It has long been believed that the Polovtsian is the enemy of the Russian land, since representatives of this tribe were seen in repeated raids on the lands of our state. However, historians know episodes of the neighboring existence of the Polovtsian tribes and Slavs, as well as their joint campaigns against, for example, the Hungarians, the Volga Bulgars, the Mongols, etc. people.
Were the ancestors of the Polovtsy Chinese?
The meaning of the word "Polovtsian" in the Old Russian language indicates that the Slavs called people either who came from the steppes (from the word "field"), or who had a yellowish skin tone (from the word "polov" - "yellow").
Indeed, the ancestors of the Cumans were nomads living in the steppes between the Eastern Tien Shan and the Mongolian Altai, whom the Chinese called the Seyanto people. In that area there was an ancient state, formed in 630, which, however, was quickly destroyed by the Uighurs and the same Chinese. After that, the inhabitants of these places changed their family name "Syrs" to "Kipchaks", which meant "unfortunate, unfortunate", and went to the Irtysh and to the eastern steppes of Kazakhstan.
Interpretations of the nineteenth century and the opinion of D. Sakharov
The meaning and interpretation of the word "Polovtsian" is also interpreted by some experts as derived from the word "fishing", which means hunting (in the sense of property and people), as well as from the word "full" - captivity, where the representatives of the Slavs were taken.
In the nineteenth century (in particular, E. Skrizhinskaya and A. Kunik) identified the name of these tribes with the root "pol", meaning half. As the above researchers suggested, the inhabitants of the Dnieper, located on the right bank, called the nomads who came from the other side of the river, "from this floor." The academician generally considered all the proposed versions unconvincing. He thought that the mystery of the origin of the name of this tribe would never be solved, since the Cuman Kipchaks left a minimal amount of their own written documents.
Polovtsy is not a separate tribe
Today it is believed that the Polovtsian is a representative of a conglomeration of nomadic tribes, and these data are based on the fact that in the eleventh century AD the Kipchak people were conquered by the Mongol-speaking tribes of the Kumosi-Kimaks, and then migrated to the west along with representatives of the Mongoloid tribes - the Kidans. By the end of the thirties of the eleventh century, this combination of peoples captured the steppes between the Volga and the Irtysh and approached the borders of the ancient Russian state.
"Yellow" people came to the borders of Russia
About who the Polovtsy are from the point of view of documentary Russian history, she first gave explanations in 1055. According to this manuscript, “light, yellow” people came to the borders of the Pereslavl kingdom, which made it possible to assign the generalized name “Polovtsy” to the Kipchaks and Mongoloid tribes.
The newly arrived peoples settled in the Sea of Azov, the course of the Lower and Northern Don, where stone "women" were found, which, as scientists believe, were installed by nomadic tribes in memory of their ancestors.
Who are the Polovtsy of those times in terms of religious teachings? It is believed that among this nomadic tribe, the cult of ancestors was originally practiced, which was realized through the installation of stone statues on high sections of the steppe, on watersheds in special sanctuaries. At the same time, direct burials were not always nearby. In the Polovtsian graves, the burial of the deceased was often common along with household items and the carcass (stuffed animal) of his war horse.
Two thousand stone idols and a minimum of writing
A mound was piled over the graves of people outstanding by the standards of the Polovtsy. In later periods, when the Kipchaks were conquered by the Muslims, some of the pagan monuments were destroyed. To date, about 2,000 stone "babes" (from "balbal" - "ancestors") have been preserved on the territory of modern Russia, which are still considered to have the power to increase the fertility of the earth and restore nature. These monuments survived many centuries, including the period of Christianization of the Polovtsians. Pagans, Muslims, Christians - that's who the Polovtsians are in different periods of development of this set of peoples.
They shot down birds with an arrow on the fly
After the appearance on the territory of the steppes of Eastern Europe in the XI century AD. The Polovtsy did not stop in this area and continued to settle further, since this was facilitated by the presence of such a powerful means of transportation of that time as a horse, and good weapons in the form of a bow.
The Polovtsian is first and foremost a warrior. From an early age, the children of these tribes were taught horseback riding and combat techniques, so that later they would join the koshun - a militia from the same clan. Dozens of people or three or four hundred could enter the koshun, who attacked the enemy like an avalanche, surrounded him with a ring and covered him with arrows. In addition to complex, technically advanced bows for that time, the Polovtsy possessed sabers, blades, and spears. They wore armor in the form of rectangular iron plates. Their military prowess was so high that a rider could shoot down any flying bird while galloping with a bow.
