The origin and history of the Turkic peoples and their cultural traditions is one of the least studied topics in science. Meanwhile, the Turkic-speaking peoples are among the most numerous on the globe. Most of them have been living in Asia and Europe for a long time. But they also swam to the American and Australian continents. In modern Turkey, the Turks make up 90% of the inhabitants of the country, and in the territory of the former USSR there are about 50 million of them, i.e. they are the second largest group of the population after the Slavic peoples.
In antiquity and the early Middle Ages, there were many Turkic state formations:
But to this day, only Turkey has retained its statehood. In 1991-1992 Turkic republics emerged from the former USSR and became independent states:
The Russian Federation includes the republics of Bashkortostan, Tatarstan, Sakha (Yakutia), as well as a number of autonomous districts and territories.
The Turks living outside the CIS do not have their own state formations either. So in China live Uighurs (about 8 million), more than 1 million Kazakhs, as well as Kyrgyz, Uzbeks. There were many Turks in Iran and Afghanistan.
The Turkic-speaking peoples are numerous and, of course, from ancient times they significantly influenced the course of the history of the regions and the world as a whole. However, the true history of the Turkic peoples is as vague as the history of the Eastern Slavic peoples. Fragments of testimonies, old books, artifacts, etc. are scattered around the world. And all this is only a small part found, described, systematized.
Many of the ancient and medieval authors wrote about the Turkic peoples and tribes. However, Europeans were the first to undertake scientific research on the history of the Turkic peoples. We will not rewrite their names, as well as ancient authors, because their conclusions are scattered, dissimilar, and the significance of their conclusions for our reality is not clear. Let us name only the name of Academician E. I. Eichwald, who was the first to scientifically substantiate the assertion that the Turkic tribes lived in Europe long before our era.
And now they are coming back - en masse!
Most researchers show the Turks as destroyers, belittle the level of their socio-economic and cultural development, deny their contribution to the development of civilization.
The official history says that the Turkic language arose in the first millennium when the first tribes belonging to this group appeared. But, as modern research shows, the language itself arose much earlier. There is even an opinion that the Turkic language came from a certain proto-language, which was spoken by all the inhabitants of Eurasia, as in the legend of the Tower of Babel. The main phenomenon of the Turkic vocabulary is that it has not changed much over the five millennia of its existence. The ancient writings of the Sumerians will still be as clear to the Kazakhs as modern books.
The Turkic language group is very numerous. If you look territorially, then the peoples who communicate in similar languages live like this: in the west, the border begins with Turkey, in the east - with the Autonomous Region of China Xinjiang, in the north - by the East Siberian Sea and in the south - by Khorasan.
Currently, the approximate number of people who speak Turkic is 164 million, this number is almost equal to the entire population of Russia. At the moment, there are different opinions about how the group of Turkic languages is classified. Which languages stand out in this group, we will consider further. Main: Turkish, Azerbaijani, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Turkmen, Uzbek, Karakalpak, Uighur, Tatar, Bashkir, Chuvash, Balkar, Karachai, Kumyk, Nogai, Tuva, Khakass, Yakut, etc.
We know that the Turkic group of languages spread very widely in Eurasia. In ancient times, the peoples who spoke this way were simply called Turks. Their main activity was cattle breeding and agriculture. But one should not perceive all modern peoples of the Turkic language group as descendants of an ancient ethnic group. As the millennia passed, their blood mixed with the blood of other ethnic groups of Eurasia, and now there are simply no indigenous Turks.
The ancient peoples of this group include:
The Turkic group of languages has a very complex classification. Rather, each historian offers his own version, which will differ from the other by minor changes. We offer you the most common option:
On their territory, the local population calls itself simply - Sakha. Hence the name of the region - the Republic of Sakha. Some representatives also settled in other neighboring areas. The Yakuts are the most eastern of the peoples of the Turkic language group. Culture and traditions were borrowed in ancient times from the tribes living in the central steppe part of Asia.
For this people, an area is defined - the Republic of Khakassia. Here is the largest contingent of Khakasses - about 52 thousand people. Several thousand more moved to live in Tula and the Krasnoyarsk Territory.
