Kievan Rus and the Polovtsians. Who are the Polovtsians? Cuman Poles

During the existence of the Golden Horde, Russian princes often took Polovtsian princesses as wives. The beginning of this tradition was laid by the son of Yaroslav the Wise, Prince Vsevolod, who in 1068 married Anna, the daughter of the Polovtsian khan, who went down in history as Anna of Polovets. His son Vladimir Monomakh also married a Polovtsian woman. The Kiev prince Svyatopolk Izyaslavich was married to the daughter of the Polovtsian khan Tugorkan, Yuri Dolgoruky - to the daughter of Khan Aepa, Rurik, the son of the great Kiev prince Rostislav Mstislavich - to the daughter of Khan Belok, the son of the Novgorod-Seversk prince Igor Svyatoslavich, the hero of "The Tale of Igor's Campaign" Vladimir - on the daughter of Khan Konchak, Prince Galitsky Mstislav Udatny - on the daughter of Khan Kotyan, who, by the way, became the grandmother of Alexander Nevsky!

So, the mother of the Vladimir-Suzdal prince Andrei Bogolyubsky, son of Yuri Dolgoruky, was a Polovtsian. The study of his remains was supposed to serve as confirmation or refutation of the theory about the Caucasoid appearance of the Cumans. It turned out that there was nothing Mongoloid in the prince’s appearance. If we believe anthropological data, they were typical Europeans. All descriptions indicate that the “Kipchaks” had blond or reddish hair, gray or Blue eyes... Another thing is that in the process of assimilation they could mix, for example, with the Mongols, and their descendants already acquired Mongoloid features.

Where did the Cumans get their Caucasian features from? One of the hypotheses says that they were descendants of the Dinlins, one of the oldest nations in Europe, who, as a result of migration processes, mixed with the Turks.

Today, among the Nogais, Kazakhs, Bashkirs, Tatars, and Kyrgyz, there are descendants of tribes with the generic names “Kipchak”, “Kypshak”, “Kypsak” with similar genetic haplogroups. Among the Bulgarians, Altaians, Nogais, Bashkirs, and Kyrgyz there are ethnic groups with the names “Cuman”, “Kuban”, “Kuba”, which some historians attribute to part of the Polovtsian tribes. The Hungarians, in turn, have the “Plavtsy” and “Kunok” ethnic groups, which are descendants of related tribes - the Cumans and the Kuns.

A number of researchers believe that distant descendants of the Cumans are also found among Ukrainians, Poles, Czechs, Bulgarians and even Germans.

Thus, the blood of the Polovtsians can flow in many peoples, not only in Asia, but also in Europe, and even Slavic ones, not excluding, of course, the Russians...

The formation of the Polovtsian ethnos took place according to the same patterns for all peoples of the Middle Ages and antiquity. One of them is that the people who give the name to the entire conglomerate are not always the most numerous in it - due to objective or subjective factors, they are promoted to a leading place in the emerging ethnic massif, becoming its core. The Polovtsy did not come out of nowhere. The first component to join the new ethnic community here was the population that was previously part of the Khazar Kaganate - the Bulgarians and Alans. A more significant role was played by the remnants of the Pecheneg and Guz hordes. This is confirmed by the fact that, firstly, according to anthropology, outwardly the nomads of the 10th-13th centuries were almost no different from the inhabitants of the steppes of the 8th - early 10th centuries, and secondly, an extraordinary variety of funeral rites is recorded in this territory . The custom that came exclusively with the Polovtsians was the construction of sanctuaries dedicated to the cult of male or female ancestors. Thus, from the end of the 10th century, a mixture of three related peoples took place in this region, a single Turkic-speaking community was formed, but the process was interrupted by the Mongol invasion.

