2. Ancient Rus and the Great Steppe, Gumilev
Part One. The geography of the Ethnosphere of the first millennium A.D. Who is Who
[As always I suggest to follow along with the footnotes as you read. They are at the bottom, and some of them give further explanations.] This chapter is a fascinating look at archeology. Pottery details are important in that they locate the expanse of an ethnic territory and their migrations. Reference is made to the phases of an ethnos, from Gumilev’s theory of “passionarity”. (rising, stasis and falling) You will start to understand it, or there are plenty of short and long descriptions of it in this library.
(I have a lot of outside projects at the moment. I hope that I can keep up a steady rhythm of uploads. Otherwise it will take too long a time.)
I. In the area of extinct passionarity
1. DESCRIPTION OF KHAZAR COUNTRY
Landscapes, like ethnicities, have their own history. The Volga Delta before the 3rd century was not like what it is today. Back then, the clear waters of the Volga flowed through the dry steppe among the high Baer (sand dunes) hillocks, flowing into the Caspian Sea much farther south than later. The Volga was still shallow then, flowing not along its modern course, but to the east: through the Akhtuba and Buzan, and probably flowed into the Ural depression, connected to the Caspian Sea by a narrow channel.
From this period remained monuments of the Sarmato-Alanian culture, i.e., the Turanians. The Khazars then still lived in the lower reaches of the Terek (river).
In the II-III centuries, the Atlantic cyclones shifted their path to the north. The rains stopped irrigating the steppe zone, where a desert prevailed for a time, and began to pour out in the Volga-Oka interfluves and in the latitude of the Kama catchment area. Especially significant was the winter wetting: drifts of wet snow and, as a consequence, huge spring floods.
The Volga carried all these muddy waters, but its channel in the lower reaches was narrow for such flows. Then a delta of the modern type was formed, extending southward almost to the Buzachi Peninsula (north of Mangyshlak). The freshened shallows began to feed huge schools of fish. The banks of the channels were overgrown with dense forests, and the valleys between the hillocks turned into green meadows. Steppe grasses, remaining only at the tops of the hillocks (vertical zoning), retreated to the west and east (where the Bakhtemir and Kigach channels are now), and in the core of the emerged azonal landscape, lotus blossomed, frogs started to sing, herons and gulls started to nest. The country changed its face.
Then the ethnos that inhabited it changed, too. Steppe Sarmatians left the banks of streams, where the mosquitoes did not give rest to the cattle, and wet grasses were unusual and even harmful for them. But the Khazars spread along the then coastline, which is now 6 meters below the level of the Caspian Sea. They found the richest fishing grounds, places for hunting waterfowl, and pastures for horses on the slopes of the Baer knolls. Khazars brought with them cuttings of grapes and planted them in their new homeland, which they got without bloodshed, by the accidental grace of nature. In very harsh winters, grapes died, but were replenished again and again with Dagestan varieties,[1] for the connection between Terek and Volga Khazaria was not interrupted.
The warlike Alans and Huns, who dominated the Caspian steppes, were not dangerous for the Khazars. Life in the delta is concentrated near the channels, and they are a labyrinth in which any outsider would get lost. The stream in the channels is fast, along the banks are dense thickets of reeds, and to get out on dry land is not possible everywhere. Any cavalry attempting to penetrate into Khazaria would not be able to quickly force the channels, surrounded by thickets. Thus cavalry was deprived of its main advantage - maneuverability, while the locals, who knew how to navigate the maze of channels, could easily intercept the initiative and give the enemy unexpected blows, being themselves elusive.
It was even more difficult in winter. The ice on fast rivers is thin and rarely, in very cold winters, could withstand a horse and a clipper. And to fall through the ice in winter, even in a shallow place, meant to freeze in the wind. If the squad stops and lights fires to dry off, then the pursued enemy in this time has time to hide and hit the pursuer again.
Khazaria was a natural fortress, but, alas, surrounded by enemies. Strong at home, the Khazars did not venture out into the steppe, which would have been very useful to them. The more diverse the landscapes of the territory in which the economic system is created, the more prospects for economic development. The Volga Delta is by no means monotonous, but it is not suitable for nomadic cattle-breeding, although the latter, as a form of extensive economy, is very beneficial for people because it is not labor-intensive, and for nature because the number of cattle is limited by the amount of grass. Nomadic life is harmless for the nature.
Khazars did not live in the steppes and, therefore, were not nomads. But they also took from nature only a surplus that it could safely share: fish, grapes and the fruits of the gardens. In short, the ethnoses of the lower Volga were in a phase of homeostasis - equilibrium with nature and with each other at that time. Under this system of life, the ethnoses seldom actively communicated with each other, because there was nothing to fight about, and it was not profitable to take foreign girls as wives: accustomed to a different life, they would be bad housewives in the husband's house.
The larger the target, the easier it is to hit it. Therefore, let us conclude our story - the tragedy of the Khazar ethnos - in the framework of the history of neighboring countries. Of course, this history will be presented "summarized", because for our theme it has only auxiliary value. But it will be possible to trace the global international relations, which penetrated into the small Khazaria, and catch the rhythm of natural phenomena of the biosphere, the ever-changing mother of all life. Then the history of culture will play with all the colors.
2. THE "REFLECTED LIGHT" ETHNOS
It may seem that by asserting the impossibility of the existence of an active ethnos without a passionate push, we have erred against our own thesis. For example, the Khazars became known to the Byzantine and Persian authors in the 4th century, and to the Armenian authors in the 3rd century[2], but neither the northward push of the 2nd c. (from Scandza to Palestine), nor the latitudinal strike of the 4th c. (from Arabia to Northern China) would not have affected them. How to explain the peculiarities of their ethnogenesis for a thousand years and the formation of numerous relics: Greben and Lower Don Cossacks, Astrakhan Tatars, and Karaites of the Crimea? In short, the Khazars behaved as a "full-fledged" ethnos that passed all phases of development, but at the expense of what?
The Russian chronicler correctly compares Khazars with Scythians[3], by which his source, George Amartol, meant the ancient, pre-Sarmatian population of the southern part of Eastern Europe[4]. At the time when the steppe watershed areas were seized successively by the Sarmatians (III century BC), Huns (IV century AD), Bulgars (V century), Avars (VI century), Magyars and Pechenegs, Khazars were quietly living in dense coastal bushes, inaccessible to the nomads, with whom they have always been enemies.
Due to such favorable natural conditions, the Khazars - the descendants of the ancient Caucasoid population of Western Eurasia - lived as a persistent ethnic group until the end of the VI century, when the situation changed extremely sharply and unexpectedly.
The most important role in the Khazar ethnogenesis fell on the newborn ethnos of the ancient Turks - Türkiyuts, as it is accepted to call them, to avoid the terminological confusion - the mixing of this ethnos with other Türkic-speaking tribes. The Türkiyuts appeared this way: in 439 a small detachment of prince Ashin fled from the North-Western China from the victorious and ruthless Tabgachis. The composition of this detachment was motley, but the predominant ethnos was the Syanbi, i.e. the ancient Mongols. Settling on the slopes of the Altai and Hangai, and mingling with the Aborigines, Turkuits made iron smelting and weapons production their narrow specialty. In 552 their first khan - Tumyn - defeated a Juan-Juan, who dominated the Steppe in the IV-V centuries. So the Great Turkic Kaganat was created.
Tumyn's younger brother, Istemi Khan, was put at the head of an army, which had a task to subdue the western steppes. Istemi reached the Don and the shores of the Black Sea. Some tribes fled from him, others obeyed the force of arms, while others thought it right to help the conqueror to share with him the fruits of victory. Among the latter were the Khazars and the Bulgarian tribe Uturgurs, who lived between the Kuban and the Don. When in the beginning of the VII century the Great Khaganate disintegrated, the Khazars and the Uturgurs were part of the Western Khaganate. Both sincerely helped their new rulers in wars against Byzantium and Iran. However in the Western Türkut Kaganate two tribal unions formed two parties, fighting for power over the powerless khan. Uturgury has adhered to one, and Khazary, naturally, to other party, and after its defeat have accepted runaway tsarevitch to itself in khans (650) [6].
