In the year 602, the lands north of the Danube were dominated by the Avars, a little-known people from the steppes. In this episode, we take a look at their origins, values, and the khaganate they established to rival the Roman empire.

As a reminder, this was the extent of the Avar khaganate in the year 602 when Season 2 begins. These nomads controlled lands from the Alps to Crimea, but they themselves had mostly settled their families on the Pannonian Plain, meaning the grasslands on either side of the Middle Danube, where the river takes a sharp bend north of Sirmium.

The Avars’ huge realm housed several different peoples, namely Romance-speaking communities, Gepids, Slavs, and Bulgars.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to A history of Romania.

Season 2, Episode 2: The khaganate

Last time, we recapped the story of season one, which ended with the Avars as the dominant power north of the Danube from the Alps to the Black Sea. Today, we’ll explore the values and lifestyle of the Avars, and see how they organized their khaganate.

The Avars were originally subjects of the Ashina, a renowned Turkic clan whose leader was called the khagan. The Ashina led a huge tribal confederation extending from Mongolia to the Caucasus, and which included hundreds of different subject peoples. Of course, not everyone was happy to serve the Ashina, and in the 6^th century, a group of clans on the western edge of the confederation elevated a khagan of their own to lead them to freedom. These clans likely consisted of various ethnicities, but by uniting around a single leader, they created a new, shared identity. And they enshrined their distinct status by calling themselves “Avars,” which probably referred to a now-forgotten prestigious clan.

This group numbered an estimated thirty thousand people, and they migrated westwards in the middle of the 6^th century in search of a new home beyond the reach of the Ashina. The Avars sent an embassy to Constantinople, offering their military services in exchange for land and subsidies, but the Roman emperor refused. The khagan was of course furious, but he couldn’t take on the Roman empire. After scouting around, he saw that the rich grasslands of the Carpathian Basin would offer a perfect new homeland for his people, and that the Gepids who were on these grasslands were a much weaker foe than the Romans.

And so, in 567, the Avar khagan struck an alliance with the Lombards, who had been longtime enemies of the Gepids, and led his riders through the Carpathian passes. It turned out that the Avars didn’t actually need help from the Lombards; they inflicted a crushing defeat on the Gepid army and even killed their king all by themselves. And so, instead of sharing the spoils with the Lombards, the khagan leveraged his dominant position and threatened his allies to let him have the whole Carpathian Basin to himself; the Lombards decided that it was better not to cross the Avars, and promptly headed for Italy.

The khagan settled most of his followers on the plains between the Danube and the Tisza, since the grassy plains of the region were perfect for their lifestyle. You see, the Avar economy relied on nomadic pastoralism which involved guiding vast herds of sheep, goats, cattle, and horses from one grazing area to another on a periodic basis so as not to exhaust the land. Communities regularly relocated their yurts to follow their herds, since their animals provided everything they needed to sustain themselves: milk, meat, wool, bones, leather, tallow, and other products. Flocks were owned in common by a clan, which was the basic unit of Avar society and consisted of extended families, their dependants, and any enslaved prisoners of war who served them; such servants took care of menial tasks and did household work, yet they made up only about a tenth of the population; the Avars kept control of their herds by managing them themselves.

Indeed, herding was the main occupation of Avar men besides fighting. Scholars assume a gender division of labour in Avar society because of the higher incidence of arthritis among men and because elite men could have several wives. Avar society was, like its neighbours, deeply patriarchal, and women were considered inferior to men.

Some elite women did exert limited influence, like the khagan’s main wife who held the title of katun. And it seems that elite women enjoyed a degree of independence, especially since they were frequently separated from their husbands for long periods as these went on campaigns or to herd flocks. Twenty-seven graves have been found of women buried with horses, a practice which is otherwise only attested for men. But most women enjoyed no such privileges and likely toiled in domestic tasks while their partners were taking care of the animals.