This nationality reached its greatest number in the 17th-18th centuries. Now this is a small ethnic group that can be found only in the south of the Kemerovo region. To date, the number is very small, about 10 thousand people.
Tuvans are usually divided into three groups, which differ from each other in some features of the dialect. Inhabit the Republic This is a small eastern of the peoples of the Turkic language group, living on the border with China.
This nation has almost disappeared. According to the 2010 census, 762 people were found in several villages of the Irkutsk region.
The eastern dialect of Tatar is the language that is considered to be the national language for the Siberian Tatars. This is also a Turkic group of languages. The peoples of this group are densely settled in Russia. They can be found in the countryside of the regions of Tyumen, Omsk, Novosibirsk and others.
A small group living in the northern regions of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug. They even have their own municipal district - Taimyrsky Dolgano-Nenetsky. To date, only 7.5 thousand people remain representatives of the Dolgans.
The Turkic group of languages includes the Altai lexicon. Now in this area you can freely get acquainted with the culture and traditions of the ancient people.
To date, there are six separate independent states, the nationality of which is the indigenous Turkic population. First of all, these are Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Of course, Turkey and Turkmenistan. And do not forget about Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan, which treat the Turkic language group in exactly the same way.
The Uighurs have their own autonomous region. It is located in China and is called Xinjiang. Other nationalities belonging to the Turks also live in this territory.
The Turkic group of languages primarily includes Kyrgyz. Indeed, the Kirghiz or Kyrgyz are the most ancient representatives of the Turks who lived on the territory of Eurasia. The first mention of the Kirghiz are found in 1 thousand BC. e. Almost throughout its history, the nation did not have its own sovereign territory, but at the same time managed to preserve its identity and culture. The Kyrgyz even have such a concept as "ashar", which means joint work, close cooperation and rallying.
The Kirghiz have long lived in the steppe sparsely populated areas. This could not but affect some of the features of character. These people are extremely hospitable. When a new person used to arrive in the settlement, he would tell news that no one could hear before. For this, the guest was rewarded with the best treats. It is customary to venerate guests sacredly to this day.
The Turkic language group could not exist without the most numerous Turkic people living not only in the state of the same name, but throughout the world.
The folk customs of the Kazakhs are very severe. Children from childhood are brought up in strict rules, they are taught to be responsible and hardworking. For this nation, the concept of "jigit" is the pride of the people, a person who, at all costs, defends the honor of his fellow tribesman or his own.
In the appearance of the Kazakhs, there is still a clear division into "white" and "black". In the modern world, this has long lost its meaning, but the remnants of the old concepts are still preserved. A feature of the appearance of any Kazakh is that he can simultaneously look like a European and a Chinese.
The Turkic group of languages includes Turkish. It so happened historically that Turkey has always closely cooperated with Russia. And these relations were not always peaceful. Byzantium, and later the Ottoman Empire, began its existence simultaneously with Kievan Rus. Even then there were the first conflicts for the right to rule the Black Sea. Over time, this enmity intensified, which largely influenced the relationship between Russians and Turks.
Turks are very peculiar. First of all, this can be seen in some of their features. They are hardy, patient and completely unpretentious in everyday life. The behavior of the representatives of the nation is very cautious. Even if they are angry, they will never express their dissatisfaction. But then they can hold a grudge and take revenge. In serious matters, the Turks are very cunning. They can smile in the face, and plot intrigues behind their backs for their own benefit.
The Turks took their religion very seriously. Severe Muslim laws prescribed every step in the life of a Turk. For example, they could kill an unbeliever and not be punished for it. Another feature is connected with this feature - a hostile attitude towards non-Muslims.
Turkic-speaking peoples are the largest ethnic group on Earth. The descendants of the ancient Turks settled on all continents, but most of them live in the indigenous territory - in the Altai Mountains and in the south of Siberia. Many peoples managed to preserve their identity within the borders of independent states.
The Turks are a community of ethno-linguistic peoples who predominantly speak Turkic languages. Most of the Turks today are Muslims. However, there are those who profess Orthodoxy. Strengthened integration with other peoples has led to a wide globalization of the Turks around the world. In this article, we have collected brief information about the Turkic peoples, as well as interesting facts about the above-mentioned communities.