After 8 years the Western Türküt Kaganate was captured by the armies of Tang empire, which benefited Khazars, who took the side of previously defeated prince, and to the detriment of Bulgars-Uturgurs, who lost the support of the supreme khan (658). Because of this Khazars, in about 670 defeated the Bulgarians, and they fled - who is on the Kama, who to the Danube, who in Hungary, and who even in Italy.
At the same time, the Khazars had to repel the invasion of the Arabs, victorious from India to Aquitaine. But in the Caucasus, unexpectedly for the conquerors of Iran and Spain, the war was fought with varying success, and the Khazar invasions in the Caucasus alternated with the Arab campaigns to Derbent (662 - 744), north of which the Arabs did not manage to gain a foothold. Where did a small relict ethnic group get such a tremendous passion, which allowed the Khazars, given the disparity of forces, to draw the war with the strongest and most aggressive state of the VIII century? The numerical advantage was on the side of the Arabs, because the Khazar Khans of Turkic dynasty supported neither Alans, nor Magyars, nor Burtases, nor Mordvians, nor Slavs, and least of all Bulgarians. The highlanders of Dagestan, the Serir, Tuman, Zirih-Heran, Kaytag, Tabasarai, Lakz and Philan kingdoms, who in 738 already submitted to Mervan, the governor of Azerbaijan and Armenia[7], supported by the unassailable Derbent, held a special position[8]. But the little Khazaria heroically defended their independence. Why?
Recall that as much as 100 years (558-650) Turkite khans used the territory of Khazaria as a base for their military operations. In Khazaria Turk Turkic warriors had a rest after crossing the dry steppes, and after returning from the Crimea or Transcaucasia they skipped the looted booty. And here for sure it was not without women, who, as it is known, are not indifferent to the winners. Children, who appeared after the military campaigns, sincerely considered themselves the Khazars. They did not know their fathers, they were brought up in the environment of the Khazars and in the landscape of the Volga Delta. They inherited only some anthropological and physiological traits, including passionarity, from the Turkuts. And since such symbiosis lasted for more than a hundred years, it is natural that the passionarity brought by outsiders was enough to turn the relic into an actively functioning ethnos.
But even more significant for the Khazar ethnogenesis was the next period, when Khazaria was ruled by Turkic Khans of Ashina dynasty (650-810), the successors of the rulers of the Great Turkic Kaganate (552-745). The runaway tsarevitch and his companions, received by the Khazars hospitably, did not merge with the mass of the people and did not oppose it. They continued to live a nomadic life, spending winters only in houses in Itil (major city); they led the fight against the Arabs and, as masters of steppe maneuvering war, taught the Khazars to repel the onslaught of regular armies; remaining pagans, who worshiped the Blue Sky and the Black Earth, they were tolerant to a complete indiscriminency. This is what ruined them. But because of what, and how?
3. WAS THE CULTURE DEVELOPED IN KHAZARIA?
Strangely enough, but for a long time it was believed that the peoples of the Eurasian [9] Steppe, especially the nomadic ones, had no cultural development of their own, their own history and certainly no original art. Excavations in the Altai, Mongolia, and Siberia have shown that art of Eurasian peoples existed, their history is now written, read texts have shown the existence of translated philosophical literature, and folklore has recorded original plots. They had everything, but not much has survived.
However, we immediately face an unforeseen difficulty: social development in the agricultural countries, among the peoples who inherited the developed culture of antiquity and among the tribes living in pristine landscapes, without writing, with primitive technology, is asynchronous. In Europe in the 8th - 10th centuries, feudalism was rapidly developing, classes were formed, craft and agriculture were divided at the expense of the improvement of technology, and in the Eurasian steppes sheep were eating grass, dogs guarded sheep, and shepherds went to visit each other; the only tool of production was the whip, but there was no need to improve it.
However, in Eurasia too, cities appeared, though only on the banks of rivers, because in the bare steppe even today people do not live sedentary. Archaeological cultures change one another, ethnic groups arise and disappear. In short, life goes on, although the formation remains the same - the primitive communal stage of military democracy. How to understand this?
As an attempt to explain the direction of the process in recent years the following postulate has been spread and accepted without criticism nor verification: the development of the cultures and peoples of the steppe and forest zones of Eurasia went "from nomads to cities", and this path is traced by archaeology, and the archaeological culture is identified with ethnos [10]. According to this principle of progressive evolution, the archeological Saltovo-Mayak culture is characteristic of the united Bulgarian-Khazar ethnos which was passing from the nomadic stock-raising to the settled agriculture because of impoverishment of some people and enslaving them by others, giving them loans for housekeeping, after which, the poor got into economic dependence on the rich people [11].
This speculative concept clearly describes the initial accumulation of capital in the formation of agrarian capitalism. There is no reason to call such a process "elements of feudal relations. But if so, then, according to the authors, capitalism was born not because of the development of productive forces and technical progress, but because of the selfishness of some and the helplessness of others, who were getting poor for some unknown reason and who in some strange way instantly mastered the complex culture of agriculture and, for these areas, viticulture, which usually requires the experience of many generations.
Map 4. Volga Khazaria in the VI-XIII centuries. (53 KB)
Карта 4. Волжская Хазария в VI-XIII вв. (53 KB)
http://gumilevica.kulichki.net/maps/args01.html
[Pictures of graves and finds are here half way into the article: ]
ZOOM IN: Gumilev was an Archeologist and this is his work from the 1960’s.
KEY TO LOCATIONS ON THIS MAP: (link)
Legend to the map of the Volga Khazaria
1. The ruins of Batu Khan's Sarai.
2. In the floodplain of the Volga - Akhguba, on the right bank of the Astuba in the Centralnaya tract and near the poultry farm (opposite the Selitryanny village), fragments of red, well-burned pottery made on a potter's wheel were found in a ploughed field. The pottery is similar to those found in Saray, and there is no doubt that it belongs to the Tatars of XIII-XVI centuries.
Fragments of moulded ceramics, badly burnt, with brown surfaces and black clay in the middle were found on the dried bank of Akhtuba below the mouth of Mangut stream. Pottery of this type is known from the Don to Baikal and dates back to the 7th-11th centuries; in this case it can be most confidently attributed to the Oguzes. One shard was found in situ in a layer under alluvial deposits 1.4 m thick.
4. Sarmatian burials blown by the wind were found on a hillock near the southern outskirts of Basta village.
5. Near the southern outskirts of Enotayevsk, in the landslide of the coastal hill above the Volga, were seen protruding from the ground bones of a man. The man was lying on his back with his head to the east, on his right side was a badly preserved iron sword. There was a clay pot at the head and a clay cup (Sarmatian) at the right elbow.
6. By the side of the road, which runs, as one might think, along the old caravan route east of the Sarpinskie Lakes, several fragments of pottery were found: gray clay, well-burned, unornamented. Despite their small expressiveness, they resemble grey clay ceramics of Khazar burials on Stepan Razin's hillock.
7. Several fragments of pottery similar to Khazar grey clay vessels of Stepan Razin's hillock were found near the roadside. Finds were found during reconnaissance in 1960.
8. On a hillside, not far from a small lake, several fragments of pottery similar to Khazar pottery were found.
9. The Azau tract is a sandy steppe, overgrown with sparse bushes and tamarisk bushes. Fragments of pottery of the type we attributed to the Khazars could be found in almost every hollow of the blowing out on the mainland loam.
