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A.K. Salmin (Saint Petersburg) – The Avar Factor in the History of the Savirs

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Abstract

There are several key events in the history of the historical ancestors of the Chuvash, assessed as unexpected fateful turns. One of them is the Avar factor, which also takes place in the “Historia” of Priscus. But his vision of the Savir-Avar relations requires corrections and serious clarifications. An interdisciplinary approach helps to move away from stagnant views. The materials for the analytical analysis were the works of Herodotus, Priscus, Menander Protector, Theophylact Simocatta, Suidæ Lexicon, the works of N.M. Karamzin, I.M. Stritter, S.M. Soloviev and I.E. Zabelin), as well as a posteriori publication of foremost scholards of the 20th and 21st centuries (S.A. Arutyunov, A.V. Golovnev, N.N. Kradin, M.S. Gadzhiev). The main attention is paid to the analysis of historical events of the 5th–9th centuries in the light of Savir- Avar contacts in the Caspian region. The author’s previous publications, as well as this article, allow us to conclude that the fragment from Priscus’ work about the Avars’ attack on the Savirs in 463 is nothing more than a fiction. At the same time, the persistent myth about the exodus of the Chuvash people’s historical ancestors from Siberia is brought to naught. Overall, the author hopes to contribute to clarifying the history of the peoples of the North Caucasus during the Great Migration of Peoples.

Keywords

Savirs, Avars, 5th–9th centuries, Caucasus, Pannonia, wars.

Anton K. Salmin

Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (the Kunstkamera) of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Saint. Petersburg, Russia

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