Scholars haven’t reached a consensus on what language the Avars spoke; the main theories propose a Turkic or Mongolic tongue. Our linguistic evidence is limited to personal names, titles, and a few short runic inscriptions. For instance, the title khagan is Mongolic, as is the name Baian, which is the first and only khagan to be named in our sources. But other names have different origins: Kunimon is Gepidic; Kandikh is Alanic; Apsikh is Hunnic; Kokh is Turkic; and other names like Solakhos, Samur, and Hermitzis have unclear origins.

The runic inscriptions we do have don’t elucidate the issue either. The longest inscription we’ve found consists of 58 characters inscribed on a lady’s needle case, but the language and meaning of these characters haven’t been deciphered; in any case, runic literacy amongst the Avars was minimal, since such writing was reserved for ritual objects.

Only one source mentions the languages spoken by the Avars, and that is the Miracula Sancti Demetrii, which recounts the miracles performed by the patron saint of Thessaloniki. The Miracula notes that one Avar commander spoke “our language, as well as those of the Romans, the Slavs, and the Bulgars.” Because the writer was Greek, “our language” likely refers to Greek, whereas the language “of the Romans” probably means Latin. Interestingly, the source doesn’t mention an Avar language. And so, if we put these various pieces of information together, the picture that emerges of the Avars is one of a multiethnic and multilingual group.

We also know very little about the religion of this diverse population. Avar religion doesn’t seem to have been organized like that of the Romans, with its dogma recorded in a holy text, a clear hierarchy of roles, and distinct territories that demarcated authority. Our sources only mention that the khagan swore oaths by the god in heaven, and that there was an Avar high priest whose title was Bookolabras, but we don’t know anything about his duties or powers.

Scholars assume that the Avars worshiped the sky god Tängri, since other contemporaneous steppe peoples did the same. In the Ashina khaganate which the Avars had fled, inscriptions mention that the khagan was invested to rule by Tängri and had to execute his will. This idea of a heavenly mandate was adopted by the Avars when they rebelled and elevated their own khagan, and so we can assume that Tängri was central to their spiritual beliefs and to the legitimacy of the ruler.

We also know that, like other steppe peoples, the Avars relied heavily on shamans. Shamans used meditation, psychoactive drugs, and other methods to alter their mental state and thus interact with the spiritual world. The goal was to guide spirits into our world to heal wounds or convey messages, which were sometimes predictions about the future. We unfortunately know very little about Avar shamans, but we know they existed and we can be sure that they had their own rules, norms, taboos, and rituals. Our sources allude to the importance of fire rites, and the one attested ritual is that of taking an oath and cutting a dog in two, which was meant to symbolically impart the dog’s fate on anyone who violated the oath.

When an Avar died, they were buried according to their social status. Commoners were usually placed in wooden coffins or hollowed-out tree trunks with an offering of meat. Elites were buried in massive mounds with silver and gold vessels, riding equipment, horses, jewellery for the women, and weaponry for the men.

Avar styles of clothing and grooming were quite distinct. For instance, the contemporaneous historian Theofánis wrote that when the first Avar embassy arrived in Constantinople, “the whole city ran up to see them, since they had never seen such a people before. For they wore their hair very long in the back, tied with ribbons and braided, while their outer clothing was similar to that of the other Huns.”

These first warriors to have come from Asia to Europe clearly formed a distinct ethnicity, but we shouldn’t think of the Avars as a group defined by blood relations. Ethnicity is a complicated matter, especially when we’re talking about ancient peoples. One way to think about it is that an ethnicity forms when individuals identify with a group; when this group marks itself as different from others through its customs, rituals, and myths; and when this group is perceived as distinct by outsiders. Common descent can of course play a key part in creating this community, but the point is that ethnicity isn’t determined at birth. People can choose which group they belong to, adhere to its standards, and so be recognized as a member of that group.

In the case of the Avars, those standards of self-identity were mainly political. The sources use the term “Avar” to refer to the elite mounted warriors of the khaganate, but also to the khagan’s advisors and envoys who didn’t necessarily come from the steppe. For instance, if a Slavic subject proved his worth to the khagan, acted as his ambassador, and conformed to the behaviours of the ruling class, then he could be inducted into this elite minority group and be considered an Avar, no matter his origins or the language he spoke.

