Uzes were a group of medieval Turkic people in East Europe. They were known as Tork in Russian chronicles. [1] Like most medieval Turkic people, they were Tengrists.
The roots of Uzes can be traced back to Oghuz Yabgu State (750-1055) located to the east of Caspian Sea. Oghuz State was the neighbour of the Khazar Khaganate in the west and north of the Caspian Sea. Oghuz-Khazar relations were not stable. Oghuz State was sometimes an ally and sometimes an enemy of the powerful Khazar Khaganate. In the 10th century a group of Oghuz people fought in the Khazar army. [2] (Dukak, the father of Seljuk was one of them.) They fought mainly against Pechenegs, a rival Turkic people. After the Khazar Khaganate disintegrated, they had to move west because of Kypchaks raids from the east. [3]
In 1054 they settled around Dnieper river. However five years later they were defeated by the Kievan Rus. They further moved west to Danube river where they were repelled by their old enemy the Pechenegs in 1065. After 1065 they paid homage to Byzantine Empire and the Russian princes. Most of them converted to Christianity. They served as soldiers in the Byzantine Empire. During the battle of Manzikert between the Byzantines and the Seljuks in 1071 they served in the right flank of the Byzantine army. However, according to some accounts they switched sides and contributed to the Seljuks victory. [1]
Uzes settled in Marmara, Western Black Sea, Central Black Sea, Central Anatolia and Thrace, most of them hybrid with Turkmens and assimilated to Muslim Oghuz Turks. [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [ excessive citations ]
Some Turkologists including Vasily Radlov proposed that Gagauz people and some of the Manav People are descendant of Uzes. [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] According to that view the origin of the name Gagauz is Gök Oguz ("Sky Oghuz"). However this view is not universally accepted by other scholars. [1]
The Oghuz Turks were a western Turkic people who spoke the Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family. In the 8th century, they formed a tribal confederation conventionally named the Oghuz Yabgu State in Central Asia. Today, much of the populations of Turkey, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan are descendants of Oghuz Turks. Byzantine sources call them Uzes. The term Oghuz was gradually supplanted by the terms Turkmen and Turcoman by 13th century.
Seljuk, variously romanized, was an Oghuz Turk warlord. He was the eponymous founder of the Seljuk dynasty and the namesake of Selçuk, the modern town near the ruins of ancient Ephesus in Turkey.
The Kipchaks or Qipchaqs, also known as Kipchak Turks or Polovtsians, were Turkic nomads and then a confederation that existed in the Middle Ages inhabiting parts of the Eurasian Steppe.
Akçakoca is a town in Düzce Province, in the West Black Sea Region of Turkey, located about 200 km east of Istanbul. It is the seat of Akçakoca District. Its population is 27,878 (2022). The town was named after a Turkish chieftain of the 14th century CE who captured the area for the Ottoman Empire, and sports a statue in his honor. The town features a modern mosque of unusual design. Tourist attractions include beaches and a small ruined Genoese castle. It is the regional center of hazelnut cultivation.
The Pechenegs or Patzinaks were a semi-nomadic Oghuz Turkic people from Central Asia who spoke the Pecheneg language. In the 9th and 10th centuries, the Pechenegs controlled much of the steppes of southeast Europe and the Crimean Peninsula. In the 9th century the Pechenegs began a period of wars against Kievan Rus', and for more than two centuries launched raids into the lands of Rus', which sometimes escalated into full-scale wars.
Anatolian beyliks were small principalities in Anatolia governed by beys, the first of which were founded at the end of the 11th century. A second and more extensive period of establishment took place as a result of the decline of the Seljuq Sultanate of Rûm in the latter half of the 13th century.
The Cumans or Kumans were a Turkic nomadic people from Central Asia comprising the western branch of the Cuman–Kipchak confederation who spoke the Cuman language. They are referred to as Polovtsy in Rus', Cumans in Western and Kipchaks in Eastern sources.
Cuman or Kuman was a West Kipchak Turkic language spoken by the Cumans and Kipchaks; the language was similar to today's various languages of the West Kipchak branch. Cuman is documented in medieval works, including the Codex Cumanicus, and in early modern manuscripts, like the notebook of Benedictine monk Johannes ex Grafing. It was a literary language in Central and Eastern Europe that left a rich literary inheritance. The language became the main language of the Golden Horde.
The Karamanlides, also known as Karamanli Greeks or simply Karamanlis, are a traditionally Turkish-speaking Greek Orthodox people native to the region of Karaman in Anatolia.
