ÿþ<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=unicode"> <meta name="Author" content="Vassil Karloukovski"> <meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft FrontPage 5.0"> <meta name="ProgId" content="FrontPage.Editor.Document"> <title>Hudud al-'Alam - 51 - Commentary of V. Minorsky</title> </head> <body> <font face="Palatino Linotype"> <b><font size=+1>Hudud al-'Alam, The Regions of the World</font></b> <br><b>V. Minorsky</b> <br>&nbsp; </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><b>§ 51. [The Bulkr.]</b> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Frähn, <i>Drei Münzen</i> and <i>Die ältesten arabischen Nachrichten über die Wolga-Bulgharen</i>, 1832 (still valuable); Chwolson, <i>Izvestiya . . . Ibn Dasta</i> [*<i>Rusta</i>], 80-101; Barthold, <i>Bul<u>gh</u>r</i> in <i>EI</i> (in great detail); R. Vasmer, <i>Über die Münzen der Wolga-Bulgaren</i>, in <i>Wiener Numism. Zeitschrift</i>, 57 (1924), pp. 63-84 (instead of&nbsp;<img SRC="460_5.jpg" height=23 width=40 align=ABSBOTTOM> read on some coins Vasmer restores the well-known title of the Bulghr kings&nbsp;<img SRC="460_6.jpg" height=24 width=41 align=ABSBOTTOM>); Marquart, <i>Arktische Länder</i>, 365-77. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">There are two gross misunderstandings in the present chapter. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Its title "Burt</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">s&quot; is entirely wrong (cf. also § 20). <i>Burt</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">s</i> is only another form of *<i>Burds</i> (see § 52), whereas here the Volga Bulghrs <a href="#460 2.">[2]</a> are described,<i> i.e. </i>the northern colony of the people from which the Danube Bulghrs had separated. The language of the Volga Bulghrs of which we possess only a few specimens in the late funeral inscriptions was probably related to the present-day Chuvash (a special and very aberrant member of the Turkish family). The Danube Bulghrs had, at an early date, adopted a Slav language, but some expression in the original Bulghr language are found in the inscriptions, as well as in a Slavonic chronicle discovered by A. N. Popov in 1866. They are still the subject of much speculation, see J. J. Mikkola, <i>Die Chronologie d. türkischen Donaubulgaren</i>, in <i>Journ. de la Soc. Finno-Ougrienne</i>, xxx (1918), fasc. 33, pp. 1-24 (with a survey of the former tentatives of decipherment). Perhaps the strongest argument for the Chuvash language being a remnant of the old Bulghr is the great number of loan-words in Hungarian which have a striking resemblance to the Chuvash ('bull" is <i>ökör</i> in Magyar and <i>wkr</i> in Chuvash) as well as the enormous number of Chuvash cultural words in the languages of their Finnish neighbours of the Volga basin, see N. Poppe, <i>Chuvashi i yikh sosedi</i>, Cheboksar<img SRC="i_k.jpg" height=17 width=8 align=ABSBOTTOM> 1927. The present-day Chuvash are of course only a poor and small fraction of the old Bulghrs who for the most part have been turkicized. This latter part of the old Bulghrs probably can be traced in the so-called "Volga Tartars". </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">The outstanding authority on the Volga peoples is Ibn Fad</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">ln , who in 309-10/921-2 took part in the embassy sent by the caliph Muqtadir to the <br>&nbsp; </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="460 2."></a><font size=-1><b>2.</b> As Barthold has pointed out, the Bulghr and Burt</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">s are also confused in Yqkt, i, 567.</font></font><font face="Palatino Linotype"> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><img SRC="line_down.gif" height=18 width=596> <br>§ 51&nbsp;&nbsp; <i>The Bulkar</i>&nbsp;&nbsp; 461 </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">Bulghr khqn in view of the latter's desire to be advised on religious matters. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">The present chapter is a poor abstract chiefly of Is</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">t</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">. The details on the special language and the number of the Bulghrs and their towns remind one of this latter author who, p. 225, says that the Bulghr language has a resemblance to the Khazar language (the latter, p. 222, being an idiom apart), and that in the towns of Bulghr and Suvr there are some 10,000 men (<i>ns</i>). Gard+z+, 97, gives an entirely different number (500,000 <i>ahl-i bayt</i>). The names of the three tribes have the following close parallels: <br>&nbsp; </font> <table BORDER CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=2 COLS=3 WIDTH="60%" > <tr> <td> <center><font face="Palatino Linotype">&nbsp;H</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype"><b>.