10. The caravan trail through Ryn-sands goes straight north. Nowadays there is an automobile road next to it. Finds were made in the blowing pit near the abandoned well. There are a lot of Tatar and Oguz ceramics, and there were also fragments attributed by M.I. Artamonov to the Bronze Age. But the latter are of no interest for our theme and their description is omitted.
11. burial ground on Stepan Razin hillock.
12. System of knolls between Tas and Kabchik (Tarnovaya) channels. On Bilinga hillock (abs. elevation minus 14.4 m) burial was found (abs. elevation minus 16.1 m). The skeleton is oriented to the northwest, lying on its back, arms outstretched, head inclined to the right. The skull is crushed, the bones are very poorly preserved. Around the skeleton, two clusters of ceramic fragments: at the right knee, remnants of a grey-clay moulded vessel with a gridded corrugation, the corolla with a roller on the inside; at the head, light brown with a smoothed surface, black-clay moulded, resembling the Guz. Near the skull is a fragment of an iron knife. One meter to the right of the right knee - a funerary pot, reddish-brown stucco, corolla without a ridge. Dimensions; height - 4.5 cm, width of the neck - 3.0 cm, width of the middle - 5.0 cm. At the right elbow is a clay spindle, and at the right side is an iron awl. On the chest is a bronze round mirror with a handle and a button in the center; the diameter of the mirror is 5 cm; the length of the handle is 1.2 cm; there is a round hole in the handle. Bronze fibulae at left shoulder, right elbow and on chest. The lower part, where the needle is fixed, is wrapped with wire; the middle part is lyre-shaped with thickenings and a button at the end. The hem of the robe or gown (fragments of fabric sticking to the ground) is marked with beads - 13 whole beads and 9 fragments. The beads are glass, round, made of pieces of tubes, covered with a layer of iridation, hiding the color. One is a cornelian bead. Date of the beads (by definition of Z.A. Lvova) - I-II century AD.
The material raised on Bilinga hillock is diverse: near the Muslim cemetery - Tatar ceramics of the XV-XVI centuries; west of the burial there are many fragments of molded ceramics, similar to those described in the skeleton. There are many fragments of iron articles: knives, ducks and a sword fragment. The greatest number of finds is associated with patches of killed earth (floors of dwellings).
To the east of the burial described above, another one was found, head to the north, very poorly preserved, in a hard layer of cemented sandy loam, covering the bones in places by 5 cm. It was accompanied by fragments of grey clay moulded pottery, small and unexpressive. No belongings were found with the skeleton. The lifting material is fragments (up to 2 cm) of iron implements, scattered randomly on the surface of the knoll.
13. The hill of Kazenny. A very poorly preserved skeleton was found on the crest of the central part of the hill. The skull was broken and its remains were lying around the skeleton. Preserved ribs and kneecaps allowed to establish that the skeleton was lying on its back and was oriented to the west. Next to the skeleton of the spruce side, there was a berm of mounded earth 0.2 m above the skeleton. Under it lay a horse's lower jaw on a layer of charred soil. Fragments of a broken stucco, black clay, burnt vessel and horse teeth lay 1.5 m to the south-west. Accompanying items: a fragment of iron knife under the skeleton's neck, pieces of iron slag and copper plates up to 1 mm long and ashes mixed with sand.
Here and elsewhere, the burials are above-ground, sometimes sprinkled with aeolian sand and dust.
Lifting material - fragments of pottery: 1) black-clay ceramics, moulded with streaked grooves; 2) moulded, black-clay ceramics with burnt to red-brown surfaces; 3) pottery, of well-bleached clay with glossing; 4) the same without flaking, corolla with a ridge; 5) the same with a reddish inner surface; 6) the neck of a modeled amphora flaked; 7) red-clay pottery, pottery, shards with ringing; 8) a fragment of an iron plate.
Burials: over the cliff of the northern edge of the hillock in its central part (in the middle) was found burial, oriented to the west, well preserved due to the fact that the layer of cemented loam over the skull reached 7-10 cm. Only the corolla of two vessels protruded outside. The skeleton lay on its back with its arms and legs slightly bent at the knees and crossed on its stomach. The feet and hands were missing. In the headboard were bones and skull of a ram, and slightly above - fragments of a thin copper plate with holes and a rivet, around which the remnants of a strap were preserved. In place of the hand of the left hand there is a partially preserved bronze mirror 2R = 6.8 cm, 0.2 cm thick; below the pelvis there is a fragment of an iron knife; another, larger one is near the left shoulder. These are fragments of a single-blade knife 12.7 cm long, 0.7 cm wide. Obviously, the knife was broken during burial and the fragments were in different places.
Near the head-head there are two grey clay vessels, flat-bottomed, 14.5 cm high, 11 and 11.5 cm in diameter. The corollas are bent outwards, one has a dimpled ornament. The legs of the skeleton were backfilled more than the head, h backfill -25 cm, and on it, 40 cm north of the skeleton's shins, a crushed flat-bottomed molded pot similar to those described above, and several amorphous bones were found. The relation of this. third pot to the burial is unclear.
The second burial is on the same hillock, but lower than the previous one; it is also oriented to the west. The skeleton lies on its back, arms and legs outstretched, feet missing, hand bones mixed up due to a small landslide that covered the body and thus saved it from destruction. There were large gaps between the long bones. The skull, unaffected by the landslide, remained on the surface and was crushed. On the right side of the skull was a black clay stucco pot with a corolla, bent outwards and decorated with a pitted ornament. Next to it were fragments of a crushed red, well-burned pottery vessel, and above the head was a fragment of a single-bladed knife.
14. Root hillock. A very poorly preserved burial was found in the center of the hillock, oriented to the northwest. It is accompanied by a fragment of iron knife and fragments of brown-gray, stucco ceramics with pitted and grooved ornamentation. Lifting material: 1) ceramics, black-clay, well-burned, pottery with layering; 2) ceramics, modeled, rough, black-clay with burnt sides - Guz; 3) ceramics, black-clay, modeled, poorly burned with flat corolla; 4) ceramics, red-clay, pottery with flat corolla, with furrowed ornament.
To the east of the hill Root is a low Bai hill literally sown with finds up to the shards of vodka corks of the XVIII century. There was collected lifting material: pottery fragments from well washed gray dough, the crocks are sonorous, pottery, walls are almost flat, apparently from big vessels with glazed grating or parallel strips with glazed ornament. The corollas are bent outward; the bottoms are flat, sometimes with a projection outward, with traces of a board. Handles molded, oval.
15. Kungur hill. The lifting material is fragments of grey clay pottery and iron implements.
16. Beshlyk hillock - a few fragments of ceramics and iron, there are human bones.
The lifting material: 1) fragments of red-clay ceramics with grooves; 2) fragments of Guz ceramics with corolla, cut obliquely; 3) black ceramics, badly burned with pits and grooved ornament; 4) brown-gray ceramics (see Root); 5) ceramics with streaked glaze (see Beshlyk hillock).
17. Shike hillock.
On the east side of the hill, above the slope a number of dugouts with access to the east, with blurred walls. These are relatively late constructions. At the top of the hill, there are remains of a burial - ribs and traces of the head of the tibia, which allow us to determine that the skeleton was oriented to the north. It is accompanied by fragments of gray pottery with brown surfaces and fragments of iron implements. There are squares of compacted earth on the crest of the hillock, with no vegetation. Apparently, floors of ancient dugouts.
18. In the sea, along the Igolki bank, a dredger dug a channel to deepen the fairway. Along the channel there are mounds, for the sea is 0,5-0,8 m deep here. Animal bones and pottery fragments, rolled by the water, were found on one of the hollows against the island of Dalnego. Large vessels are black clay, with a red surface from firing, the dough is weak, poorly tempered, dents from the fingers. Small vessels black clay, with red surface from firing, dough weak, poorly abraded, dents from fingers. Small vessels are gray-clay, thin-walled. Both are similar to the Khazar vessels found earlier. The absolute mark of the find is minus 29.6 m, taking into account the sea level in the bank and the depth of the channel.