Polovtsians are nomads

The Polovtsians were a classic nomadic pastoral people. The herds included cattle, sheep, and even camels, but the main wealth of the nomad was the horse. Initially, they conducted year-round so-called camp nomadism: finding a place with abundant food for livestock, they located their homes there, and when the food was depleted, they went in search of new territory. At first, the steppe could safely provide for everyone. However, as a result of demographic growth, the transition to more rational farming—seasonal nomadism—has become an urgent task. It involves a clear division of pastures into winter and summer, the folding of territories and routes assigned to each group.

Dynastic marriages

Dynastic marriages have always been a tool of diplomacy. The Polovtsians were no exception here. However, the relationship was not based on parity - Russian princes willingly married the daughters of Polovtsian princes, but did not send their relatives in marriage. An unwritten medieval law was at work here: representatives of the ruling dynasty could only be given as wives to an equal. It is characteristic that the same Svyatopolk married the daughter of Tugorkan, having suffered a crushing defeat from him, that is, being in an obviously weaker position. However, he did not give up his daughter or sister, but took the girl from the steppe himself. Thus, the Polovtsians were recognized as an influential, but not equal force.

But if baptism future wife seemed to be a deed even pleasing to God, then “betrayal” of one’s faith was not possible, which is why the Polovtsian rulers were unable to obtain the marriage of the daughters of Russian princes. There is only one known case when a Russian princess (the widowed mother of Svyatoslav Vladimirovich) married a Polovtsian prince - but for this she had to run away from home.

Be that as it may, by the time of the Mongol invasion, the Russian and Polovtsian aristocracies were closely intertwined with family ties, and the cultures of both peoples were mutually enriched.

The Polovtsians were a weapon in internecine feuds

The Polovtsians were not the first dangerous neighbor of Rus' - the threat from the steppe always accompanied the life of the country. But unlike the Pechenegs, these nomads met not with a single state, but with a group of principalities warring among themselves. At first, the Polovtsian hordes did not strive to conquer Rus', being content with small raids. It was only when the combined forces of the three princes were defeated on the Lte (Alta) River in 1068 that the power of the new nomadic neighbor became apparent. But the danger was not realized by the rulers - the Polovtsians, always ready for war and robbery, began to be used in the fight against each other. Oleg Svyatoslavich was the first to do this in 1078, bringing the “filthy” to fight Vsevolod Yaroslavich. Subsequently, he repeatedly repeated this “technique” in the internecine struggle, for which he was named the author of “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” by Oleg Gorislavich.

But the contradictions between the Russian and Polovtsian princes did not always allow them to unite. Vladimir Monomakh fought particularly actively against the established tradition. In 1103, the Dolob Congress took place, at which Vladimir managed to organize the first expedition into enemy territory. The result was the defeat of the Polovtsian army, which lost not only ordinary soldiers, but also twenty representatives of the highest nobility. The continuation of this policy led to the fact that the Polovtsians were forced to migrate away from the borders of Rus'.

After the death of Vladimir Monomakh, the princes again began to bring the Polovtsy to fight each other, weakening the military and economic potential of the country. In the second half of the century, there was another surge of active confrontation, which was led by Prince Konchak in the steppe. It was to him that Igor Svyatoslavich was captured in 1185, as described in “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign.” In the 1190s, raids became fewer and fewer, and at the beginning of the 13th century, the military activity of the steppe neighbors subsided.

Further development of the relationship was interrupted by the arrival of the Mongols. The southern regions of Rus' were endlessly subjected not only to raids, but also to the “drives” of the Polovtsians, which devastated these lands. After all, even the simple movement of an army of nomads (and there were cases when they went here with their entire household) destroyed crops, the military threat forced traders to choose other paths. Thus, these people contributed a lot to shifting the center of the country’s historical development.

The Polovtsians were friends not only with the Russians, but also with the Georgians

The Polovtsians not only marked their active participation in history in Rus'. Expelled by Vladimir Monomakh from the Seversky Donets, they partially migrated to the Ciscaucasia under the leadership of Prince Atrak. Here Georgia, which was constantly subject to raids from the mountainous regions of the Caucasus, turned to them for help. Atrak willingly entered the service of King David and even became related to him, giving his daughter in marriage. He did not bring with him the entire horde, but only part of it, which then remained in Georgia.