-'.</b></font></center> </td> <td> <center><font face="Palatino Linotype"><b>Ibn Rusta</b></font></center> </td> <td> <center><font face="Palatino Linotype"><b>Gard+z</b>+</font></center> </td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>B.hd</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">kl</i></font></td> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>B.rs</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">kl</i></font></td> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>B.rskl</i></font></td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>Ishkil</i> (?)</font></td> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>Isghil</i> (?)&nbsp;</font></td> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>Iskil</i> (?) <a href="#461 1.">[1]</a></font></td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>B.lkr</i></font></td> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>B.lkr&nbsp;</i></font></td> <td><font face="Palatino Linotype"><i>B.lkr</i></font></td> </tr> </table> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">The form of the latter name points to the Persian (?) origin of the basic source:&nbsp;<img SRC="461_1.jpg" height=24 width=42 align=ABSBOTTOM> *<i>Bulgr</i>. The name B.rs</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">kl (*<i>B.rchkl</i>) is known in two places: since the fifth-sixth century a.d. the Byzantine and other Christian authors mention&nbsp;<img SRC="461_2.jpg" height=21 width=160 align=ABSBOTTOM>, &amp;c., in the north-eastern Caucasus whereas Muslim authors (tenth century) speak of the *Barchkl off the middle Volga. According to Marquart this tribe of unknown origin was turkicized by the Huns, see <i>Die Chronol. d. alttürk. Inschr.</i>, 87-93, <i>Streifzüge</i>, pp. 490-1, and <i>Arktische Länder</i>, p. 328. The name seems to have found an echo even in the <i>Shh-nma</i>, ed. Mohl, iv, 70, where Afrsiyb is accompanied by his grandsons&nbsp;<img SRC="461_3.jpg" height=24 width=87 align=ABSBOTTOM> (cf. the name of the river<i> Ili &lt; Ilä</i>) and&nbsp;<img SRC="461_4.jpg" height=21 width=53 align=ABSBOTTOM><i> Barzuv+l</i> (the <i>Mujmal al-tawr+kh</i> gives: <i>B.rz+l</i>). Justi's Iranian etymology in <i>Iran. Namenbuch</i>, p. 74, is certainly inadequate. Idr+s+, ii, 398, mentions on the Dniepr a place&nbsp;<img SRC="461_4b.jpg" height=23 width=42 align=ABSBOTTOM> which lay at one day's journey upstream from Pereyaslav (<img SRC="461_5.jpg" height=23 width=44 align=ABSBOTTOM>), i.e. in the neighbourhood of Kiev. More to the south from this point a station <i>Birzula</i> exists on the Kiev-Odessa railway. </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">The king <i>M.s</i> in Ibn Fad</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">ln 's original <i>risla</i> is called&nbsp;<img SRC="461_6.jpg" height=28 width=167 align=ABSBOTTOM> *<i>Almush</i> and this name resembles the name <i>Almus</i> which was borne by the father of Arpád, founder of the first Magyar dynasty, Chwolson, <i>Isvestiya</i>, 91, Marquart, <i> Streifzüge</i>, 497. Our author dropped <i>al</i> which he evidently took for the Arabic article. <i>Blt</font><font face="Arial Unicode MS">#</font><font face="Palatino Linotype">wr</i> must be perhaps restored as&nbsp;<img SRC="461_7.jpg" height=26 width=48 align=ABSBOTTOM> *<i>Y<img SRC="i_k.jpg" height=17 width=8 align=ABSBOTTOM>ltuvar</i> or <i>Yiltüver</i> in view of the Hunnic (= Turkish) title <i>Alp-Ilutver</i> found in Moses KaBankatvats'i, Part ii, chap. 41, Patkanov's transl., p. 198. [Marquart:&nbsp;<img SRC="461_8.jpg" height=26 width=140 align=ABSBOTTOM><i> Alp-ilätvär</i> ?.] </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">The second error in our text is that the description of the two Bulghr towns is inserted out of place between § 53 and 54. The ruins of Bulghr (cf. § 6, 43.) are situated near the village Bolgarskoye, or Uspenskoye, in the Spassk district, 115 Km. south of Kazan and at 7 Km. from the left bank of the Volga. Suvr lay on the river Utka near the present village Kuznechikha, cf. Barthold, <i>Bul<u>gh</u>r</i> in <i>EI</i>. <a href="#461 2.">[2]</a> See <b>Map xii.</b> <br>&nbsp; </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="461 1."></a><font size=-1><b>1.</b> Chwolson, <i>Izvestiya</i>, 97, compares this name with that of the Transylvanian <i>Szekler</i> (?). [Cf. supra p. 320, line 2.]</font> </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype"><a NAME="461 2."></a><font size=-1><b>2.</b> Smolin, <i>Po razval. Drevn. Bulgara</i>, Kazan, 1926.</font> <br>&nbsp; </font> <p><font face="Palatino Linotype">[<a href="hud_51.html">Previous</a>] [<a href="hud_52.html">Next</a>] <br>[<a href="index.html">Back to Index</a>] </font> </body> </html>