Camp kitchen... under the saddle
Who are the Polovtsy in terms of their way of life? These peoples were typical nomads, very unpretentious even by the standards of that time. Initially, they lived in covered wagons or felt yurts, fed on milk, cheese and raw meat, which was softened under the saddle of a horse. From raids they brought loot and captives, gradually adopting knowledge, habits and customs from other cultures. Despite the fact that the origin of the word has not been found an exact definition of what Polovtsian means, many peoples of that time felt for themselves.
The Polovtsians had someone to adopt cultural traditions from, since the nomadic tribes of the Kipchaks in the twelfth century reached the Ciscaucasian steppes (the headquarters of the Polovtsian khans was on the Sunzha River), visited Pomorie, Surozh and Korsun, Pomorie, Tmutarakan, made a total of about 46 raids to Russia, in which they often won, but were also defeated. In particular, around 1100 AD. about 45 thousand Kipchaks were forced out by the Rusichs to the Georgian lands, where they mixed with the local peoples.
The Polovtsian habits of grabbing everything and everyone who came to hand led to the fact that by a certain time, part of the nomadic peoples had learned to build dwellings for the winter, where stoves were even equipped in the likeness of Russian heating elements. Primitive leather garments were decorated with ribbons on the sleeves, like the Byzantine nobles, signs of organization appeared among the tribes.
Polovtsian kingdoms were no less than European
By the time of their conquest by the Mongol-Tatar troops in the XIII century, the Polovtsian hordes were associations, the strongest of which were the Don and Transnistrian. In those days, the Polovtsian was a representative of the people who lived in a territory that was not inferior in size to European kingdoms. These quasi-state formations prevented the passage of caravans on the way "from the Varangians to the Greeks", carried out independent raids on Russia and were active until the 90s of the twelfth century, after which the Kipchaks fought mainly in Russian squads during the inter-princely strife of that time.
So how can you answer the question of who the Polovtsians are? From ancient history, we can conclude that this people, despite some primitiveness, played an important role in shaping the political map of the world of that time and in the formation of various nationalities, including modern ones.
What did the Polovtsy look like? From many sources it is reliably known that the Polovtsy were fair-haired, with blue eyes (approximately like representatives of the Aryan race), in connection with this, their name is light. However, there are different versions about this. The messages of the Egyptians about how the blond Polovtsy looked, on the one hand, could be made from the point of view of pronounced brunettes. And on the other hand, they belong to the time when the Polovtsians managed to live side by side with the Russians for two centuries and, as a result of incest, acquired the same external qualities.
The appearance of the Polovtsy
One of the explanations for the name Polovtsy (it means yellow in Old Russian) is associated with hair color. The word "Kumans" means all the same - "yellow". The word "esaryk", which was also called the Polovtsy, not only means yellow, white, pale, but is, apparently, the basis of the modern Turkish word "saryshin" - "blond". It is, generally speaking, strange for nomads who came from the east. In favor of the opinion about the blond hair of the Kipchaks, the parchment of medieval Egypt also speaks out. For many years, the Polovtsy were part of the ruling elite there and themselves put sultans of their own blood on the throne. Egyptian documents, however, occasionally speak of bright eyes and hair among the Kipchaks.
Polovtsy as a nomadic people
If we consider the Polovtsy as a nomadic people, then you can suddenly find that it was a tribal union of well-trained military affairs, strategically thinking people. Nomads began to study military affairs from a very early age. According to the historian Carpini, already two or three-year-old children of nomads began to master horses and learn to use small bows specially made for them. The boys learned to shoot and hunt small steppe animals, and the girls joined in the nomadic household. In general, children perceived hunting as a trip to a foreign country.
They prepared for it, on the hunt developed prowess and the art of fighting, it revealed the most dashing horsemen, the most keen-sighted shooters, the most skillful leaders. Thus, the second important function of hunting was to teach military affairs to everyone - from the khan to a simple warrior and even his "servant", that is, everyone who participated in military activities: campaigns, raids, barant, etc.
Eurasian territory of the Polovtsian steppe
Cumans now (Hungarian descendants of the Cumans)
On the current map of the world it is impossible to find a people with the name "Polovtsy", but they certainly left their mark on modern ethnic groups. Many modern Turkic peoples (Kazakhs and Nogais), as well as modern Tatars and Bashkirs, have traces of Cumans, Kipchaks and Kumans in their ethnic basis. But that's not all: it is safe to say that the Polovtsy not only completely dissolved in other ethnic groups, but also left their direct descendants. Now there are groups of sub-ethnic groups whose ethnonym is the word "Kypchak". In Hungary there is now a modern people known as the "Kuns" ("Cumans"). This people can be called a descendant of the very Polovtsians who lived in the Polovtsian steppe in the 11th - 12th centuries.