From the beginning of the 12th century, the Polovtsians actively penetrated into the territory of Bulgaria, which was then under the rule of Byzantium. Here they were engaged in cattle breeding or tried to enter the service of the empire. Apparently, these included Peter and Ivan Aseni, who rebelled against Constantinople. With significant support from the Cuman troops, they managed to defeat Byzantium, and in 1187 the Second Bulgarian Kingdom was founded, with Peter as its head.

At the beginning of the 13th century, the influx of Polovtsians into the country intensified, and the eastern branch of the ethnos already participated in it, bringing with them the tradition of stone sculptures. Here, however, they quickly became Christianized and then disappeared among the local population. For Bulgaria, this was not the first experience of “digesting” the Turkic people. The Mongol invasion “pushed” the Cumans to the west; gradually, from 1228, they moved to Hungary. In 1237, the recently powerful Prince Kotyan turned to the Hungarian king Bela IV. The Hungarian leadership agreed to provide the eastern outskirts of the state, knowing about the strength of Batu’s approaching army.

The Polovtsians roamed the territories allotted to them, causing discontent among neighboring principalities, who were subjected to periodic robberies. Bela's heir Stefan married one of Kotyan's daughters, but then executed his father-in-law under the pretext of treason. This led to the first uprising of freedom-loving settlers. The next revolt of the Polovtsians was caused by an attempt to forcefully Christianize them. Only in the 14th century did they completely settle down, become Catholics and begin to dissolve, although they still retained their military specificity and even in the 19th century they still remembered the prayer “Our Father” in their native language.

We know nothing about whether the Cumans had writing

Our knowledge about the Polovtsians is quite limited due to the fact that this people never created their own written sources. We can see a huge number of stone sculptures, but we will not find any inscriptions there. We get information about this people from their neighbors. Standing apart is the 164-page notebook of the missionary-translator of the late 13th - early 14th centuries “Alfabetum Persicum, Comanicum et Latinum Anonymi...”, better known as the “Codex Cumanicus”. The time of creation of the monument is determined by the period from 1303 to 1362, the place of writing is called Crimean city Cafu (Feodosia). Based on its origin, content, graphic and linguistic features, the dictionary is divided into two parts, Italian and German. The first is written in three columns: Latin words, their translation into Persian and Polovtsian. The German part contains dictionaries, grammar notes, Cuman riddles and Christian texts. The Italian component is more significant for historians, since it reflected the economic needs of communication with the Polovtsians. In it we find words such as “bazaar”, “merchant”, “money changer”, “price”, “coin”, a list of goods and crafts. In addition, it contains words that characterize a person, a city, and nature. The list of Polovtsian titles is of great importance.

Although, apparently, the manuscript was partially rewritten from an earlier original, was not created at once, which is why it is not a “slice” of reality, but still allows us to understand what the Polovtsians were doing, what goods they were interested in, we can see their borrowing of ancient Russian words and, most importantly, reconstruct the hierarchy of their society.

Polovtsian women

A specific feature of the Polovtsian culture were stone statues of ancestors, which are called stone or Polovtsian women. This name appeared because of the emphasized chest, which always hangs over the stomach, which obviously carried a symbolic meaning - feeding the clan. Moreover, a fairly significant percentage of male statues have been recorded that depict their wives with a mustache or even a goatee and at the same time have breasts identical to those of a woman.