For the first time, the Turkic peoples became known in 542. The term was used by the Chinese people in chronicles. Almost 25 years have passed and the Byzantines also started talking about the Turkic peoples. Today, the whole world knows about the Turks. In general, the term "Turks" is translated as solid or strong.
Mostly, the ancestors of the Turks had "Mongoloid" facial features. What it means: dark coarse straight hair, dark eye color; small eyelashes; light or swarthy skin color, cheekbones protruding strongly, the face itself is flattened, often low nose bridge and a highly developed fold of the upper eyelid.
Today the Turks are far from their ancestors. At least in terms of looks. Now it is a kind of "blood with milk." That is, a mixed type. The current Turks no longer have pronounced facial features, as it used to be. And of course, there is a logical explanation for this. As mentioned earlier, the Turkic peoples have integrated with other peoples around the world. A kind of "crossing" of the Turkic peoples took place, which led to a change in appearance.
Today, Azerbaijanis are one of the largest communities among the Turkic peoples. And by the way, this is a large Muslim layer all over the world. Today, more than seven million Azerbaijanis live in the country of the same name, and this makes up over 90 percent of the entire population of the country. The history of the origin of the people dates back to primitive times. Gradual colonization led to a mixed ethnic background. A special difference is the mentality, which acts as a kind of link between the West and the East in the modern world.
They have the following qualities:
Azerbaijanis are famous for their carpets. For them, it is both a traditional occupation and a source of income. In addition, Azerbaijanis are excellent jewelers. Until the 20th century, Azerbaijanis led a nomadic and semi-nomadic lifestyle. Today, Azerbaijanis are culturally and linguistically similar to the Turks, but by origin they are no less close to the most ancient peoples of the Caucasus and the Middle East.
This people is probably one of the most mysterious. For several centuries, the Altaians have been living in their own "galaxy", which by right will not be appreciated by a single living soul in the modern world. Nobody will understand. The Altai people are divided into 2 communities. These are the northern group and the southern group. The first communicate exclusively in the Altai language. Among the latter, it is customary to speak the Northern Altai language. Altaians carried cultural values through the years, and continue to live according to the rules of their ancestors. Interestingly, the source of health and the so-called "healer" for this nation is water. The Altaians believed that a spirit lives in the depths of the waters, capable of curing any ailment. The people today continue to exist in balance with the outside world. Wood, water, rock - they consider all this to be animated objects and treat the above with great respect. Any appeal to higher spirits is a message of love to all living things.
The native home for the Balkars is the mountains of the Caucasus. Northern. By the way, the name itself suggests that the Balkars are the inhabitants of the mountains. These people are easy to recognize. They have characteristic features of appearance. Big head, aquiline nose, light skin, but dark hair and eyes. The history of the origin of the aforementioned people is a mystery shrouded in darkness. However, cultural values and traditions have been known for a long time and originate from ancient times. For example, a woman, a girl, any representative of the weaker half is obliged to unconditionally obey a man. Sitting at the same table with your husband is forbidden. To be in front of other men - compare treason.
The Bashkirs are another Turkic people. There are about 2 million Bashkirs in the world. One and a half million of them live in Russia. The national language is Bashkir, and the people also speak Russian and Tatar. Religion, like most Turkic peoples, is Islam. Interestingly, in Russia, the people of Bashkiria are considered to be "titular". Most of them live in the south of the Urals. Since ancient times, the people led a nomadic lifestyle. In the beginning, families lived in yurts and moved to new places following herds of cattle. Until the 12th century, people lived in tribes. Cattle breeding, hunting, and fishing were developed. Due to the enmity between the tribes, the people almost disappeared, since marriage with a representative of a hostile tribe was comparable to betrayal.
The Gagauz people are mostly living on the Balkan Peninsula. Today the home of the Gagauz is Bessarabia. This is to the south of Moldova and the Odessa region of Ukraine. The total number of modern Gagauz is about 250 thousand people. The Gagauz profess Orthodoxy. Probably the whole world knows about the music of the Gagauz people. In something, but in this form of art they are professionals. They are also famous for their open political struggle and high level of democracy.