On the other hand, in every recorded case of an Avar defecting to the empire, the sources no longer call him an Avar. This suggests that a person could only be an Avar as a part of the khaganate; if he no longer adhered to its power structure, he was stripped of his status as an Avar, regardless of his dress, beliefs, language, or descent. Unlike the Goths who were considered Goths no matter where they were and who they served, Avar identity depended on belonging to a political group.

We can see this process of identification play out in the late 6^th century invasions of the Balkans. When our sources recount the raids in Greece, they distinguish between Avars and Slavs based on their lifestyles, allegiances, and forms of warfare. They use the label “Avar” for high-status warriors on horseback who fought with sophisticated equipment and techniques, and who returned into the fold of the khaganate after raiding. On the other hand, the sources use the label “Slav” for any warriors who fought on foot, especially if they remained behind on imperial land; so if a horseback warrior decided to reject the khagan’s authority, to settle his family in the Balkans, and to take up farming, the sources lump him in with the Slavs.

What this tells us is that Avar ethnic affiliation was a dynamic process. To be an Avar, you had to serve the khagan, participate in the khaganate’s public life, and behave according to its customs. Initially, only a restricted group of nomads from the steppes fit these standards, but over generations, the Avar ethnic group adjusted to include loyalists and to exclude defectors.

Whatever the Avars couldn’t produce from their flocks, they extracted from neighbouring sedentary communities. Indeed, the Avars subjugated the Gepid and Romance communities of the Carpathian Basin and forced them to pay tribute; and when some Slavic tribes migrated into the region, they too were given the same demands. This tribute consisted of goods like grains and tools which weren’t a necessity for the Avars, but rather a speciality; the nomads could live just fine with cheese and bows made using animal products from their herds, but if they wanted more specialized goods, like carts and swords, they needed the resources and expertise of agrarian communities. Nomadic societies had a long tradition of trading with sedentary ones for manufactured goods which they couldn’t produce themselves – and raiding for them when they didn’t like the deal.

In fact, a main source of wealth for the khaganate came from plunder and subsidies extracted from their agrarian neighbours. After the khagan had settled his followers on the grassy plains of the Carpathian Basin, he ordered his warriors to ride out in all directions. By the 570s, Avar warriors reached the Alps in the West, the Danube in the South, and the Black Sea in the East, and forced the communities in those regions to pay them tribute.

During the 580s, the Avars aimed to extract tribute from the rich Roman empire; their riders repeatedly defeated imperial forces and devastated the Balkans. One reason for their success was that numerous Slavic tribes were also attacking the empire at the same time since they sought to migrate onto its lands. Another reason was the long and exhausting war which the Romans were fighting against the Persians; only after the two sides concluded a peace could the Romans turn their full attention towards the Balkans.

Once reinforcements trekked back West, the imperial army campaigned against the Avars and Slavs almost every year in the 590s. The result of this decade of relentless campaigning was that the Romans reformed their defensive line along the Danube and stopped the unmitigated flow of raiders into their provinces. As the 7^th century dawned, the Avar advance had finally been checked.

The Romans saw the Avars as endlessly aggressive and greedy in their desire for plunder and riches. But from the Avar perspective, wealth was a marker of social prestige, and the khagan needed to accumulate riches for himself and to distribute them amongst his followers to maintain his leadership position. And for a group of nomadic horse archers, there was no better place to acquire riches than the empire, which is why the khagan used constant threats and attacks to convince the emperor to give him money.

The Avars saw these payments as tribute, whereas the Romans were careful to call them “subsidies.” Indeed, in most cases, the sources use the term dóra, meaning “gifts,” which were presumably given for services offered, namely for fending off unfriendly barbarians.

Such tribute or subsidy treaties were established on several occasions. The first was negotiated in 575 and granted the khagan 80,000 soldi annually. Ten years later, this sum rose to 100,000 soldi, and a dozen years after that, in 598, the sum went up to 120,000 soldi. If there was fighting between the two sides, the deficit was compensated by retroactive payments, meaning that, between 575 and 602, the khagans had amassed almost 3 million soldi. That’s a big number, but it doesn’t mean much without context. To put it into perspective, the empire had an annual revenue of about 5 million soldi towards the end of the 6^th century. By that measure, it took the khagans three decades of raiding and negotiating to amass about two-thirds of the wealth the empire collected in a single year. You can see why the emperors preferred to secure peace by using their tax revenue as opposed to the lives of their soldiers.