The 12th century is the period of the heyday of Polovtsian culture and the mass production of stone statues; faces appear in which the desire for portrait resemblance is noticeable. Making idols from stone was expensive, and less wealthy members of society could only afford wooden figures, which, unfortunately, have not reached us. The statues were placed on the tops of mounds or hills in square or rectangular shrines made of flagstone. Most often, male and female statues—the ancestors of the Kosha—were placed facing east, but there were also sanctuaries with a cluster of figures. At their foot, archaeologists found the bones of rams, and once they discovered the remains of a child. It is obvious that the cult of ancestors played a significant role in the life of the Cumans. For us, the importance of this feature of their culture is that it allows us to clearly determine where the people roamed.

Attitude towards women

In Polovtsian society, women enjoyed considerable freedom, although they had a significant share of household responsibilities. There is a clear gender division of spheres of activity both in crafts and in cattle breeding: women were in charge of goats, sheep and cows, men were in charge of horses and willows. During military campaigns, all the concerns of defense and economic activity nomadic Perhaps sometimes they had to become the head of the kosh. At least two female burials were found with staffs made of precious metals, which were symbols of the leader of a larger or smaller association. At the same time, women did not stay away from military affairs. In the era of military democracy, girls took part in general campaigns; the defense of a nomadic camp during the absence of a husband also presupposed the presence of military skills. A stone statue of a heroic girl has reached us. The size of the sculpture is one and a half to two times larger than the generally accepted one, the chest is “tucked up”, in contrast to the traditional image, covered with elements of armor. She is armed with a saber, a dagger and a quiver for arrows, however, her headdress is undoubtedly female. This type of warrior is reflected in Russian epics under the name Polanitsa.

Where did the Polovtsians go?

No people disappears without a trace. History does not know cases of complete physical extermination of the population by alien invaders. The Polovtsians didn’t go anywhere either. Some of them went to the Danube and even ended up in Egypt, but the bulk remained in their native steppes. For at least a hundred years they maintained their customs, although in a modified form. Apparently, the Mongols forbade the creation of new sanctuaries dedicated to Polovtsian warriors, which led to the emergence of “pit” places of worship. Recesses were dug in a hill or mound, not visible from afar, inside which the pattern of placement of statues, traditional for the previous period, was repeated.

But even with the cessation of this custom, the Polovtsians did not disappear. The Mongols came to the Russian steppes with their families, and did not move as a whole tribe. And the same process happened to them as with the Cumans centuries earlier: having given a name to the new people, they themselves dissolved in it, adopting its language and culture. Thus, the Mongols became a bridge from the modern peoples of Russia to the chronicle Polovtsians. 

The Polovtsians belonged to the nomadic tribes. According to different sources, they also had other names: Kipchaks and Komans. The Polovtsian people belonged to the Turkic-speaking tribes. At the beginning of the 11th century, they expelled the Pechenegs and Torques from the Black Sea steppes. Then they headed to the Dnieper, and upon reaching the Danube they became the owners of the steppe, which began to be called Polovtsian. The religion of the Polovtsians was Tengriism. This religion is based on the cult of Tengri Khan (the eternal sunshine of the sky).

The daily life of the Polovtsians was practically no different from other tribal peoples. Their main occupation was cattle breeding. By the end of the 11th century, the type of nomadic Polovtsians changed from camp to more modern. Each individual part of the tribe was assigned plots of land for pastures.

Kievan Rus and the Cumans

Starting from 1061 and up to 1210, the Polovtsians made constant raids on Russian lands. The struggle between Rus' and the Polovtsians lasted quite a long time. There were about 46 major raids on Rus', and this does not take into account smaller ones.

The first battle of Rus' with the Cumans was on February 2, 1061 near Pereyaslavl, they burned the surrounding area and robbed the nearest villages. In 1068, the Cumans defeated the troops of the Yaroslavichs, in 1078 Izyaslav Yaroslavich died in a battle with them, in 1093 the Cumans defeated the troops of 3 princes: Svyatopolk, Vladimir Monomakh and Rostislav, and in 1094 they forced Vladimir Monomakh to leave Chernigov. Subsequently, several retaliatory campaigns were made. In 1096, the Polovtsians suffered their first defeat in the fight against Russia. In 1103 they were defeated by Svyatopolk and Vladimir Monomakh, then they served King David the Builder in the Caucasus.