Dolgans are the people of the Turks living in Russia. There are about 8,000 of them in total. In comparison with other Turkic peoples, this community is very small. The people are devoted to Orthodoxy, unlike most of the Turks. However, history says that in ancient times the people professed animism. In other words, shamanism. The language spoken by the Dolgans is Yakut. Today, the habitat of the Dolgans is Yakutia and the Krasnoyarsk Territory.
Karachays are a community that lives in the Caucasus, in its northern part. For the most part, this is the population of Karachay-Cherkessia. There are about three hundred thousand representatives of this nationality in the world. They practice Islam. It is noteworthy that the Karachays have a unique character. For centuries, the Karachays led an isolated lifestyle. So today they are independent. Karachays need freedom like air. Traditions originate from ancient times. And this means that family values and respect for age are a priority.
The Kirghiz are a Turkic people. Indigenous population of modern Kyrgyzstan. There are also numerous Kyrgyz communities in Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, China, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkey and Uzbekistan. The Kyrgyz are Muslims. There are about 5 million people in the world. The history of the formation of the people originates in the 1st and 2nd millennium of our era. And it was formed only in the 15th century. Ancestors - residents of Central Asia and South Siberia. Today, the Kyrgyz have combined a decent level of development and devotion to traditional culture. Sports competitions, namely horse racing, are very common. Folklore is well preserved - songs, music, the heroic epic work "Manas", improvisational poetry of akyns.
Today, over a hundred thousand representatives of the people live on the territory of the Russian Federation - the Nagais. This is one of the Turkic peoples who have long lived in the Lower Volga region, in the North Caucasus, in the Crimea, the Northern Black Sea region. In total, according to rough estimates, there are a little more than 110 thousand representatives of Nogais in the world. In addition to Russia, there are communities in Romania, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Turkey. Experts are sure that it was founded by the Golden Horde temnik Nogay. And the center of the Nogais was the city of Sraychik on the Ural River. Today, there is a memorial sign.
The Telengits are a relatively small people living on the territory of the great Russian Federation. At the beginning of the 2000s, the people were introduced to the indigenous peoples of Russia. At present, the Telengits live in the southern regions of Altai. In particularly dry places. However, they are sure that they have chosen a place that is saturated with unprecedented, extraordinary and enormous power, so moving is out of the question. There are a little more than 15 thousand Telengits in total. This people is on the verge of extinction, it is possible that after some 100 years there will be no representatives of the Telengits at all. Today, they believe in spirits. A shaman is a kind of conductor between people and spirits. The harsh climate of Altai does not prevent the Telengits from leading a nomadic lifestyle. The people are engaged in cattle breeding: they breed cows, sheep, horses and so on. They live in yurts and periodically move to new habitats. The men hunt, the women gather.
Teleuts are rightfully considered the indigenous people of the Russian Federation. The language and culture of the people is very similar to the culture of the Altaians. Modern Teleuts settled in the southern regions of the Kemerovo region. There are 2500 Teleuts in total. And for the most part, they are residents of rural areas. They profess Orthodoxy and adhere to traditional customs in religion. The people are literally dying out. Every year they become less and less.
Turks are the second largest ethnic group in Cyprus. In total, there are almost eighty-one million people in the world. Most believers are Sunni Muslims. They make up almost 90 percent of the total. Interesting facts about Turks:
The Turks are a peculiar people, they are patient and unpretentious, but very insidious and vindictive. Non-Muslims do not exist for them.
The Uighurs are a people who live in the eastern part of Turkestan. They practice Islam, Sunni interpretation. Interestingly, people are literally scattered all over the world. From Russia to the west of China. At the beginning of the 19th century, people were forcibly converted to the Orthodox faith. However, this was not crowned with great success.
The Shors are quite a small people of the Turks. Only 13 thousand people. They live in the south of Western Siberia. They communicate, for the most part, in Russian. In this regard, the native Shor language is on the verge of extinction. Every year the traditions are overgrown with "Russianness". They call themselves Tatars. Appearance - Mongoloid. Dark and elongated eyes, pronounced cheekbones. Truly beautiful people. Religion - Orthodoxy. However, to this day, part of the Shors profess Tengrism. That is, three realms and nine heavens, which have powerful power. According to Tengrism, the earth is overflowing with good and evil spirits. Interestingly, for men, a young widow with a child was considered a major find. This is a sure sign of wealth. Therefore, there was a real struggle for young mothers who had lost their spouses.
