian anthropological type. Hungarian anthropologists really define the Avars as Caucasoids (in the majority) and note that a small stratum, apparently the dominant one, retained a pronounced Mongoloid type, such as that of modern Buryats and Mongols. However, even more often among representatives of the same dominant group, the so-called Turanian (Central Asian) type of facial structure was noted. But all these data refer already to the Avars of the Danube; during the period of their resettlement, the ratio of components could be different.
The successful advance of the Avars to the west was helped a lot by Byzantium, which tried to use the newcomers to secure its border along the Danube, in line with the traditional policy of playing nomads against each other. Already in the first two years of their stay in the Black Sea region (558-560), the Avars defeated the opponents of Byzantium - the Savir and the Antian tribal union, then moved to the mouth of the Danube, attacked the Slavic tribes of the Croats and Dulebs in the Carpathian region, subjugated part of the so-called Proto-Bulgarians.
But in the Black Sea region, the Avars, apparently, did not feel very comfortable - both because of their own small numbers, and because of the continued Turkic threat from the east. Apparently, they failed to subjugate the local tribes. Then they make an alliance with the Lombard Germans. They helped the Avars to defeat their relatives, the Gepids, while they themselves went to Italy.
As a result, the Avars get (in 567) an ideal refuge on the outskirts of the steppe belt - the territory of modern Hungary: the mountains cover the approaches from the north and east, the Danube - from the south. You can engage in cattle breeding - nomadic and transhumance (in the mountains). But the main thing is that the local settled population was conquered: the remnants of the Gepids and the Slavs, mostly Dulebs. This population could be used for military purposes and exploited, which the Avars did. It is no coincidence that it is here, in the Danube region, that the Avar Khaganate is taking shape.
No matter what they say about the “mutually beneficial” symbiosis of nomads and settled peoples, in those conditions, in the presence of farmers in the neighborhood, the nomads had one goal: to sit on their necks. This provided huge benefits, first of all, it made it possible to provide oneself with food: you never know what can happen to pastures (even if there are enough of them) or to livestock ... You need to get what you lack, and there are only two ways: exchange (when there is something to change) or robbery . Therefore, nomads cannot do without farmers, but they feel great without them.
The Hungarians, in similar conditions, moving to a settled way of life, were able to do what neither the Huns nor the Avars could do: they became one of the European peoples. At the same time, they retained the necessary pastoral traditions, but did not suffer at all from the fact that they abandoned roaming. The Slavs also had a complex economy: both agriculture and cattle breeding. But the Avars, as archeology shows, tried in every possible way to preserve their way of life and their dominance over their neighbors, which is vital for them in these conditions.
However, it is unlikely that they retained power in the Black Sea region after they left these lands (although there are supporters of the opposite opinion). Most likely, some of the tribes were listed there as dependent on the Avars, paid some kind of tribute, took part in campaigns. It was hardly possible for the kagan to maintain real power in conditions when the Avars constantly moved, fought with neighbors or started civil strife.