On the territory of Hungary there are several historical regions, in which even the names hint at their connection with the Kuns - Kiskunshag (it can be translated as “the territory of the younger Kuns”) and Nagykunshag (“the territory of the senior Kuns”). Despite the fact that there are no large people of Kuns there, in the city of Karcag (the capital of the “territory of the senior Kuns”) there is still a society Kunsovetsheg, whose main task is to preserve information and knowledge about the Kuns and in general about their entire history.
Location of Kunshag on the map of Hungary
Appearance of the Hungarian Cumans
Despite the fact that there is practically no information on this topic in Russian, one can rely on the conclusions of the Russian ethnologist B.A. Kaloev, whose main focus was the study of the Hungarian Alans. Here is how he describes the appearance of the Hungarian Polovtsians: “the special swarthy skin, black-eyed and black-haired, and, obviously competing with similar features of the gypsies, they received the nickname kongur, i.e. “dark”. As a rule, Coons have a "short and dense physique"
Coon language
Of course, they did not have the Polovtsian language, the main communication is conducted in one of the dialects of the Hungarian language. But they also made a contribution to Hungarian literature, leaving about 150 words in the Hungarian literary language.
Number of kuns
It is impossible to say the exact number of people - the descendants of the Polovtsians. Just as, according to the laws of Hungary, the ethnic composition of the inhabitants should be taken into account according to the principle of the native language, then according to some of the 16 million Hungarian people, one tenth can be considered descendants of the Kuns-Polovtsy.
Fragment from the book "Donbass - an endless story"
The Polovtsy remained in the history of Russia as the worst enemies of Vladimir Monomakh and cruel mercenaries from the times of internecine wars. The tribes that worshiped the sky terrorized the Old Russian state for almost two centuries.Who are the Polovtsy?
In 1055, Prince Vsevolod Yaroslavich of Pereyaslavl, returning from a campaign against the Torques, met a detachment of new nomads, previously unknown in Russia, led by Khan Bolush. The meeting was peaceful, the new "acquaintances" received the Russian name "Polovtsy" and the future neighbors dispersed. Since 1064, in Byzantine and since 1068 in Hungarian sources, Cumans and Kuns are mentioned, also previously unknown in Europe. They were to play a significant role in the history of Eastern Europe, turning into formidable enemies and insidious allies of the ancient Russian princes, becoming mercenaries in a fratricidal civil strife. The presence of the Polovtsians, Kumans, Kuns, who appeared and disappeared at the same time, did not go unnoticed, and the questions of who they were and where they came from still worry historians.
According to the traditional version, all four of the above-mentioned peoples were a single Turkic-speaking people, which was called differently in different parts of the world. Their ancestors, the Sars, lived on the territory of Altai and the eastern Tien Shan, but the state formed by them was defeated by the Chinese in 630. The rest went to the steppes of eastern Kazakhstan, where they got their new name "Kipchaks", which, according to legend, means "ill-fated". Under this name, they are mentioned in many medieval Arab-Persian sources. However, both in Russian and in Byzantine sources, the Kipchaks are not found at all, and a people similar in description is called "Kumans", "Kuns" or "Polovtsy". Moreover, the etymology of the latter remains unclear. Perhaps the word comes from the old Russian “polov”, which means “yellow”. According to scientists, this may indicate that this people had light hair color and belonged to the western branch of the Kipchaks - “Sary-Kipchaks” (Kuns and Cumans belonged to the eastern and had a Mongoloid appearance). According to another version, the term "Polovtsy" could come from the familiar word "field", and designate all the inhabitants of the fields, regardless of their tribal affiliation.
The official version has many weaknesses. Firstly, if all the aforementioned peoples originally represented a single people - the Kipchaks, then in this case, how to explain that neither Byzantium, nor Russia, nor Europe, this toponym was unknown. In the countries of Islam, where the Kipchaks were known firsthand, on the contrary, they did not hear about the Polovtsians or Cumans at all. Archeology comes to the aid of the unofficial version, according to which, the main archaeological finds of the Polovtsian culture - stone women erected on mounds in honor of the soldiers who fell in battle, were characteristic only of the Polovtsy and Kipchaks. The Cumans, despite their worship of the sky and the cult of the mother goddess, did not leave such monuments.