Chuvash. There are about one and a half million people in the world. 98 percent of which live on the territory of the Russian Federation. Namely, in the Chuvash Republic. The rest is in Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. They communicate in their native language - the Chuvash language, which by the way has 3 dialects. Chuvash profess Orthodoxy and Islam. But if you believe the myths of the Chuvash, then our world is divided into three parts: the upper, middle and, accordingly, the lower worlds. Each world has three layers. The earth is square. And rests on a tree. From 4 sides the earth is washed away by water. And the Chuvash believe that someday it will reach them. By the way, if you believe the myths, they live just the same in the center of the "square land". God - lives in the upper world, along with the saints and unborn children. And when someone dies, the path of the soul lies through the rainbow. In general, not myths, but a real fairy tale!
They are settled on the vast territory of our planet, ranging from the cold Kolyma basin to the southwestern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The Turks do not belong to any particular racial type, even among the same people there are both Caucasoids and Mongoloids. They are mostly Muslims, but there are peoples who profess Christianity, traditional beliefs, and shamanism. The only thing that connects almost 170 million people is the common origin of the group of languages that the Turks now speak. Yakut and Turk - they all speak related dialects.
Among some scholars, disputes still do not subside over which language family the Turkic language group belongs to. Some linguists singled it out as a separate large group. However, the most generally accepted hypothesis today is the version about the entry of these related languages into the large Altaic family.
A great contribution to these studies was made by the development of genetics, thanks to which it became possible to trace the history of entire peoples in the wake of individual fragments of the human genome.
Once a group of tribes in Central Asia spoke the same language - the ancestor of modern Turkic dialects, but in the 3rd century. BC e. a separate Bulgar branch separated from the large trunk. The only people who speak the languages of the Bulgar group today are the Chuvash. Their dialect is noticeably different from other related ones and stands out as a special subgroup.
Some researchers even propose to place the Chuvash language in a separate genus of the large Altai macrofamily.
Other representatives of the Turkic group of languages are usually divided into 4 large subgroups. There are disagreements in the details, but for simplicity, we can take the most common way.
Oguz, or southwestern, languages, which include Azerbaijani, Turkish, Turkmen, Crimean Tatar, Gagauz. Representatives of these peoples speak very similarly and can easily understand each other without an interpreter. Hence the huge influence of strong Turkey in Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan, whose inhabitants perceive Turkish as their native language.
The Turkic group of the Altai family of languages also includes the Kypchak, or northwestern, languages, which are spoken mainly on the territory of the Russian Federation, as well as representatives of the peoples of Central Asia with nomadic ancestors. Tatars, Bashkirs, Karachays, Balkars, such peoples of Dagestan as Nogais and Kumyks, as well as Kazakhs and Kirghiz - they all speak related dialects of the Kypchak subgroup.
The southeastern, or Karluk, languages are solidly represented by the languages of two large peoples - the Uzbeks and the Uighurs. However, for almost a thousand years they developed separately from each other. If the Uzbek language has experienced a colossal influence of Farsi, the Arabic language, then the Uyghurs, the inhabitants of East Turkestan, have brought a huge amount of Chinese borrowings into their dialect over the years.
The geography of the Turkic group of languages is wide and varied. Yakuts, Altaians, in general, some indigenous peoples of northeastern Eurasia, are also combined into a separate branch of a large Turkic tree. Northeastern languages are quite heterogeneous and are subdivided into several separate genera.
The Yakut and Dolgan languages separated from the single Turkic dialect, and this happened in the 3rd century BC. n. e.
Tuvan and Tofalar languages belong to the Sayan group of languages of the Turkic family. Khakasses and residents of Gornaya Shoria speak the languages of the Khakass group.
Altai is the cradle of the Turkic civilization, the indigenous inhabitants of these places still speak the Oirot, Teleut, Lebedin, Kumandin languages of the Altai subgroup.
However, not everything is so simple in this conditional division. The process of national-territorial delimitation, which took place on the territory of the Central Asian republics of the USSR in the twenties of the last century, also affected such subtle matter as language.