The final defeat of the Polovtsians by Vladimir Monomakh and the Russian army of many thousands occurred as a result crusade in 1111. To avoid final destruction, the Polovtsians changed their place of nomadism, moving across the Danube, and most of their troops, along with their families, went to Georgia. All these “all-Russian” campaigns against the Polovtsians were led by Vladimir Monomakh. After his death in 1125, the Cumans took an active part in the internecine wars of the Russian princes, participating in the defeat of Kyiv as allies in 1169 and 1203.

The next campaign against the Polovtsy, also referred to as the massacre of Igor Svyatoslavovich with the Polovtsy, described in “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign,” took place in 1185. This campaign of Igor Svyatoslavovich was an example of one of the unsuccessful ones. After some time, some of the Polovtsians converted to Christianity, and a period of calm began in the Polovtsian raids.

The Polovtsians ceased to exist as an independent, politically developed people after the European campaigns of Batu (1236 - 1242) and made up the majority of the population of the Golden Horde, passing on to them their language, which formed the basis for the formation of other languages ​​(Tatar, Bashkir, Nogai, Kazakh, Karakalpak , Kumyk and others).

The Polovtsians are one of the most mysterious steppe peoples, who entered Russian history thanks to raids on principalities and repeated attempts by the rulers of the Russian lands, if not to defeat the steppe inhabitants, then at least to come to an agreement with them. The Polovtsians themselves were defeated by the Mongols and settled throughout a large part of Europe and Asia. Now there is no people who could directly trace their ancestry to the Polovtsians. And yet they certainly have descendants.

In the steppe (Deshti-Kipchak - Kipchak, or Polovtsian steppe) lived not only the Cumans, but also other peoples, who were either united with the Cumans 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 identify 11 tribes, Russian chronicles also indicate that different tribes of the Polovtsians lived west and east of the Dnieper, east of the Volga, near the Seversky Donets.

The descendants of the Polovtsians were many Russian princes - their fathers often took noble Polovtsian girls as wives. Not long ago, a dispute arose about what Prince Andrei Bogolyubsky actually looked like. According to the reconstruction of Mikhail Gerasimov, his appearance combined Mongoloid features with Caucasoid ones. However, some modern researchers, for example, Vladimir Zvyagin, believe that there were no Mongoloid features in the appearance of the prince at all.

What did the Polovtsy themselves look like?

Some historians believe that among the ancestors of the Cumans were the “Dinlins” described by the Chinese: people who lived in southern Siberia and were blond. But the authoritative Polovtsian researcher Svetlana Pletneva, who has repeatedly worked with materials from mounds, does not agree with the hypothesis about the “blond hair” of the Polovtsian ethnic group. “Yellow” can be a self-name of a part of a nationality in order to distinguish itself and contrast it with others (in the same period, for example, there were “black” Bulgarians).

According to Pletneva, the bulk of the Polovtsians were brown-eyed and dark-haired - they were Turks with an admixture of Mongoloidity. It is quite possible that among them there were people of different types of appearance - the Polovtsians willingly took Slavic women as wives and concubines, although not princely families. The princes never gave their daughters and sisters to the steppe people. In the Polovtsian nomads there were also Russians who were captured in battle, as well as slaves.

Hungarian king from the Cumans and the “Cuman Hungarians”

Part of the history of Hungary is directly connected with the Cumans. Several Polovtsian families settled on its territory already in 1091. In 1238, pressed by the Mongols, the Cumans under the leadership of Khan Kotyan settled there with the permission of King Bela IV, who needed allies.
In Hungary, as in some other European countries, the Cumans were called “Cumans”. The lands on which they began to live were called Kunság (Kunshag, Cumania). In total, up to 40 thousand people arrived at the new place of residence.