All these arguments "against" allow many modern researchers to move away from the canon of studying the Polovtsians, Cumans and Kuns as one and the same tribe. According to the candidate of sciences, Evstigneev, the Polovtsy-Sars are the Turgesh, who for some reason fled from their territories to Semirechye.
Weapons of civil strife
The Polovtsians had no intention of remaining a "good neighbor" of Kievan Rus. As befits nomads, they soon mastered the tactics of sudden raids: they set up ambushes, attacked by surprise, swept away an unprepared enemy in their path. Armed with bows and arrows, sabers and short spears, the Polovtsian warriors rushed into battle, at a gallop bombarding the enemy with a bunch of arrows. They went "raid" through the cities, robbing and killing people, driving them into captivity.
In addition to the shock cavalry, their strength also lay in the developed strategy, as well as in new technologies for that time, such as heavy crossbows and "liquid fire", which they borrowed, obviously, from China since the days of living in Altai.
However, as long as centralized power was maintained in Russia, thanks to the order of succession to the throne established under Yaroslav the Wise, their raids remained only a seasonal disaster, and certain diplomatic relations even began between Russia and the nomads. A lively trade was carried on, the population communicated widely in the border regions Among the Russian princes, dynastic marriages with the daughters of the Polovtsian khans became popular. The two cultures coexisted in a fragile neutrality that could not last long.
In 1073, the triumvirate of the three sons of Yaroslav the Wise: Izyaslav, Svyatoslav, Vsevolod, to whom he bequeathed Kievan Rus, fell apart. Svyatoslav and Vsevolod accused their older brother of conspiring against them and striving to become "autocratic", like his father. This was the birth of a great and long turmoil in Russia, which the Polovtsy took advantage of. Without taking sides to the end, they willingly took the side of the man who promised them big "profits". So, the first prince who resorted to their help - Prince Oleg Svyatoslavich, whom his uncles disinherited, allowed them to rob and burn Russian cities, for which he was nicknamed Oleg Gorislavich.
Subsequently, the call of the Cumans as allies in the internecine struggle became a common practice. In alliance with the nomads, Yaroslav's grandson Oleg Gorislavich expelled Vladimir Monomakh from Chernigov, he also got Murom, driving out Vladimir's son Izyaslav. As a result, the warring princes faced a real danger of losing their own territories. In 1097, on the initiative of Vladimir Monomakh, then Prince of Pereslavl, the Lubech Congress was convened, which was supposed to end the internecine war. The princes agreed that from now on everyone had to own his "fatherland". Even the prince of Kyiv, who formally remained the head of state, could not violate the borders. Thus, fragmentation was officially fixed in Russia with good intentions. The only thing that even then united the Russian lands was a common fear of the Polovtsian invasions.
Monomakh's War
The most ardent enemy of the Polovtsians among the Russian princes was Vladimir Monomakh, during whose great reign the practice of using Polovtsian troops for the purpose of fratricide was temporarily stopped. Chronicles, which, however, actively corresponded with him, tell about him as the most influential prince in Russia, who was known as a patriot who spared neither strength nor life for the defense of Russian lands. Having suffered defeats from the Polovtsians, in alliance with whom stood his brother and his worst enemy - Oleg Svyatoslavich, he developed a completely new strategy in the fight against nomads - to fight on their own territory. Unlike the Polovtsian detachments, which were strong in sudden raids, the Russian squads gained an advantage in open battle. The Polovtsian "lava" broke on the long spears and shields of Russian foot soldiers, and the Russian cavalry, surrounding the steppes, did not allow them to run away on their famous light-winged horses. Even the time of the campaign was thought out: until early spring, when the Russian horses, which were fed with hay and grain, were stronger than the Polovtsian horses that were emaciated on pasture.
Monomakh's favorite tactics also gave an advantage: he provided the enemy with the opportunity to attack first, preferring defense at the expense of footmen, since by attacking the enemy exhausted himself much more than the defending Russian warrior. During one of these attacks, when the infantry took the main blow, the Russian cavalry went around from the flanks and hit the rear. This decided the outcome of the battle. Vladimir Monomakh needed just a few trips to the Polovtsian lands to rid Russia of the Polovtsian threat for a long time. In the last years of his life, Monomakh sent his son Yaropolk with an army beyond the Don, on a campaign against the nomads, but he did not find them there. The Polovtsy migrated away from the borders of Russia, to the Caucasian foothills.