All residents of the Uzbek SSR were called Uzbeks, a single version of the literary Uzbek language was adopted, based on the dialects of the Kokand Khanate. However, even today the Uzbek language is characterized by pronounced dialectism. Some dialects of Khorezm, the westernmost part of Uzbekistan, are closer to the languages of the Oguz group and closer to Turkmen than to literary Uzbek.
Some areas speak dialects that belong to the Nogai subgroup of the Kipchak languages, hence the situations when a Ferghana native hardly understands a native of Kashkadarya, who, in his opinion, godlessly distorts his native language, is not uncommon.
The situation is approximately the same with other representatives of the peoples of the Turkic group of languages - the Crimean Tatars. The language of the inhabitants of the coastal strip is almost identical to Turkish, but the natural steppe people speak an dialect closer to the Kypchak ones.
For the first time, the Turks entered the world historical arena in the era of the Great Migration of Nations. In the genetic memory of Europeans, there is still a shudder before the invasion of Attila's Huns in the 4th century. n. e. The steppe empire was a motley formation of numerous tribes and peoples, however, the Turkic element was still predominant.
There are many versions of the origin of these peoples, however, most researchers place the ancestral home of today's Uzbeks and Turks in the northwestern part of the Central Asian plateau, in the area between Altai and the Khingar Range. This version is also followed by the Kyrgyz, who consider themselves the direct heirs of the great empire and are still nostalgic about this.
The neighbors of the Turks were the Mongols, the ancestors of today's Indo-European peoples, the Ural and Yenisei tribes, the Manchus. The Turkic group of the Altaic family of languages began to take shape in close cooperation with close peoples.
In the first century A.D. e. individual tribes begin to migrate towards southern Kazakhstan. In the 4th century, the famous Hun invasion of Europe took place. It was then that the Bulgar branch separated from the Turkic tree and an extensive confederation was formed, which was divided into the Danubian and Volga. Today's Bulgarians in the Balkans now speak Slavic and have lost their Turkic roots.
The reverse situation occurred with the Volga Bulgars. They still speak Turkic languages, but after the invasion of the Mongols they call themselves Tatars. The conquered Turkic tribes living in the steppes of the Volga took the name of the Tatars, a legendary tribe that had long disappeared in wars, with whom Genghis Khan began his campaigns. They also called their language Tatar, which they used to call Bulgar.
Chuvash is considered the only living dialect of the Bulgar branch of the Turkic group of languages. The Tatars, another descendant of the Bulgars, actually speak a variant of the later Kipchak dialects.
The peoples of the Turkic language group include the inhabitants of the harsh regions of the basin of the famous Kolyma, the resort beaches of the Mediterranean, the Altai mountains and the steppes of Kazakhstan, which are flat as a table. The ancestors of today's Turks were nomads, along and across the Eurasian continent. For two thousand years they interacted with their neighbors, who were Iranians, Arabs, Russians, Chinese. During this time, an unimaginable mixture of cultures and bloodlines occurred.
Today it is even impossible to determine the race to which the Turks belong. Residents of Turkey, Azerbaijanis, Gagauz belong to the Mediterranean group of the Caucasian race, there are practically no guys with slanted eyes and yellowish skin. However, the Yakuts, Altaians, Kazakhs, Kirghiz - they all carry a pronounced Mongoloid element in their appearance.
Racial diversity is observed even among peoples who speak the same language. Among the Tatars of Kazan you can meet blue-eyed blonds and black-haired people with slanted eyes. The same is observed in Uzbekistan, where it is impossible to deduce the appearance of a typical Uzbek.
The majority of Turks are Muslims who practice the Sunni branch of this religion. Only in Azerbaijan adhere to Shiism. However, individual peoples either retained ancient beliefs or became adherents of other major religions. Most of the Chuvash and Gagauz profess Christianity in its Orthodox form.
In the northeast of Eurasia, individual peoples continue to adhere to the faith of their ancestors; among the Yakuts, Altaians, Tuvans, traditional beliefs and shamanism continue to be popular.
During the time of the Khazar Khaganate, the inhabitants of this empire professed Judaism, which continues to be perceived as the only true religion by today's Karaites, fragments of that mighty Turkic state.
