From: stephan.nikolov@history.ox.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Caucasoid Turks/Bulgars
Date: 12 Feb 1999 00:00:00 GMT
Message-ID: <7a05ai$45s$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>
References: <369E3BE1.5C45@sbu.ac.uk> <77li2j$qi0$1@whisper.globalserve.net> <369F52FE.2B6@sbu.ac.uk> <77rc86$auj$1@brokaw.wa.com> <36A444B3.F3B70F1C@alum.mit.edu.-> <7827sb$269$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com> <36A52D70.9E372DD2@alum.mit.edu.-> <36A556AB.9927BD29@montclair.edu> <36a63533.58309714@news.yale.edu> <7866ud$i9m$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com> <36cdb21e.883120019@news.wxs.nl> <36A7FCC8.79790A6B@earthlink.net> <36d77e23.1000882888@news.wxs.nl> <36a8d455.81661202@news.yale.edu> <78pl3c$84o@cpca3.uea.ac.uk> <36b0dc2f.3434839@news.yale.edu> <78v30o$vl6@cpca3.uea.ac.uk> <36b34d7c.60430113@news.yale.edu> <794e84$4iq@cpca3.uea.ac.uk> <3744d12a.1873763068@news.wxs.nl> <796m95$eq2@cpca3.uea.ac.uk> <375c0ea6.1954957123@news.wxs.nl> <79fo99$qkl@cpca3.uea.ac.uk> <79skrj$u81@cpca3.uea.ac.uk> <79vl9f$dub@cpca3.uea.ac.uk>
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In article <79vl9f$dub@cpca3.uea.ac.uk>,
  e.karloukovski@uea.ac.uk (Vassil Karloukovski) wrote:
> In article <79skrj$u81@cpca3.uea.ac.uk>, e.karloukovski@uea.ac.uk says...
> a final note about the nominalia. - Before Asparuh, who crossed the Danube
> in 680 AD and settled in present Bulgaria, it lists the names of five rulers:
> Avitohol, Irnik, Gostun, Kurt, and Bezmer. The standard approach was to
> equate Avitohol to Atilla, and Irnik - to his son Ernah, and that was used
> to support the "Hunnic" origin of the bulgars. But in contrast to the
following
> after them rulers, Avitohol and Irnik are attributed unusually long reigns -
> 300 and 150 years respectively, from ~150 to ~450 AD, and from ~450 to ~600
> AD, and they appear more like progenitors.
>
> Also, the next notable ruler in the list - Kurt/Kubrat, is known to have
> thrown off the west turcute domination (at the end of the VI c.) and to have
> restored the "old Great Bulgaria" as it appears in the byzantine sources.
> And they put it near the Kuban river which is far away from the perimeter
> of action of Atilla and, especially, of Ernah:
>
>  " ... and along the eastern coast of that lake (the Sea of Azov), around
>    Phanagoria and the jews dwelling there, live many peoples. From the same
>    lake up to the Kuphis (Kuban) river, where the bulgarian fish xiston is
>    fished for, is situated the old Great Bulgaria and the so called Kotrags,
>    who are also of the same tribe."  (Theophanes the Confessor)
>
>  " We must say something about the origin of the so called Huns and Bulgars
>    and about their way of life. Around the lake of Meothida, along the Kuphis
>    river, is situated the old Great Bulgaria and the so called Kotrags, who
>    are of the same tribe"  (Nicephorus, patriarch of Constantinople)
>
> Peter Dobrev (as well as earlier researchers) have proposed iranian
etymologies
> for the name of Avitohol: from the wakhan awu, awi 'doe', the ishkashimi
ahvi,
> ahui 'doe', the farsi kabuli afi, ahu 'the same'; and the wakhan tohol, tofl
> 'child, descendant', etc. Thas is, Avitohol corresponds to the persian name
of
> Avituh, meaning 'doe's child'. This interpretation is supported by one XIV c.
> lithuanian chronicle, which narrates the miraculous ways in which the
progenitors
> of various peoples had been saved:
>
>  " Romulus and Remus were nurtured by a she-wolf. Astiag, the king of the
>   medians, said to Gasparg, his secretary, to kill Cyrus so that he wouldn't
>   reign after him, but Gasparg took pity on him. ... _Also, the son moesian,
>   or bulgarian, was nurtured by a doe, after he was thrown in the woods to
>   die._ Paris, the son of Priam, was nurtured by a bear..."
>
> Thus, Avitohol with his 300 years in the nominalia was not a historical
personage
> but the progenitor of the bulgars. The next ruler after him - Irnik, was
equated
> to Ernah, the son of Atilla, who moved with his tribe south of the Danube and
> settled in Scythia Minor (northern Dobrudzha) as byzantine federates. First,
> Irnik is an iranian name and corresponds to the persian name Yernik. Next,
the
> nominalia explicitly states that the first five bulgar rulers prior to
Asparuh
> lived _north_ of the Danube:
>
>  "... These 5 princes reigned on the other side of the Danube for 515 years
>   with shaven heads. And after that came to this side of the Danube prince
>   Isperih, and the same is up to now."
>  (" Sii 5 k'nenz dryzhashe knenzhenie ob onu stranou Dunaja 515 let
>    ostrizhenniimi glavami. I potom pride na stranou Dounaja Isperih k'nenz
>    tozhde i dosele.")
>
> On the other hand, there is the account of the armenian historian Egishe that
> around 427 AD a certain Eran, ruler of the hajlandurs (most certainly - the
> onogundurs-bulgars) was at the head of a hostile to the persians union of
> peoples who ravaged the persian territories up to the byzantine border. This
> Eran must have been famous enough in order to exert his authority and to
> unite the tribes and it looks plausible that the nominalia would use him in
> order to describe the next period of 150 years.  There could be, of course,
> some later overlaping and interaction with the memory of the hunnic Ernah
> as Scythia Minor was also the first Asparuh's territory to south of the
Danube.
>
> Regards,
> Vassil K.
>
>