19. "Devil's hill fort", or "the hill fort of the Book of the Big Draw".
20. Survey of the banks of the Bakhtemir and the Old Volga did not yield any finds. Riverside Baer knolls are built up, and distant ones contain few fragments of Tatar ceramics. The lower reaches are alluvial plain, with clumps of willows and reed beds. Above, on the latitude of the "Devil's fortress", hillock Karakol (7 km south-east of the village Samosdelki) - unfortified Tatar settlement. Traces of hollow, fragments of large red clay vessels with furrowed ornament: remains of brick oven; between the bricks are bones of bull and red fish.
21. Near the village of Uvary, a group of knolls, where, according to survey information, "skulls and skulls" are found. We examined Tutinsky hillock, where we managed to clean the remains of three Khazar (i.e., similar to finds on Stepan Razin hillock) burials. All of them are above-ground, in very hard cemented loamy sand, poorly preserved because they are washed away.
a) Burial: skeletal remains - spine oriented to the NHS (3450); two pots (fragments): 1) red-clay pot, well-burned flat-bottomed, molded, bottom diameter 9.0 cm and 2) fragments of molded, black-clay pot, with walls red from firing, bottom missing, diameter 20 cm; inside "rim" sheep blade, amorphous bones, iron fragment and ash.
b) Burial: skeleton without head, without left arm and left leg; oriented to the northwest.
c) Vessel crushed, so that the clay is stratified. Black-clay stucco pot with glazed surface, corolla bent outward, bottom flat.
22. At Tabola, near the Chapaevskiy fish factory, two knolls were examined. A fragment of a vessel of glued clay ribbons (corrugated), similar to Dagestan vessels from under the Derbent wall of the 6th century, was found near the first one from the river. At the top of the hill was collected lifting material: 10 fragments of grey clay pottery of Khazar time, 5 fragments of Gozo ceramics and the main mass - grey clay pottery, ringed; ornamented with grooves and pits, pressed in by the oval end of the stick.
On a hillock, 1.5 km away from the river, gray clay pottery, strong pottery with a circular ridge on the corolla. It is decorated with a series of quadrangular depressions made with a stick along the corolla. It is close to Khazar, but not completely identical, maybe because we find here fragments of large vessels. Stains of the floors of round and oval dwellings were found on the examined hillocks.
23. On Tabola, near the village of Semibugry (there are really seven of them), the hillocks - Sarai-Tube - were examined. Diverse pottery was found: gray glazed; black with glazed lattice; red with furrowed ornamentation and moulded, black in the fracture with red firing (Guzskaya). The number of finds (45 fragments) exceeds all previously surveyed sites.
24. On the Tabol channel, near the village of Razdor, a chain of Baer knolls. Ceramics at all are the same, of three types: a) red, pottery, well-burned; 2) thick-walled, moulded, with red firing, black dough in the fracture (Guzskaya); black, glazed, well-washed dough, ringed crocks.
25. Lamb's knoll stands lonely above Tuzuklei among the delta plain 1 km from the river. Absolute altitude - minus (from sea-level)14.4 m. The abundance of lifting material and burials is striking.
Finds: a pot with a lid assembled from shards. The height is 10 cm, the diameter at the corolla is 8.5 cm, the length is 7.0 cm and the middle part is 12.6 cm. Stucco, black clay, the corolla is bent outward.
The skeleton of a child, lying with its head facing east. (This is the only case of Oriental orientation.) It lies on its back, its skull crushed, arms and legs outstretched. In the headboard, in the place where the bones of the sacrificial ram are usually located, lies the skeleton of an infant. The infant's skull, which has fallen apart at the seams, is at the right shoulder of the skeleton. Near the head of the skeleton are two pots. One is black clay molded, with a gray surface and a rim bent outward; its outer side is covered with horizontal grooves, 1.5 cm high, 12.5 cm in diameter, 0.6 cm thick; the second one is flat-bottomed, red, pottery, pear-shaped with a flat handle, the dough is well burned; its height is 12.6 cm, diameter is 10 cm; wall thickness is 0.5 cm; on the wide part there are two stripe fingers, at the base of the neck there is one, and above it the pattern in the form of festoons is traced. Under the skull, earring rings 1.3 cm in diameter were found.
The skeleton of a child at the northwestern end of the knoll lies on its back, head facing west. There is a fragment of a bronze earring-ring at the right temple. The left side of the ribs and clavicle are disturbed: they lie on and around the skull. Vessel assembled from shards, molded, fluted. Partially restored. Height, 12 cm; diameter, about 14 cm.
Skeleton of child without pots, running on right side, oriented to the west. The skull is crushed in recent times; under the skull is an iron needle, under the pelvic bones and the loins are traces of wood, like a spacer. The length of the skeleton is 0.60 m.
Lifting material on Baran's Hill: a) Gooz pottery - 13 fragments from vessel walls, unexpressive, with nail-drawn horizontal grooves; 6) Tatar pottery - 2 fragments; c) Khazar pottery, made on a circle, grey-clay, ringed - 4 fragments.
Ornamentation: 1) wave (sinusoid) of seven parallel grooves; stroke width - 2 mm; 2) same, coarser, stroke width - 4 mm; 3) grooves straight, four in the middle of the vessel side; stroke width - 4 mm; 4) same, deeper, covering the whole vessel fragment; stroke width - 2 mm; d) Khazar ceramics, stucco, black clay, slightly burned; e) two fragments of an iron knife; f) fragment of a ceramic tile, slightly curved; dimensions - 13x7x3 cm. On the northern and eastern side, quadrangular patches of kilned earth were found, which are apparently the floors of dwellings. The burials are grouped on the southern part of the knoll, between the ridge and the scarp and on the western end of the knoll.
26. Two low-visibility fragments of Guz ceramics were found on the hillside of Khurdun hillock.
27. Lifting material - Guz ceramics - on Mullin knoll.
28. The lifting material - pottery - on the Tishkovsky hillock (Tishkovo in the lower reaches of the Buyan channel, close to the Caspian sea): a) fragments of gray clay pottery, with black surfaces, made on a potter's wheel, with a streaked glaze - 3 fragments (Khazars); b) Goozian - 3 fragments; c) gray clay, modeled with a red inner surface.
29. On the left bank of Buyan channel, on a solitary knoll in the deltaic alluvial plain - two unimpressive fragments of Khazar ceramics, indicating the settlement of the southern delta in the first millennium AD.
30. Lifting material - pottery - on Fedoritkina hill near the village Multanovo. Grey-clay vessels made of scraped dough, outer surface with flattened surface, flat walls, corolla with a flute, furrowed ornament. Many fragments of iron tools.
31. The lifting material - Tatar ceramics - on the hillock against the Kotyaevka village, on the right bank of the Kigach.
32. Lifting material - pottery - Bezymyannyi hillock, near Tumganovka: (a) ceramics gray clay, pottery, well-burned, corolla round, bent inside. There are no analogues in our finds.
Hillocks of the Naryn-gora along the Makarke river: fragments of Khazar red pottery and a fragment of gray pottery.
33. Vor hillock, near the Red Yar: (a) grey clay pottery, pottery, with black surface, corolla curved outward, good firing, dashed glaze - II fragments (analogy - Saltovo, Khazars); 6) grey clay pottery, moulded, well-burnt; 4 fragments (Khazars); c) red clay pottery, pottery, well burnt - 9 fragments (Tatars); d) fragments of iron implements - 8 fragments.
