Facing off against Byzantines, Arabs, Vikings, Turks, Mongols, and
Russians, this steppe culture dominated Black Sea and Caucasus trade
during Medieval times.
The Bulgars were a Turkic people who
established a state north of the Black Sea, and who showed similarities
with the Alans and Sarmatians. In the late 500s and early 600s AD their
state fragmented under pressure from the Khazars; one group moved south
into what became Bulgaria, but the rest moved north during the 7th and
8th centuries to the basin of the Volga river. There they remained under
Khazar domination until the Khazar Khanate was defeated by Kievan
(Scandinavian) Russia in 965. Thereafter the Volga Bulgars - controlling
an extensive area surrounding an important hub of international trade -
became richer and more influential; they embraced Islam, becoming the
most northerly of medieval peoples to do so. Given their central
position on trade routes, their armies were noted for the splendour of
their armour and weapons, which drew upon both Western and Eastern
sources and influences (as, eventually, did their fighting tactics).
In
the 1220s they managed to maul Genghis Khan's Mongols, who returned to
devastate their towns in revenge. By the 1350s they had recovered much
of their wealth, but they were caught in the middle between the Tatar
Golden Horde and the Christian Russian principalities. They were ravaged
by these two armies in turn on several occasions between 1360 and 1431.
A new city then rose from the ashes - Kazan, originally called New
Bulgar - and the successor Islamic Khanate of Kazan resisted the
Russians until falling to Ivan the Terrible in 1552. The costumes,
armament, armour and fighting methods of the Volga Bulgars during this
momentous period are explored in this fully illustrated study.
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