Khan Kotyan even gave his daughter to Bela's son Istvan. He and the Cuman Irzhebet (Ershebet) had a boy, Laszlo. Because of his origin, he was nicknamed “Kun.”

According to his images, he did not look at all like a Caucasian without an admixture of Mongoloid features. Rather, these portraits remind us of reconstructions of the external appearance of steppe people familiar from history textbooks.

Laszlo's personal guard consisted of his fellow tribesmen; he valued the customs and traditions of his mother's people. Despite the fact that he was officially a Christian, he and other Cumans even prayed in Cuman (Cuman).

The Cuman Polovtsians gradually assimilated. For some time, until the end of the 14th century, they wore national clothes, lived in yurts, but gradually adopted the culture of the Hungarians. The Cuman language was replaced by Hungarian, communal lands became the property of the nobility, who also wanted to look “more Hungarian.” The Kunsag region was subordinated to the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century. As a result of the wars, up to half of the Cuman-Kipchaks died. A century later, the language completely disappeared.

Now the distant descendants of the steppe people are no different in appearance from the rest of the inhabitants of Hungary - they are Caucasians.

Cumans in Bulgaria

The Polovtsians arrived in Bulgaria for several centuries in a row. In the 12th century, the territory was under the rule of Byzantium; Polovtsian settlers were engaged in cattle breeding there and tried to enter the service.

In the 13th century, the number of steppe inhabitants who moved to Bulgaria increased. Some of them came from Hungary after the death of Khan Kotyan. But in Bulgaria they quickly mixed with the locals, adopted Christianity and lost their special ethnic features. Perhaps some Bulgarians now have Polovtsian blood flowing through them. Unfortunately, it is still difficult to accurately identify the genetic characteristics of the Cumans, because there are plenty of Turkic traits in the Bulgarian ethnos due to its origin. Bulgarians also have a Caucasian appearance.

Polovtsian blood in the Kazakhs, Bashkirs, Uzbeks and Tatars

Many Cumans did not migrate - they mixed with the Tatar-Mongols. The Arab historian Al-Omari (Shihabuddin al-Umari) wrote that, having joined the Golden Horde, the Cumans moved to the position of subjects. The Tatar-Mongols who settled on the territory of the Polovtsian steppe gradually mixed with the Polovtsians. Al-Omari concludes that after several generations the Tatars began to look like the Cumans: “as if from the same (their) family,” because they began to live on their lands.

Subsequently, these peoples settled in different territories and took part in the ethnogenesis of many modern nations, including the Kazakhs, Bashkirs, Kyrgyz and other Turkic-speaking peoples. The types of appearance of each of these (and those listed in the section title) nations are different, but each has a share of Polovtsian blood.

The Cumans are also among the ancestors of the Crimean Tatars. The steppe dialect of the Crimean Tatar language belongs to the Kipchak group of Turkic languages, and Kipchak is a descendant of Polovtsian. The Polovtsians mixed with the descendants of the Huns, Pechenegs, and Khazars. Now the majority of Crimean Tatars are Caucasians (80%), steppe Crimean Tatars have a Caucasian-Mongoloid appearance.

Another mysterious ancient people who settled all over the world are the gypsies. You can find out about this in one of our previous reviews.

Polovtsy - encyclopedic reference:

“Polovtsians, Kipchaks, Kypchaks, Cumans, Turkic-speaking people who lived in the 10th-13th centuries. in the southern Russian steppes and Central Asia, from the west. spurs of the Tien Shan to the Danube. They were engaged in cattle breeding and led a nomadic lifestyle. In the 11th century, the Polovtsians were at the stage of decomposition of the communal tribal system and the formation of a class feudal society. They united into a tribal union led by a khan.

The Polovtsian army consisted of light and heavy cavalry, which had a permanent composition such as Russian squads and militia. Armed with bows, sabers, spears; Helmets and light armor served as protection. Important role Predatory wars played a role in their lives.