The Seljuk dynasty, or Seljukids, Seljuqs, also known as Seljuk Turks, Seljuk Turkomans or the Saljuqids, was an Oghuz Turkic, Sunni Muslim dynasty that gradually became Persianate and contributed to Turco-Persian culture in West Asia and Central Asia. The Seljuks established the Seljuk Empire (1037–1194), the Sultanate of Kermân (1041–1186) and the Sultanate of Rum (1074–1308), which stretched from Iran to Anatolia and were the prime targets of the First Crusade.
The Turkic migrations were the spread of Turkic tribes and Turkic languages across Eurasia between the 4th and 11th centuries. In the 6th century, the Göktürks overthrew the Rouran Khaganate in what is now Mongolia and expanded in all directions, spreading Turkic culture throughout the Eurasian steppes. Although Göktürk empires came to an end in the 8th century, they were succeeded by numerous Turkic empires such as the Uyghur Khaganate, Kara-Khanid Khanate, Khazars, and the Cumans. Some Turks eventually settled down into sedentary societies such as the Qocho and Ganzhou Uyghurs. The Seljuq dynasty settled in Anatolia starting in the 11th century, resulting in permanent Turkic settlement and presence there. Modern nations with large Turkic populations include Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, and Turkic populations also exist within other nations, such as Chuvashia, Bashkortostan, Tatarstan and the Sakha Republic of Siberia in Russia, Northern Cyprus, the Crimean Tatars, the Kazakhs in Mongolia, the Uyghurs in China, and the Azeris in Iran.
The name for the country Turkey is derived from the Medieval Latin Turchia, Turquia, from Medieval Greek [Τουρκία] Error: {{Lang}}: invalid parameter: |t= (help), itself being Τούρκος. It is first recorded in Middle English, attested in Chaucer, c. 1369. The Ottoman Empire was commonly referred to as Turkey or the Turkish Empire among its contemporaries. The word ultimately originates from the autonym Türk, first recorded in the Bugut inscription and the Hüis Tolgoi Inscription of the 6th century, and later, in the Orkhon inscriptions and the Tariat inscriptions (𐱅𐰇𐰼𐰜) of the 8th century.
The Seljuk Empire, or the GreatSeljuk Empire, was a high medieval, culturally Turco-Persian, Sunni Muslim empire, established and ruled by the Qïnïq branch of Oghuz Turks. The empire spanned a total area of 3.9 million square kilometres from Anatolia and the Levant in the west to the Hindu Kush in the east, and from Central Asia in the north to the Persian Gulf in the south, and it spanned the time period 1037–1308, though Seljuk rule beyond the Anatolian peninsula ended in 1194.
Abu Suleiman Dawud Chaghri Beg ibn Mikail, widely known simply as Chaghri Beg (989–1060), Da'ud b. Mika'il b. Saljuq, also spelled Chaghri, was the co-ruler of the early Seljuk Empire. The name Chaghri is Turkic and literally means "small falcon", "merlin".
The martolos was an internal security force of the Ottoman Empire in the Balkans (Rumelia), mostly active between the 15th to 17th centuries. It initially constituted out of the local mostly Christian populations, but over time members converted into Islam. For their military service, they were given privileged status, in relation to the Rayah. Their commanders were predominantly Muslim.
The Qiniq were an Oghuz Turkic ("Turkmen") tribe.
This article summarizes the History of the western steppe, which is the western third of the Eurasian steppe, that is, the grasslands of Ukraine and southern Russia. It is intended as a summary and an index to the more-detailed linked articles. It is a companion to History of the central steppe and History of the eastern steppe. All dates are approximate since there are few exact starting and ending dates. This summary article does not list the uncertainties, which are many. For these, see the linked articles.
Turkoman, also known as Turcoman, was a term for the people of Oghuz Turkic origin, widely used during the Middle Ages. Oghuz Turks were a western Turkic people that, in the 8th century A.D, formed a tribal confederation in an area between the Aral and Caspian seas in Central Asia, and spoke the Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family.
Turkic history is the systematic documentation and study of events involving the Turkic peoples.
Manavs or Manav Turks are a Turkic people living in northwest Anatolia, especially in Sakarya, Bilecik, Balıkesir, Bursa, Çanakkale, Kocaeli, Eskişehir, Bolu and Düzce provinces. It is proposed that Manavs descend from Cumans and Kipchaks who settled in the Byzantine Empire.