On guard for the dead and the living
The Polovtsians, like many other peoples, have sunk into oblivion of history, leaving behind "Polovtsian stone women" who still guard the souls of their ancestors. Once they were placed in the steppe to “guard” the dead and protect the living, and were also placed as landmarks and signs for fords. Obviously, they brought this custom with them from their original homeland - Altai, spreading it along the Danube. "Polovtsian women" is far from the only example of such monuments. Long before the appearance of the Polovtsy, in the 4th-2nd millennium BC, such idols were placed on the territory of present-day Russia and Ukraine by the descendants of the Indo-Iranians, and a couple of thousand years after them, by the Scythians.
"Polovtsian women", like other stone women - not necessarily the image of a woman, among them there are many male faces. Even the very etymology of the word "woman" comes from the Turkic "balbal", which means "ancestor", "grandfather-father", and is associated with the cult of veneration of ancestors, and not at all with female beings. Although, according to another version, stone women are traces of a matriarchy that has gone into the past, as well as a cult of veneration of the mother goddess, among the Polovtsy - Umai, who personified the earthly principle. The only obligatory attribute is the hands folded on the stomach, holding the bowl for sacrifices, and the chest, which is also found in men, and is obviously associated with the feeding of the clan.
According to the beliefs of the Polovtsy, who professed shamanism and tengrism (worship of the sky), the dead were endowed with a special power that allowed them to help their descendants. Therefore, a Polovtsian passing by had to make a sacrifice to the statue (judging by the finds, these were usually rams) in order to enlist its support. This is how the Azerbaijani poet of the 12th century Nizami, whose wife was a Polovtsian, describes this ceremony: “And the back of the Kipchaks bends before the idol... flock, What to leave a sheep in front of an idol is necessary.
The Polovtsians are one of the most mysterious steppe peoples, which entered Russian history thanks to raids on principalities and repeated attempts by the rulers of Russian lands, if not to defeat the steppe people, then at least to negotiate with them.
The Polovtsy themselves were defeated by the Mongols and settled over a significant part of the territory of Europe and Asia. Now there is no people who could directly trace their ancestry to the Polovtsians. And yet they certainly have descendants.
Polovtsy. Nicholas Roerich
In the steppe (Dashti-Kipchak - Kipchak, or Polovtsian steppe) lived not only the Polovtsy, but also other peoples, who are either united with the Polovtsians, or considered independent: for example, the Cumans and Kuns. Most likely, the Polovtsians were not a "monolithic" ethnic group, but were divided into tribes. Arab historians of the early Middle Ages distinguish 11 tribes, Russian chronicles also indicate that different tribes of the Polovtsy lived west and east of the Dnieper, east of the Volga, near the Seversky Donets.
Location map of nomadic tribes Many Russian princes were descendants of the Polovtsians - their fathers often married noble Polovtsian girls. Not so long ago, a dispute broke out about how Prince Andrei Bogolyubsky actually looked.
It is known that the prince's mother was a Polovtsian princess, so it is not surprising that according to the reconstruction of Mikhail Gerasimov, Mongoloid features were combined with Caucasoid ones in his appearance.
What Andrey Bogolyubsky looked like: reconstruction by V.N. Zvyagin (left) and M.M. Gerasimov (right)
What did the Polovtsy themselves look like?
Khan of the Polovtsians (reconstruction)
There is no consensus among researchers on this matter. In the sources of the XI-XII centuries, the Polovtsians are often called "yellow". The Russian word also probably comes from the word "sexual", that is, yellow, straw.
Some historians believe that among the ancestors of the Polovtsy were the “Dinlins” described by the Chinese: people who lived in southern Siberia and were blond. But the authoritative researcher of the Polovtsy Svetlana Pletneva, who has repeatedly worked with materials from the mounds, does not agree with the hypothesis of the "fairness" of the Polovtsian ethnos. “Yellow” can be a self-name of a part of the nationality in order to distinguish itself, to oppose the rest (in the same period there were, for example, “black” Bulgarians).
Polovtsian camp
According to Pletneva, the bulk of the Polovtsians were brown-eyed and dark-haired - these are Turks with an admixture of Mongoloidness. It is quite possible that among them were people of different types of appearance - the Polovtsians willingly took Slav women as wives and concubines, though not of princely families. The princes never gave their daughters and sisters to the steppes.
In the Polovtsian pastures there were also Russians who were captured in battle, as well as slaves.