The tactics of the Polovtsians boiled down to setting up ambushes, using surprise and rapid attacks of cavalry masses on the flanks and rear of the project in order to encircle it and defeat it. In defense, which they rarely resorted to, they used carts, fencing with them their campsite and leaving only gaps for attacking cavalry units to leave.

Since 1054, the Polovtsians made frequent attacks on the lands of Kievan Rus (1068, 1092, 1093, 1096), Byzantium (1087, 1095), Hungary (1070, 1091, 1094), and intervened in the internecine wars of the Russians. principalities Rus. the princes (see Vladimir Monomakh) organized a number of successful campaigns against them (1103, 1106, 1107, 1109, 1111, 1116).

Subjugated and captured Cumans often settled on the borders of Rus', and sometimes were included in its armed forces as mercenary troops. strength In the beginning 13th century in alliance with the Russians they opposed the Mongol-Tatars, but were defeated (Kalka). After the Mongol-Tatar conquests of the 13th century. some of the Polovtsians moved to Hungary and the Balkans, some merged with the conquerors and became part of the Golden Horde.”

From the Soviet Military Encyclopedia, volume 6.

Origin

Polovtsy - nomads

The Polovtsians were a classic nomadic pastoral people. They raised cattle, sheep, and even camels. But the main wealth of the nomad was, of course, the horse. Initially, they conducted year-round so-called camp nomadism: finding a place with abundant food for livestock, they located their homes there, and when the food was depleted, they went in search of new territory. At first, the steppe could safely provide for everyone. However, with the increase in numbers, the transition to a more rational, seasonal nomadism became an urgent task. It involves a clear division of pastures into winter and summer, the folding of territories and routes assigned to each group.

The Polovtsy remained in the history of Rus' the worst enemies of Vladimir Monomakh and cruel mercenaries during the internecine wars. Tribes who worshiped the sky terrorized the Old Russian state for almost two centuries.

They were to play a significant role in the history of Eastern Europe. For some they turned into formidable enemies, for others into insidious allies. This primarily affected the ancient Russian princes - the Polovtsians became mercenaries in fratricidal civil strife. The presence of the Cumans, Cumans, and 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 concern historians to this day. According to the traditional version, all four of the above-mentioned peoples were a single Turkic-speaking people, which were called differently in different parts of the world.

Ancestors of the Cumans

Their ancestors - the Sars - lived in the territory of Altai and the eastern Tien Shan, but the state they formed was defeated by the Chinese in 630. The survivors headed to the steppes of eastern Kazakhstan. There they received a new name “Kipchaks”, which, according to legend, means “ill-fated” and as evidenced by medieval Arab-Persian sources.

However, in both Russian and Byzantine sources, Kipchaks are not found at all. People similar in description are called “Cumans”, “Kuns” or “Polovtsians”. 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 these people had light hair color and belonged to the western branch of the Kipchaks - “Sary-Kipchaks” (Kuns and Cumans belonged to the east 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 role of the Polovtsy in civil strife in Rus'

The Polovtsy could not become a “good neighbor” of Kievan Rus. As befits nomads, they soon mastered the tactics of surprise raids: they set up ambushes, attacked by surprise, and swept away an unprepared enemy on their way. Armed with bows and arrows, sabers and short spears, the Polovtsian warriors rushed into battle, pelting the enemy with a bunch of arrows as they galloped. They raided cities, robbing and killing people, taking them captive. In addition to the shock cavalry, their strength also lay in the developed strategy, as well as in technologies that were new for that time, such as heavy crossbows and “liquid fire,” which they apparently borrowed from China since their time in Altai.

However, as long as centralized power remained in Rus', 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. There was brisk trade and the population communicated widely in the border areas. Dynastic marriages with the daughters of Polovtsian khans became popular among Russian princes.