Karaulnyi hillock near Krasny Yar: a) pottery, gray, well-burned, porous with knobbly surface - 2 fragments; b) handle from a jug, molded, light red, well-burned. Zurman hillock near Krasny Yar: a) one fragment of grey clay moulded ceramics (Khazar); b) two fragments of Tatar ceramics.
The hillocks from Krasnoye Yar to Marfin - no finds.
34. Maly Aral - hillocks east of the village. Finds: red and gray, well-burnt ceramics (2 fragments) and Gozo, amorphous (2 fragments).
BACK TO THE MAIN TEXT
Undoubtedly, the ancient Khazars, Bulgars, Oguzes, and Pechenegs had a tribal system. As is known, in the primitive communal formation the land belongs to the clan and, consequently, to all its members. A clan-dweller, having lost livestock as a result of a fall, ice or hijacking by enemies, had the right to assistance from his clan, and gratuitously at that. Therefore individual poverty could not exist among these peoples. Some representatives had wealth not in the form of capital, but as treasure (earrings, necklaces, valuable weapons, silk or brocade robes)[12]. Loans at interest in the absence of the monetary system do not happen, and in a subsistence economy there is no need for them. Hence, with the level of productive forces and the abundance of natural resources existing in the first millennium, there were no prerequisites for the development of capitalism even in its infancy. The accumulation of wealth for the sake of wealth would have seemed a pointless and dirty occupation for every tribesman, and if someone began to make off with his fellow tribesmen, they would have either kicked him out or killed him as a freak. But before that M.I. Artamonov wrote, that Khazaria was turned into a class state by the Jewish merchant upper crust, who relied on the hired troops and deprived Kagan of freedom and power[13]. The events of the IX century had nothing to do with the settling of the nomads.
And there was no settling. The farming and nomadic cattle-breeding coexisted from the ancient centuries, because they were the ways of adaptation of the ethnic groups to the landscapes [14]. Of course, ethnoses developing technology change, but in doing so they affect the geographical environment, creating anthropogenic landscapes - large cities. But when this takes place, an archaeologist will easily discover it. But in Khazaria, only fortresses and bazaars were built to ensure the transit trade, which had no impact on the nature of the steppes and river valleys.
Finally, the identification of the Khazars and Bulgarians is based on an unjustified equating ethnicity with archeological, i.e. material culture. And since the Saltovo-Mayak culture is represented mainly by pottery, it means that the ancient people are recognized as an addition to the shards of broken pots, i.e., both are "material of the same order. The authors' logic is simple to the extreme: shards are more convenient to study. They lie on the ground and are visible, and the ancient people have rotted away. Therefore it is enough with the shards alone, the rest can be guessed.
But let us imagine that an archaeologist in the 20th century is excavating in Leningrad. In his study of crockery he will identify the "culture of clay pots," "culture of porcelain," "culture of aluminum bowls," and "culture of plastic saucers." In excavating dwellings, he will divide into different "cultures" the empire-style palaces, brick apartment houses, and block buildings. All these houses he is obliged, according to the postulate, to interpret as monuments of special ethnic groups. But the example is taken for the 250-year history of a single city!
So is it right to base ethnic diagnostics on the forms of ceramic products, rather than on the way of life of peoples, i.e. their interaction with the nature which feeds them and the living traditions of everyday life, morals and views, changing from age to age in accordance with a strict pattern of ethnogenetic processes? No, each science has its own sphere and its own limits. Archaeology deals with "corpses of things", i.e. monuments. Archaeology is powerless where cloth and fur have decayed, and gold jewelry has been poured into ingots by enemies. We must look for another way.
4. PHASES OF ETHNOGENESIS IN WESTERN EURASIA
In the special work [16] we have established that the ethnic history of mankind consists of a number of discrete processes, ethnogenesis, superimposed on the historical canvas of similar processes, taking place earlier on the territory which has attracted the attention of the researcher. For example, in Eastern Europe and the adjoining western fringe of the Great Steppe, during the period covered by the written sources, many peoples have changed. From the 8th to the 3rd century BC, the Scythians dominated here, but were annihilated by the Sarmatians. From III century BC to IV century AD, to be exact - up to 370 AD, the masters of the steppes east of the Don were the Sarmatians, and the right bank of the Dnieper was seized by the Goths. In 371 the Huns crossed the Don and in 376 forced the Goths beyond the Danube, and about 420 they occupied Pannonia. In 454 the Huns were defeated by the Gepids, in 463 - the Bulgarians, in 469 - the Byzantines, after which the dominion over the Black Sea steppes went to the Bulgarians. The fate of the Huns is a vivid example of the fact that any ethnic process can be disrupted by political collisions that cannot be foreseen. The Huns could have won the battle with the Gepids at Nedao in 453, or defeated the Saragurs (Bulgars) in 463. Then a strong Hunnish state would have been created in the Eastern Europe already in the 5th century. But as it did not happen, numerous local ethnic groups regained their independence. Among them were the descendants of the Ants, the Dulebs, who lived in Volyn. The Arabian geographer Masudi, who wrote about 930, notes: "Of these tribes (Slavic) one had before in antiquity power, its king was called Majak, and the tribe itself was called Valinana... (i.e. "Volynians"). It was revered among their tribes and had precedence among them"[17].
The Bulgars did not create a unified state. The eastern ones, in the basin of Kuban', - Uturgury, and western ones, between Don and the lower Danube, - Kuturgury, were at enmity with each other and became a prey for new arrivals from the east: Kuturgury were subdued by Avars (more exactly, pseudo-Avars, or Varchonits), and Uturgury by Turkists in 558-574. The border between Avar and Western Turkic Kaganate became the Don. Since 668 the Avars, entrenched in Pannonia, were natural enemies of the Slavs. Details of this long war are not preserved in the sources, for events proceeded far from Byzantium and Gaul, where the only records were kept, but even from fragmentary records it is visible, that in 581 Avars seized Sirmium, the Greek fortress on the Danube (near Belgrade), and then plundered the Balkan Peninsula (583-587). From 588 to 631 the Avars won victories and "dominated the Dulebs" (an East Slavic tribe), and about 600 they, together with the Chorutan Slavs, settled Inner Norik. In 619-620 the Avars, in alliance with the Persians, reached the walls of Constantinople, but were repulsed. Their new attempt to achieve a victory over the Greeks in 627 ended in a disastrous defeat, which led to a revolt of the Bulgarian tribe - Kuturgurs, who inhabited the steppes from the Carpathians to the Don, which the few Avars used in the fight against their enemies - Antes, allies of the Romans"[18].
In those years on the northern border of Avars' Kaganate there was a similarly fierce war, a trace of which are fortification sites destroyed and abandoned by the local population (for example, the "Pastyr fortress")[19]. When the Uturgurs in 670 were defeated by Khazars, who conquered Northern Caucasus, the Bulgarians were dispersed, and the former lands of Kuturgurs were settled by Tiberians and Ulichi.
All these events undermined the power of the Avars, who in the 6th century dominated in the steppes east of the Carpathians. The decline of the Avar Kaganate occurred in the 8th century. Because the Avars, or Obras, were not only warlike, but also intellectual. Their diplomacy and management abilities were at a height of the requirements of that time. They had natural allies, the Kangars, or Pechenegs, in the steppes of the Aral Sea. And yet they fled from the few Turkuts, retreated from the walls of Constantinople and suffered defeats from the Slavs of Samo's power. It is not accidental [20].
Let's look into the history. Until the VI century BC Aryan tribes of Central Asia and Iran represented an integrity formidable and aggressive. At the turn of the sixth and fifth centuries BC the fiery sermon of Zarathushtra, directed against the ancient gods - the Devs, was heard. Hindus and Hellenes, Scandinavians and Celts did not hear it, but in the steppes of Central Asia it sounded like thunder. Those who embraced the new teaching became Iranians; those who remained loyal to the ancient gods remained Turanians.