Along with world civilization, the Turkic languages also developed, absorbing the vocabulary of neighboring peoples and generously endowing them with their own words. It is difficult to count the number of borrowed Turkic words in the East Slavic languages. It all started with the Bulgars, from whom the words “kap” were borrowed, from which arose “temple”, “suvart”, transformed into “serum”. Later, instead of "serum" they began to use the common Turkic "yogurt".
The exchange of vocabulary became especially lively during the Golden Horde and the late Middle Ages, during active trade with the Turkic countries. A huge number of new words came into use: donkey, cap, sash, raisins, shoe, chest and others. Later, only the names of specific terms began to be borrowed, for example, snow leopard, elm, dung, kishlak.
Many Turkic-speaking tribes participated in the historical process of formation and development of the ancient Turkic statehood and culture. An important role in this process was played by the Pechenegs, united in a powerful union of tribes.
The Pechenegs roamed in the 8th-9th centuries between the Aral Sea, the Lik and Volga rivers and controlled the territory inhabited by Iranian-speaking Sarmatian, Finno-Ugric and other tribes.
Faced with pressure from the Khazars, Oguzes, and Polovtsians (Kipchaks), the Pechenegs moved west. One of the reasons that prompted the Pechenegs to move to the east of Europe, first the Pechenegs, and then the Oguzes and Polovtsy, was an almost century-old drought, which sharply reduced the areas suitable for nomadism in the Aral Sea and Transcaspia.
In the 9th century, the Pechenegs crossed the Volga and settled in the Northern Black Sea region, controlling the vast steppe strip from the Don to the Danube and fighting with almost all their close neighbors: the Khazars, Magyars, Russia and Byzantium.
Byzantium often resorted to the military assistance of the Pechenegs to weaken Ancient Rus'. So, in 972, the Pechenegs met the squad of Svyatoslav Igorevich, who was returning from Byzantium, at the Dnieper rapids, and defeated it.
The fierce war continued under Prince Vladimir Svyatoslavovich, who created several fortified lines to protect the southern borders of Rus', concluded an alliance with the Oghuz against the Pechenegs and became close to Byzantium.
In 1036, he defeated the Pechenegs near Kyiv, after which the Pecheneg military association broke up.
The Oghuz-Torks completed the work, and later, who ousted the Pechenegs in the middle of the XI century to the Carpathians and the Danube. Groups of Pechenegs gradually dissolved among the surrounding population, and most of them merged with the Polovtsians (Cumans).
There are reasons to consider the Pechenegs, Oguzes and Polovtsy, who settled and lived on the Danube, the Turkic-speaking people of the Gagauz, as distant descendants of the Bulgarians. The Gagauzians adopted Christianity in the 13th century and moved to Bessarabia in the late 18th-19th century. Now they have formed the Gagauz Republic within Moldova.
The Oghuz tribes were mentioned in the Orkhon-Yenisei inscriptions of the 8th century. under the name tokuz-oguz (literally - nine genera). Subsequently, they became part of the Turkic and Uyghur Khaganates, where, in the process of the formation of the Uyghur ethnos, the name Tokuz-Oguz was replaced by the ethnonym "Uyghur".
In the 9th - 11th centuries, under the name Oguz, a Turkic union of the Aral and Caspian tribes was formed with a center in the city of Yangikent in the lower reaches of the Syr Darya. In the 10th century, Western Oguzes (guzes, uzes, torks) appeared in the east of Europe, another part of them moved to Central Asia. The Western Oghuz-Torks fought with the Khazar Khaganate, the Pechenegs, made an unsuccessful campaign against Byzantium, and at the beginning of the 11th century roamed the steppes of the Black Sea region.
Oghuz-torks often acted as allies of the Kievan princes. The chronicle first mentions Torks in 985, when they participated in the campaign of Prince Vladimir against the Volga Bulgarians. Later, they participated in the internecine wars of the Russian princes, fought with the Polovtsians. Part of the Torks, settled by the sons of Yaroslav along the rivers Ros and Torch (the city of Torchesk), eventually became Slavic, and those who remained in the steppes were assimilated by the Polovtsians.
