Khazar Khaganate

A Turkic steppe polity that emerged in the mid-7th century (c. 650) on the lower Volga and the Pontic-Caspian steppe north of the Caucasus, growing out of the western Turkic khaganate after it fragmented.

8th to early 10th century: a dominant power controlling the north-south and east-west trade between the Abbasid Caliphate, Byzantium, and the forests and rivers of the north, taxing the flow of furs, slaves, and silver and fielding armies that fought the Arabs to a standstill in the Caucasus.

Territory in the record

The Volga-Caspian and Pontic steppe: the lower Volga (capital at Atil), the northern Caucasus, Crimea, and loose overlordship of neighboring Slavic and steppe peoples.

Broken in the 960s by the rising Rus under Sviatoslav of Kiev, who sacked the Khazar cities around 965-969. The khaganate disintegrated, absorbed by the Rus, the Pechenegs, and later steppe powers.

For three centuries the Khazars were the shield of eastern Europe, blocking Arab expansion north of the Caucasus and stabilizing the steppe corridor along which Rus, Byzantine, and Islamic trade flowed. Their most famous act was a religious one: the ruling elite's conversion to Judaism, a deliberate third path between Christian Byzantium and the Muslim Caliphate that has fascinated and divided historians ever since.