The ancient ethnic groups of Central Asia-Sogdians, Parthians, true Abars ("aba" in Jungaria), Hephthalites, Hionites, and Kangars - were at the end of their life journey and, even taking refuge behind the Carpathians, they were doomed. That they survived until the arrival of the Hungarians is an act of great courage and firmness. For the Slavs, these heirs of the ancient Turan were enemies worthy of admiration.
Even more terrible was the fate of the Turkuts. In the middle of the 8th century they were physically exterminated - some in their homeland, others in China, where they tried to find salvation. But they left many ethnic groups a magnificent legacy: a glorious name, traditions of military valor, and a passionate gene pool scattered over many steppe populations.
The introduction of the trait of passionarity from outside does not differ in its consequences from its emergence by mutation. The difference is clarified only in the fact that with genetic drift the trait spreads more rapidly, and hence the process is more intense. Therefore the incubation period of the Khazar ethnogenesis lasted for three generations, about 70 years, after which since 627 the name "Türkic-Khazars" becomes relevant, losing its meaning after 650, when Khazars are called mestizos of the Türkic-Khazar origin. Somehow Istahri and other Eastern geographers divided the Khazars into two classes: swarthy [21] and black-haired, and "white, beautiful, perfect in appearance"[22]. They also related the Khazars, now to the Turks, then to the non-Turks, putting them now to the Georgians, then to the Armenians [23]. The Khazarian language, according to Istahri, resembles neither Türkic, nor Persian, nor any other known language, but is similar to the language of Bulgarians [24]. This last has caused a lot of perplexities, for the language of Bulgarians is considered Turkic. But was it so in the V-VI centuries, when Turks first appeared in the Volga region? Hardly!
The Turkic language spread as an international and commonly used language only in the XI century thanks to the Polovtsians, and it displaced from the steppe Old Russian, which dominated in the X-XI centuries. [25] Before that ethnic groups spoke their own languages at home, which did not come down to us, and in addition knew the Old Turkic language of the military leaders.
Thus, in the 7th century in the Lower Volga region optimal conditions for ethnogenesis were created: different landscapes in close combination, economic ways corresponding to them, coexistence of ethnic substrates belonging to a single (Eurasian) super-ethnos, and import of passionarity, which allowed to formalize ethnic diversity into a social system. This latter was elastic enough for the ethnoses that entered it to become sub-ethnoses of Khazar ethnos, which inherited the name from their ancestors.
That is why M.I. Artamonov doubted the authenticity of the Armenian chronicles mentioning the Khazars in the III century AD. [26] The ethnonym was the same, but the ethnos was different, and that is often the case.
The phase of ethnic growth took about 150 years, from the middle of VII century to the end of VIII century. During this time, the Khazars went from success to success, and very successfully found contacts with their neighbors. However the character of these contacts was different, which led to the shift of the normal curve of ethnogenesis, so the acmatic-phase (growing) did not come.
Therefore, let's pay attention to the neighbors of the Khazars, but first recall that in the III-V centuries, the Khazar ethnos was in a phase of homeostasis. Its productive forces were stable, and society was in the primitive communal formation with well-established production relations. But this did not prevent the Khazars to live and protect their homes from neighbors, not always friendly.
5. BETWEEN THE MOUNTAINS AND THE SEA
So far in our field of vision was the Volga Khazaria, the "Caspian Netherlands. But for a long time, the Khazars dominated in the plains of Dagestan, in the Terek-Sulak interfluve. Archaeological work in 1967-1980 established that the Khazars lived on the northern bank of the Terek and on the shores of the Caspian Sea between the mouth of the Terek and Sudak. The credit for this finding belongs to G.S. Fedorov, who acquainted the author of these lines with the obtained materials in 1966. [27] The similarity of this ceramics with the ceramics of the Volga delta is beyond doubt.
Conversely, the foothill and steppe regions of Dagestan were not inhabited by the Khazars. Although the Khazar influence can be traced on them, but, according to A.V. Gadlo, it was brought in a ready-made form from outside [28]. One has to agree with it. The Khazar-Kala fortress is a fortress of the Serir state, sometimes captured by Khazars. It covered a wide road to the inner mountain Dagestan, while the neighboring gorges were inaccessible because of the cliffs, between which the streams flowed, and therefore there was no need to defend them. In short, this was a frontier zone, and not a quiet habitation of the Khazars, as on the seashore. The sea in the V-VIII centuries. stood low: its level was minus 34 m, i.e. 6 m lower than in the XX century. So it was not the sea that disturbed the coastal inhabitants [29].
Even in the subsequent centuries, when the northern, flat shore of the Caspian Sea was flooded, the Dagestan steppes were out of danger, because the maximum mark of the Novocaspian transgression was minus 18 m, and even the town of Babayurt was at the zero mark, i.e. 12 m higher than the maximum level of the Caspian Sea in the 13th-14th centuries. Only the lower reaches of the Volga were flooded [30].
The terrible X century was a time of tremendous changes not only in Russia (baptism), in the Caliphate (the capture of Baghdad by the Deilemites), in China (restoration of unity - the Song Dynasty), but also in the steppes of the Northern Caspian and Aral Sea region. The cruel centuries-old drought that struck the steppe zone of Eurasia in the 10th century [31] weakened the Pechenegs and Oguzes, whose nomads were seized by the desert. The rains and snow that fell over the expanses of the Trans-Ural region and on the shores of the Aral Sea, in the IX century, imperceptibly moved to the north, to the banks of the Oka and Kama. In the 10th century the rise of the Caspian Sea level stopped, because the cyclones moved even more northwards, to the White Sea basin, where the Viking ships could easily navigate [32]. But this was no consolation for the steppe people, for their homeland had lost the lakes around which the sheep had grazed until recently, and the springs whose water could be used to feed the horses, and the amount of snow that fed the thirsty land had not increased. It now fell in the northern tundra and lay there, trampled by a blizzard, waiting for the time when the spring sun will turn it into water, and it will melt the permafrost and lower the level of groundwater. Then the water of the lakes will turn into liquid mud, and the fish, the staple food of the northerners, will die. The disgrace of nature fell on many peoples in this cruel X century!
But the level of the Caspian Sea in the X century was approximately the same as in the XX century. Only in the XIII-XIV centuries. it rose to minus 18 meters, but the rising level had nothing to do with Khazaria, as there was no Khazar Khaganate, nor the Khazar ethnos. The first such ethnos fell; back in the tenth century, under the attack of Russian Prince Svyatoslav, the second broke up into Christian (Terek Cossacks) and Muslim (Astrakhan Tatars) parts. The descendants of the Khazars remained, but the ethnic system disappeared. And this in Dagestan was contributed not by the onset of the sea, but by the difficult ethno-political situation: Arab aggression, the migration of Jews from Iran, the cultural influences of the Armenian Agnies, etc. Therefore, for the history of Khazaria, the Caspian transgression that began did not matter.
And here it is necessary to clarify the problem arising from the accepted aspect. It is known that all inhabited regions are inhabited as much as possible at a given level of economy. Plain Dagestan is a fertile steppe, bounded on the north by the Terek valley, on the east by the Caspian Sea, and on the west by a chain of low ridges and their spurs, beyond which rises mountain Dagestan. It is difficult to find an area in the Caspian Sea that is so favorable for nomadic cattle-breeding, agriculture and fishing, especially during the period of increased moisture of the steppe zone. That is why this plain has always been densely populated [33].
Map 5. Terek Khazaria in the VIII-XII centuries. (47 KB)
Карта 5. Терская Хазария в VIII-XII вв. (47 KB)
http://gumilevica.kulichki.net/maps/args02.html
L.N. Gumilev. Discovery of Khazaria. Ancient Rus and the Great Steppe
Map 2: Terek Khazaria in the VIII-XX centuries.