Why did the Slavs for so long (more than two centuries) endure domination over themselves by a generally small enemy? Partly, probably, because some of the Slavs were not subjects of the Avar Khagan, but his allies. The difference in military traditions also affected: the Slavs fought on foot, almost without defensive weapons. This way it was possible to defeat the Byzantine infantry, but not the Avars, who were accustomed to horse warfare at home both in the steppe and in the mountains - they had shells, powerful combat bows, and stirrups, which allowed riders to successfully use against infantry along with a long sword with a spear, and later (from the 7th century) a saber.
As a result, the Slavs had to participate in all the military campaigns of the Avars, and they did not sit idle: raids on Byzantium, independent Slavs, and Franks became commonplace. During such expeditions, the actions of the Avar cavalry and the Slavic infantry or river fleet were skillfully combined. The Avars helped their Slavic allies in 595 defeat the Bavarians, attack the lands up to the Adriatic, Italy. However, this cooperation was bound to end sooner or later.
In 602, the Avars finally defeated the Antes, but they could not keep the Black Sea region under control. This was prevented by the Proto-Bulgarians, supported by Byzantium. And Byzantium itself, the object of almost annual Avar raids, managed in 626 to inflict a decisive defeat on the nomads near the walls of Constantinople. After that, campaigns against the empire had to be stopped.
Successfully fought off the Avars and the Slavs of the Lower Danube. The reduction in income caused by these events could not but lead to increased exploitation of the conquered Slavs and to attempts to subjugate yesterday's allies. The pressure on the Serbs and Croats, on the Czech and Polish tribes is intensifying (it’s not for nothing that almost all Slavic languages ​​\u200b\u200bpreserved the word arr in the meaning of a giant, which was also reflected in the Tale of Bygone Years: "Avars can be doubted, but the figurative meaning of the word is clearly a strong opponent).
And what did it mean to “be under the Avars” (even if we consider the words of the Russian chronicler as a fairy tale that the Avars harnessed Slavic women to carts instead of horses) - this is reported by the Frankish chronicle as far back as the 6th century: annually the Avars went to their Slavic subjects for wintering, for everything ready, raped women, took full, robbed. And this is in addition to tribute.
Naturally, such a "symbiosis" did not suit the Slavs. Gradually, in the struggle against the Avars, a state was formed on the western outskirts of the Slavic world, headed by Samo (620-650s), but it did not outlive its founder.
The Avars still defeated the Serbs and Croats, but due to civil strife in the Khaganate, its Proto-Bulgarian component became unreliable - in the 7th century. several nomadic hordes that made up it left Avaria.
The Kagans are increasingly orienting their raids on Italy, Bavaria, on the lands of present-day Slovenia and Austria, where the Horutan Slavs (ancestors of the Slovenes) lived. Here the Avars, it would seem, were helped by the struggle of the Bavarians with the Franks. But it all ended with the fact that the kaganate, weakened by uprisings and wars, having lost many possessions and located on a territory hardly much larger than modern Hungary (where the Avars, stubbornly maintaining a nomadic lifestyle, could not live without robbing their neighbors) - this kaganate opposed himself to the powerful Frankish power of Charlemagne, who had his own views on Italy, and on Bavaria, and on the neighboring Slavic lands.
Italy and Bavaria submitted to Charles, the Horutans became his allies. The Avars, who under these conditions made another raid on the Frankish possessions (788), led Charles, the "defender of the Christian West", to the conclusion that it was time to put an end to the Avars. The Franks had the necessary forces for this - battle-tested plate cavalry.
In 791, Karl sent two armies against the kaganate (he led one himself) and Slav allies. A number of Avar fortifications (hrings) were destroyed. In 796, a decisive blow fell on the Khaganate, torn by civil strife. The capital fell, the hring headquarters of the kagan.
And by 803, the last attempts at resistance were broken, and the modern Hungarian, Austrian and Slovenian lands west of the Danube were under the control of the Franks, where the border region was formed - the Eastern Mark of the Frankish Empire. It was then, apparently, that the proverb "Die like a brother" was born in the Slavic environment.
The nobility and the military class of the Avars themselves were, apparently, really basically exterminated. But it is hardly possible to say the same about the agricultural population (including, perhaps, part of the Avars who settled on the ground), as well as about the remnants of the nomads who scattered over the mountains and forests. They became Frankish subjects, and in 811 the Franks even had to defend them from the onslaught of their Slavic allies.
But it was no longer possible to stop the assimilation of the defeated and subordinated Avars who fell into completely new conditions for them. The last time the Avars are mentioned in the Frankish Chronicle was under 822. Later, obviously, they were absorbed by the Slavic and German colonists and the Hungarians who occupied the former lands of the Avar Khaganate.

Sources

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Procopius of Caesarea. War with the Persians. Any edition.
Theophylact Simocatta. Story. M., 1957.
The Tale of Bygone Years. Any edition.
Chichurov I.S. Byzantine historical writings. M., 1980.

LITERATURE

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