I personally wouldn't put all my trust in the Namelist(or Nominalia, as you
prefer to call it here). Don't forget that we have a late copy of the
manuscrpipt written in Old Church Slavonic(or Old Bulgarian, as they call it
in Bulgaria) that can be traced back for a protograf from the first half/the
middle of the tenth century. We still do not know if it is direct translation
from Bulgar (proto-Bulgarian or whatever you call it here) or is a
translation from Greek Bulgar text. Neither know we anything about the
textual tradition of the Name list between its composition (allegedly the
760's) and the time when the Slavonic protograf of the now available document
was written. It is clear indeed that there are two tipes of time in the
document:"mythological time" and "historical" time. I personally do not have
any difficulties with an idea that a charismatic clan trying to establish
their power over other clans (who might well have been of various cultural
and linguistic characteristics) and claiming for the purpose Attilide origin
(I guess Pritsak is close to such an understanding). The empire of Attila was
perfectly ligitimate in the world of Eurasia, so descendancy from Ernach
(these third most beloved sons !!!) would not do any harm but rather
facilitate the claims of Dulo for superiority over the Slavs in southeastern
Europe vis-a-vis the Avars for instance, who were dwelling precisely in the
territory where was the core of Attila's empire. A reading of Nicephoros and
Theophanes that Kuvratos (Kurt) rebelled precisely against the Avars in the
early 630's would indirectly support such a notion.

And it seems that Kuvratos(Kurt) would have been intelligent enough to employ
such a legent for this guy seems to have been well travelled and to have seen
and heard things in Constantinople as we hear from the Greek sources and we
can infer from Malaya Pereschepina findings (I have my doubts about John of
Nikiu's story, though; prefer rather Nicephoros).

As for the wolf story, Dobrev might eventually turn correct although this
story is not unknown for other people than the "Iranians" either. It seems
that the Hsiung-nus had the same legend (she-wolf nursed an abandoned infant
at the time when a crow was soaring above him (I have always thought the the
Bulgarian poet Hr. Botev was a genius. Well, he certainly is;). Note also:
"The origin of Chingis qayan (y here substitutes for the gamma sound) was a
bluish wolf which was born having [his] destiny from Heaven above. His spouse
was a fallow doe" (Cf. Cleaves (transl), The Secter History of the Mongols,
p. 1).

I am obviously NOT advocating Turkic origin or whatsoever. I am just pointing
out certain similarities

Stephan Nikolov

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