In the first centuries A.D. North Caucasus was inhabited by Sarmato-Alans, but they gradually ceded the leading position to the Khazars, Turks and Savirs. The latter are counted among the Hunnic circle of ethnic groups, but in these fertile places they assimilated among the natives, the Barsils, retaining only political power. The ruler of Hun-Savirs had a title "elteber" and was a vassal of Khazar Khagan [34]. The descendants of Alans lived under his rule, who left many archeological monuments [35]. As if there was no place for the introduction of another ethnos.
Of course, this rich country could accept a small number of political immigrants, such as the Iranian Jews in the sixth century, but it took the iron grip of history for their descendants to multiply and gain their own range. The Arab invasions of the 8th century turned the country between Derbent and Semender (Samandar) into a battlefield for centuries.
Villages were burnt, towns were looted, fortresses were destroyed, and the people who inhabited them were either slaughtered or taken captive [36]. The country was emptied, and then there were free lands where the newcomers could settle.
Thus, we have revealed the mechanism of interaction between socio-political phenomena (war) and demographic (migration) and ecological phenomena (introduction into the emptied ecological niche). However, let us note that the military onslaught of the Arabs was a consequence of the passionary push, i.e. a natural phenomenon (mutation), although its dominant feature - greed and avarice - was connected with the socio-cultural tradition accumulated in the preceding Arab-Muslim cultures of the ancient East. Other passionaries of the same push behaved not less fiercely, but differently: Rajputs did not establish, but crushed despotic power, Turkuts brought booty from distant campaigns in their saddlebags, Tabgachs received not slaves after victories, but ranks and grants. And although the source of energy was the same, it was embodied in action differently, depending on the prevailing traditions.
And yet, not all the winners were passionate. The Khazars and Bulgarians were in a phase of homeostasis, but this means that they had a greater charge of energy than those who were in obscuration (such as the Persians) or experienced a temporary decline (the Greeks). Consequently, in history we see not the absolute values of the passionaric voltage, but the relative values of its drops in ethnic contacts.
Let us note this and move on to a further consideration of the arrangement of ethnic cohesion at the end of the 8th century.
6. THE WEST
The axis of the passionate push, which aroused a series of grandiose events, passed from the southern Sweden, Gothia, through the Central Europe near the Carpathians, Dacia, Asia Minor, Cilicia, Palestine and along the Red Sea to Abyssinia. The ethnic groups located directly on this axis reacted so violently to the mutational shift that, before they had accumulated enough strength, they perished in a collision with the organized system of the Roman Empire. This fate befell the Dacians and the Palestinian Jews [37]. And those who stayed home and only expanded rather than changed their range? They were the Slavs. The ancestors of the Slavs, the Venedes, who arose in the area of the passionary explosion in the 1st c., by the IV c., divided into the Sklavins and Ants. By the 7th century those and others spread to the shores of the Baltic Sea, displacing the Vandals from there, to the Adriatic Sea, where they mixed with the descendants of militant Illyrians, to the Balkans and even to Peloponnesus, weakening the Thracians, Macedonians and part of the Hellenes. In the east, the Slavs reached the Dnieper, and one of the groups made their way north to Lake Ilmen (the Novgorod Slavs). There is no reason to think that this spread was the result of a population explosion. No, the winners took captive wives, and their children adopted the language of their fathers. That is why the Slavic tribes began to resemble each other very little, although the "Slavic language" was easily understood by their descendants up to XI century. The Slavs didn't quarrel with the Khazars at that time, because there were two strongest ethnoses between them: Bulgars and Savirs. (With last bordered Polane, which after began to refer to as "Russ"[38].) Reporter explains, that Russia - the new historical phenomenon, replaced the disintegrated union Polanian [39]. To this we shall add from ourselves, that "Polane" - not the ethnic self-name because the Slavic ethnoses at which Antes dominated, were called Duleb or Volynian. The Polyans are found not only in that zone.
Let us proceed to the generalization. Passionary mutation manifested itself the stronger, the closer to the axis of the shock were the ethnic groups at the turn of the new era. And its consequences were more tragic, the stronger was the cultural tradition of the ethnic group. Both are understandable. The ethnoses, located on the periphery of the shock area, had a gradual passionar rise and managed to change the stereotype of behavior without damaging the structure. And if the structure was amorphous, its rebuilding did not require a quick and rigid breaking. That is why the Franks, Saxons and Lombards, who began the historical period with homeostasis, created relatively stable ethno-social communities. They received the charge of passionarity not directly, but through sexual transmission of the trait. Therefore they entered the arena of history at the end of the 5th century, when the Goths, Vandals, Gepids and Burgundians had time to squander their passionarity, giving up their passionaries to perish. However, both for the late and for the "ready-made" ethnic groups, the period of active formation fits into the phase of fracture, i.e. gradual attenuation. The ferocious Merovingians of the 6th century were replaced by "lazy kings" of the 7th century. The Angles, Saxons and Jutes, after their victories over the Celts of Britain, created seven kingdoms which feuded with each other and failed to conquer the island to the end. The Lombards split their kingdom into counties and became easy prey to the Franks. The Germans restored the tribal division at the expense of weaker central authority. By the beginning of the 8th century Europe had become a "wild west", powerless and safe for its eastern neighbors - the Slavs. And it was a legitimate thing.
In the first 169 years the passionarity of the system passed its incubation period, and it turned out that the old ethnoses renewed. From 155 to 400 there was a rise of passionarity to the overheated acmatic phase, after which the war started everyone against everyone and, then a worse everyone against everyone. This phase was used by the Huns Mundzuk and Attila, who seized hegemony in Europe. But they paid for it with their defeat at Nedao in 453 and the ruthless extermination, after which they were gone. Since the end of the V century there is a decline in the passionary tension of ethnic systems, which is not at all surprising, because it is now clear that in the VI century half of the ethnic life has been lived and no experience and education has been accumulated. There is no inertial phase, for foreign nature, even if it is blessed Italy, does not help to live. The Goths and Vandals live off the conquered natives, and imitating them, plunge into the phase of obscuration. They perish already in 5-8 centuries after birth, for the fracture is a severe age-related disease and not every ethnos is destined to survive it.
On the other hand, Byzantium, which emerged from the same shock and, therefore, is the same age as the "barbarian" ethnic groups, enters the inertial phase, after which it surprises the world with its brilliance. Its golden glow illuminated the world for another three centuries, until it began to fade after the potency had been squandered. And yet Byzantium lived a limit of about 1,500 years. What accounts for this strength of resilience to the blows from the outside and breakdowns from within? Strength of spirit and refinement of mind - that's what saved Byzantium from ruin at the acme phase breakdown.
We now call the Byzantines "Greeks" according to the linguistic principle, but in fact in Constantinople lived and acted besides Greeks, Goths, Isaurians, Slavs, Armenians, Paphlagonians, Illyrians and Arabs. To the capital from their homelands sought the best, that is, the most passionate, people. United by a strict system of Orthodoxy, they defended the empire as their homeland, because they considered their ancestors are not wild mountaineers or pirates, but the holy martyrs of the early centuries of Christianity. They treasured and protected their traditions even at the cost of their lives. That is why Byzantium outlived all its peers except the eastern Slavs.
NOTES
[1] See:Potapenko A.I. Old resident of the Russian land. Rostov, 1976. С.50.