Disagreements within Rus'

The two cultures coexisted in a fragile neutrality that could not last long. In 1073, the three sons of Yaroslav the Wise: Izyaslav, Svyatoslav and Vsevolod, to whom he bequeathed Kievan Rus, quarreled. Svyatoslav and Vsevolod accused their older brother of conspiring against them and striving to become an “autocrat” like their father. This was the birth of a great and long unrest in Rus', which the Polovtsians took advantage of.

Without completely taking sides, they willingly sided with the man who promised them big “profits.” Thus, the first prince who resorted to their help, Oleg Svyatoslavich (who was disinherited by his uncles), allowed the Polovtsians to plunder and burn Russian cities, for which he was nicknamed Oleg Gorislavich. Subsequently, calling the Cumans as allies in internecine struggles became a common practice.

In alliance with the nomads, Yaroslav's grandson, Oleg Gorislavich, expelled Vladimir Monomakh from Chernigov, and he took Murom, driving out Vladimir's son Izyaslav from there. As a result, the warring princes faced a real danger of losing their own territories.

In 1097, on the initiative of Vladimir Monomakh, the Lyubech Congress was convened, which was supposed to put an end to the internecine war. The princes agreed that from now on everyone should own their own “fatherland”. Even the Kiev prince, who formally remained the head of state, could not violate the borders. Thus, fragmentation was officially consolidated in Rus' with good intentions. The only thing that united the Russian lands even then was a common fear of Polovtsian invasions.

War of Vladimir Monomakh

The most ardent enemy of the Polovtsians among the Russian princes was Vladimir Monomakh, under whose great reign the practice of using Polovtsian troops for the purpose of fratricide temporarily ceased. Chronicles tell of Vladimir Monomakh as the most influential prince in Rus', who was known as a patriot who spared neither his strength nor his life for the defense of Russian lands.

Having suffered defeats from the Polovtsians, in alliance with whom his brother and his worst enemy, Oleg Svyatoslavich, stood, he developed a completely new strategy in the fight against the nomads - to fight on their own territory. Unlike the Polovtsian detachments, which were strong in sudden raids, Russian squads gained an advantage in open battle. The Polovtsian “lava” crashed against the long spears and shields of Russian foot soldiers. Meanwhile, the Russian cavalry, surrounding the steppe inhabitants, did not allow them to escape on their famous light-winged horses.

Even the timing 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 provided an advantage: he provided the enemy with the opportunity to attack first, preferring defense through foot soldiers, since by attacking, the enemy exhausted himself much more than the defending Russian warrior.

During one of these attacks, when the infantry took the brunt of the attack, the Russian cavalry went around the flanks and struck in the rear. This decided the outcome of the battle. For Vladimir Monomakh, just a few trips to the Polovtsian lands were enough to rid Rus' of the Polovtsian threat for a long time. IN recent years 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 Polovtsians migrated away from the borders of Rus', to the Caucasian foothills.

What remains of the Polovtsians

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 upon a time 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 Polovtsians, in the 4th-2nd millennium BC, such idols were erected on the territory of present-day Russia and Ukraine by the descendants of the Indo-Iranians. And a couple of thousand years after them - the Scythians. “Polovtsian women,” like other stone women, are not necessarily images of women; among them there are many men’s faces.

Even the etymology of the word “baba” 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 creatures. Although, according to another version, stone women are traces of a bygone matriarchy, as well as the cult of veneration of the mother goddess among the Polovtsians (Umai), who personified the earthly principle. The only obligatory attribute is the hands folded on the stomach, holding the sacrificial bowl, and the chest, which is also found in men and is obviously associated with feeding the clan.

According to the beliefs of the Cumans, who professed shamanism and Tengrism (worship of the sky), the dead were endowed with special powers that allowed them to help their descendants. Therefore, a Cuman passing by had to offer a sacrifice to the statue (judging by the finds, these were usually rams) in order to gain its support.