Mentioned from the end of the XI - XII century. the tribal association of the "black hoods" also consisted of the remnants of the Turkic tribes - Pechenegs, Torks, Berendeys. It defended the southern borders of Kievan Rus and was used by the Russian princes competing in the struggle for power as a military support. Gradually, the Torks moved to a settled way of life. In the XII century. the prince of Kyiv was formally "the supreme overlord of the black hoods." It is interesting to note that the ethnonym “black hoods” echoes the self-name of the Karakalpaks, a modern Turkic ethnic group living in Karakalpakstan as part of the Republic of Uzbekistan.
The Oguzes of Central Asia, led by the Seljuks, subjugated Khorezm, Iran, Azerbaijan, moved to Asia Minor and the Middle East, creating a huge Seljuk State by the end of the 11th century. In the XI-XIII century, the ethnonym "Oguz" was replaced in Central Asia by the ethnonym "Turkmen", and in the Middle East - by the ethnonym "Turk". The Oghuz played a significant role in the ethnogenesis of modern Turkmens, Azerbaijanis and Turks.
In the 11th century, the peoples of Eastern Europe and Central Asia become witnesses of the next wave of migration of nomadic peoples after the great Hunnic migration, caused by the movement of a new strong union of Turkic nomadic tribes called Kipchaks, Polovtsy or Cumans. The term "Kipchaks" was used in the east, the Slavs called these tribes Polovtsy, and they were most often called Cumans in Europe.
The Kipchaks in the 8th century were part of the so-called Kimak Khaganate, which existed in Western Siberia, and were the western group of this tribal union. After isolation, the Kipchaks occupied the territory of North-Western Kazakhstan and in the 10th century bordered the Kimaks in the east, the Khazars in the west, and the Oguzes in the south. Already in the middle of the 10th century, the Kipchaks, following the Oghuz-Torks, crossed the Volga and spread in a wide wave across the steppes of Eastern Europe, subjugating the main part of the Pechenegs and Torks-Oguzes remaining there.
The vast territory controlled by the Kipchaks in the 11th-13th centuries was called Desht-i-Kipchak in the east (from the Persian “Kipchak steppe”), its borders stretched from the Irtysh to the Danube.
It is assumed that the northern border of Desht-i-Kipchak passed along the Moskva River, where the Turks bordered on the Finno-Ugric peoples, and displays a toponymic series of names near Moscow: Kolomenskoye - from "kolloma" (protection), Kapotnya - from "high settlement" (" tall grass"), Kuntsevo - from the" shelter "(" visiting yard "), Desht-i-Kipchak was conditionally divided into the western and eastern parts, the borders of which were the Urals and the Yaik River.
The western part of the Kipchak steppes was called the Polovtsian land in the Russian chronicles. Nomadic cattle breeding remained the basis of the Kipchak economy, but under the influence of the peoples of the occupied lands, part of the Kipchaks switched to a settled way of life, agriculture, crafts and trade. A significant role was played by the military aristocracy, striving to expand power and replenish wealth.
Most of the Polovtsy remained pagans. The dominant religion, obviously, was shamanism, which had been preserved among the Kipchaks from ancient times. The Polovtsian archaeological monuments of the Black Sea steppes are considered to be burial mounds, on which “stone women” were usually installed - statues of human figures from one and a half to three and a half meters high, which have early analogues among the Scythian-Sarmatian and Turkic peoples. The sculptures preserved in the southern Russian steppes allow us to present the details of the costume and weapons of the Polovtsy. The social system of the Polovtsy was at the stage of formation of early feudal relations.
Despite the vastness of the territories controlled by the Kipchaks, they did not have a state as a formalized political institution. Separate tribal unions, headed by prince-khans, were nothing more than a conglomerate. But, located at strategically important geopolitical and trade crossroads that connected the countries, cultures and civilizations of the East and Europe, they played an important role in the fate of many peoples of Eurasia, especially Russian and Tatar. The Kipchak enzyme gave brightness and strength to the multicolored Turkic civilization.
Thus, by the beginning of the Middle Ages, the Great Steppe was not only charged with the energy of the multi-ethnic flow of Eurasian peoples, but also turned into an arena of unique historical creativity and cultural and civilizational competitive rivalry.