[2] Moses Khorensky in his "History of Armenia" mentions that between 193 and 213-th years "the multitude of Khazars and Bashkirs". "The crowds of Khazars and Basils (Barsils), having united, passed through the gates of Jor (Derbent passage)... crossed Kura and scattered to all sides" (quoted from: Artamonov M.I.History of Khazars.L.1962.P.115). M.I.Artamonov believes that the mention of the Khazars at such early time is an anachronism (Ibid, P.131), but does not give any reasons to doubt it. Taking the information of the source, we note that in the II century the Khazars lived in the lower reaches of the Terek and Sudak. They later spread to the Volga not through dry steppes, but along the shore of the Caspian Sea, which then was at minus 36 m, i.e. 8 m lower than in the 20th century (see: Gumilev L.N. Khazaria and Caspian Sea // Vesti. LENINGRAD STATE UNIVERSITY. 1974. № 6. С. 84-95; Ibid. Khazaria and Terek // Ibid. 1974.№24.С.78-88).
[3] PVL CH.1 P.14.
[4] Ibid. P.II. С. 223.bank of the Dnieper, but also in Moravia, in Slavic Bulgaria and in the upper Vistula. It shows that the contemporaries put a special meaning in the word "Poles": "Giant" - a giant [40]. But "Ros" is an ethnonym, fixed for the 4th century by the 6th century author Jordanes, a Gothic historian, who denounced the "treacherous people of the Rossomons"[41] because they helped Huns to defeat Goths. The allies of Roussomons and Huns were Antes, i.e. Polonians[42], who still differed from Roussomons,[43] but by the 10th century merged into a single ethnos, Rus, in the narrow sense, differentiated from the other Slavic tribes of the Eastern Europe: Krivichi, Vyatichi, Radimichi, Drevlyans and Slovenes of Novgorod.
[5] The term "Türk" has three meanings. For VI-VIII centuries it is a small ethnos (Türks), which led a huge association in the Great Steppe the (el) and died in the middle of the VIII century. These Turks were Mongoloid. The Khazar dynasty descended from them, but the Khazars themselves were Europeans of the Dagestan type. For the IX-XII centuries. Turk is the common name for the warlike northern peoples, including the Magyars, Russians and Slavs. This cultural and historical meaning of the term has nothing to do with the origin. For the modern orientalists "Turk" is a group of languages spoken by the ethnic groups of different origin.
[6] For details see: Artamonov M.I. History of the Khazars. С. 171; Gumilev L.N. Ancient Turks. С. 238.
[7] See: History of Dagestan. VOL.1. M., 1967. P.153.
[8] Derbent was finally occupied by Arabs in 685-686, and separated from the Caliphate in X century along with Shirvan.
[9] Eurasia in this paper refers to the inner part of the continent, mainly the steppe between the Carpathians and Manchuria, which represents ethno-cultural integrity. In the same ethnocultural aspect the names "Eastern Europe" and "Western Eurasia" should be considered.
[10] See: Pletneva S.A. From Nomads to Cities. М. ,1967.
[11] See: Artamonov M.I.,. Pletnev S.A. Yet again about steppe culture of Eurasia // Peoples of Asia and Africa. 1970. № 3. С. 92.
[12] See: Artamonov M.I. History of Khazars. С.99.
[13] See: Ibid. С. 457-458. It may seem strange that M.I.Artamonov in the article, written jointly with S.A.Pletneva, rejects and ignores the conclusions of his own book, such as the war between the Khazars and Bulgars, which showed that they are different ethnic groups, and more. I do not have an explanation for this strangeness.
[14] See: Gumilev L.N., Erdei I. Unity and diversity of nomadic culture in the Middle Ages // Peoples of Asia and Africa. 1969. № 3.С.78- 87.
[15] Artamonov M.I., Pletneva S.A. op. cit. p. 89.
[16] See: Gumilev L.N. Ethnogenesis and the Biosphere of the Earth. Л., 1989.
[17] Garkavi L.Ya. Tales of Jewish writers about Khazars and Khazar kingdom. SPb, 1874. С. 135.
[18] See: Chicherov I.S. Byzantine historical works. "Theophanes' Chronographia. М., 1980. С. 58. Footnote 197. С. 96.
[19] See: Braichevsky M.Y. Pohodnye Rusi. Kiev, 1968. С. 172.
[20] See: Gumilev L.N. Ethnogenesis and the Earth's Biosphere. Vol. IV, Moscow, 1987. С. 208-215.
[21] In Sahariy they call "red" (see: 3ahoder B.N. Caspian Code of Information about Eastern Europe, in 2 vol. Т. 1. М., 1962. С. 138).
[22] Ibid. С. 137.
[23] Ibid. С. 135.
[24] See Ibid. С. 135.
[25] See: K u nik A., Rosen V. Izvestiya Al-Bekri and other authors about Rus'.
[26] See: Artamonov M.I. History of Khazars. P. II 6.
[27] See: Fedorov G.S. Excavations in northern Dagestan //Archeological discoveries of 1967. С. 92.
[28] See: Gadlo A.V. Ethnic history of the North Caucasus IV-X centuries. Л., 1979. С. 202-203.
[29] See: Gumilev L.N. Khazaria and Caspian Sea. (Landscape and ethnos. I) / / Leningrad State University Vestnik. 1964. № 6. С. 82-95.
[30] In this connection M.G.Magomedov's attempt to dispute the fact of fluctuations of the Caspian Sea level on the basis that the Caspian waves did not reach the piedmont steppes, lying 20 m above the maximum level (see: Magomedov M.G. Formation of Khazar Khaganate. М., 1983. P.18 and 181) is surprising. The only low standing fortress, Teng-Kala in the lower reaches of the Sulak River, "consists of alternating layers of cultural deposits and river silt 20-30 cm thick" (p. 39). (с. 39). Since the Sulak flows in a deep canyon, for floods to occur, the river must be backed up, i.e., the level of the Caspian Sea must be high. And if soon so, M.G. Magomedov himself denies his thesis. However, this is not the only case: citing the book of L.N.Gumilyov "The Ancient Turks" (pages 41 and 153-158 - there is nothing about the Khazars there, see: Magomedov M.G.Ibid), he shows a complete misunderstanding of the quoted text. And most surprisingly, such a serious archaeologist as S.A. Pletneva, as editor of cited book, did not point out to M.G. Magomedov his mistakes. Here is an example of how dangerous it is to trust people who ignore geography to check their work. After all, they do not care what we are talking about: the foothills of Dagestan or the Volga Delta.
[31] See: Gumilev L.N. Discovery of Khazaria. С. 55-70. He also. History of Caspian Sea level fluctuations during 200 years (from the IV century BC to the XVI century AD) // Fluctuations of humidification of the Aral-Caspian region in the Holocene. М., 1980. С. 32-47.
[32] See: Gumilev L.N. The Vikings didn't lie // Nature. 1977. №5.С.95-99.
[33] See: Fedorov Ya.A., Fedorov G.S. Early Turks in the North Caucasus (Historical and ethnographic sketches). М., 1978. С. 142-143.
[34] See Ibid. С. 149.
[35] See ibid. С. 154-155.
[36] See ibid. С.173-174.
[37] See: Weber G. Vseobshaya istoriya. VOL. IV. С.814.
[38] "...Polians who are nowadays called Rus'" (STY.PvL.Ch.I. P.21).
[39] See: Braychevskiy M.U. Pokhodnye Rus'. 149-164.
[40] See: Rybakov B.A. Ancient Russ // Soviet archeology. XVII. 1953. С. 47. Subsequently this term was superseded by the Turkic equivalent "bogatyr", but in the most ancient byliny were preserved its female gender - polyanitsa (See: Balashov D.M. "Danube". Historical Life of Folk Poetry // Russian Folklore. XVI. Л., 1976. С. 100). Consequently, the Polyans are not a tribe and not a social layer, but a psychological type of a Slavic pasionary of the era of undescribed victories.
[41] See: Jordanes. С. 91.
[42] See: Braichevsky M.Y. The adventures of Pyci. С. 155.
[43] Not to mix them with Roxalans (see:Gumilev L.N. Tale of the Khazar tribute... P.169. Footnote 43).
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