But while this was a relatively small sum for the empire, it was considerable for the khagan, whose accumulated wealth allowed him to exercise power over his followers and subjects. His treasure included coins, dresses embroidered with gold and silver, saddles and girdles ornamented with gold, silken garments, glass vessels, couches, precious stones, and even Indian spices. It was a dizzying array of luxury goods, and no one north of the Danube could access them except through the intermediary and favour of the khagan.

Indeed, the Avar ruler restricted trade with the empire to ensure he maintained control on the wealth flowing in and out of his realm. For instance, we have no evidence that the khaganate exported animal products to the empire, even though the Avars produced an immense amount of them through their lifestyle. Looking at it from the other side, very few amphorae have been found inside the khaganate, which is strange since they were such common objects in the empire; the most plausible explanation is that there wasn’t extensive trade across the border, since we would’ve found many more amphorae had the Romans been allowed to export them.

And so, the khagan accumulated a tremendous amount of riches through plunder and subsidies. He used some of the coins he received to buy luxury goods in Constantinople, but most of the soldi that came his way were melted down to be used in the production of gold goods for the elite.

Goldsmiths enjoyed a particularly high status in the khaganate, as indicated by the fact that they were buried with their tools. One grave includes tongs, hammers, bellows, Roman-type molds for casting belt fittings and jewellery, as well as a precision scale with Roman weights. As these objects suggest, many of these goldsmiths were in fact Romans. The khagan’s forces regularly brought back prisoners of war who had special skills, and some artisans were permanently settled inside the khaganate. Goldsmiths were especially important, because the prestige value of gold far outweighed its monetary use. The Avars had no need for currency in their internal economy, since they received staple goods from their subjects and made big transactions between themselves by bartering luxury goods.

The khagan needed all these coins and prestige goods from the Roman empire to distribute as symbolic gifts. By bestowing wealth, he was able to maintain his position at the top of the power structure, show his largesse as a ruler, place his warriors under his obligation, and channel competition between his followers and rivals. In effect, one of his main roles within the khaganate was to balance the acquisition of prestige amongst the elite.

You see, Avar warriors received everything they needed to live from the tribute of subject peoples. They didn’t need silver basins, gold jewellery, and silk cloaks, but they wanted such luxury goods because they reflected their position within society. Dazzling clothes and beautiful weapons were ways for Avars to signal their status to their peers. If Avar warriors had only wanted to enrich themselves for the sake of wealth, then they could’ve gone off on their own as independent raiders or entered imperial service as mercenaries. But they didn’t; they remained loyal to the khagan because they not only needed to communicate their status, but to also have their status acknowledged by the ruler.

To receive a gift from the khagan meant receiving the favour of the legitimate sovereign, which made you rise in the power hierarchy of the khaganate. Receiving such goods could also be a way to become an Avar: if you rendered an exceptional service to the khagan, he could recognize your efforts with splendid gifts and signal to the other Avars that you were one of them. Indeed, the khagan was surrounded with logádes, meaning “the chosen” in Greek, who were advisors personally appointed by him who could come from outside the clan structure. Ultimately, the goal of accumulating prestige was to be close to the khagan. If you stepped outside of that power structure, your prestige dissipated and your wealth no longer translated into status.

Though the Avar elite were driven by the acquisition of luxury goods, their society couldn’t function without the tribute provided by their agrarian subjects. The ruling class needed the produce of farmers, shepherds, and artisans to have the freedom to play their power games.

This diverse population included Gepid communities on the lands of the former province of Dacia, as well as Romance communities which had been there long before them; and there were also some Slavic tribes who had migrated into the Carpathian Basin in the late 6^th century and established relationships with the natives of the region. This fascinating amalgam of peoples will be the topic of our next episode.

So join me in two weeks as we survey the subjects of the Avars and the relationships they negotiated with their overlords to advance their interests.