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(Northern Ossetia) culture in northern and central Caucasus. In the steppes north of the Black Sea and Azov Sea and the Caucasus, the Iron Age begins with the Koban (1100 BCE-400BCE) and the pre-Scythian Chernogorovka and Novocerkassk cultures from ca. 900 BC. By 800 BC, it was spreading to Hallstatt C ( 800BCE-600 BCE Central Europe) via the alleged Thraco-Cimmerian migrations. It is sometimes assumed that the migration of the Cimmerians was triggered by an Iranian expansion, from the area of the former Srubna culture of Late Bronze Age (16th-12th centuries BC), into the steppes of what is now the Ukraine. is a successor to the Yamna culture, the Catacomb culture and the Abashevo culture. The Srubna culture is succeeded by the Scythians and Sarmatians in the 1st millennium BC, and by Khazars and Kipchaks in the first millennium AD.

In the 4th and 5th centuries AD, the Proto-Magyars moved to the west of the Ural Mountains to the area between the southern Ural Mountains and the Volga River (Bashkiria, or Bashkortostan). In the early 8th century, a part of the proto-Magyars moved to the Don River (to a territory between the Volga, the Don and the Donets), a territory later called Levedia. The Red Croats, remained on the Don. After the Magyar tribes invaded the Pannonian basin in 896, they also started the conquest of Transylvania which remained an autonomous principality of the Hungarian Kingdom until the Ottoman victory over the Magyars following the Battle of Mohács (1526).

The Khazars were a semi-nomadic Turkic people from Central Asia, whose ruling class converted to Judaism. The name 'Khazar' seems to be tied to a Turkic verb meaning "wandering" ('gezer' in modern Turkish). In the 7th century AD they founded an independent Khaganate in the Northern Caucasus along the Caspian Sea, where over time Judaism became the state religion. At their height, they and their tributaries controlled much of what is today southern Russia, western Kazakhstan, eastern Ukraine, large portions of the Caucasus (including Dagestan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, etc.), and the Crimea.

Originally, the Khazars practiced traditional Turkic shamanism, focused on the sky god Tengri, but were heavily influenced by Confucian ideas imported from China, notably that of the Mandate of Heaven. The Ashina clan were considered to be the chosen of Tengri and the kaghan was the incarnation of the favor the sky-god bestowed on the Turks. A kaghan who failed had clearly lost the god's favor and was typically ritually executed. Historians have sometimes wondered, only half in jest, if the Khazar tendency to occasionally execute their rulers on religious grounds led those rulers to seek out other religions.

Following their conversion to Judaism, the Khazars themselves traced their origins to Kozar, a son of Togarmeh. Togarmeh is mentioned in the Hebrew scriptures as a grandson of Japheth. It is unlikely, however, that he was regarded as an ancestor before the introduction of Biblical traditions to Khazaria. In the Torah, Togarmah is listed in the genealogy of nations as the son of Gomer, and grandson of Japheth (Gen. 10:3). Traditionally he is regarded as the ancestor of the Turkic-speaking peoples. According to traditional Armenian and Georgian accounts, both these peoples as well as several other Caucasian peoples are the descendants of Togarmah (Armenian: Thorgom; Georgian: Thargamos). Furthermore, the local names for Armenia (Hayq) and Georgia (Kartli/Sakartvelo) come allegedly from sons of Thogarmas, Haik and Kartlos, respectively.

In the Book of Ezekiel (27:14, 38:6), the descendants of Togarmah are described as trading horses and mules in Tyre and elsewhere in the Levant. Here Togarmah may refer to Armenians or Cimmerians. Gomer, eldest son of Japheth, mentioned in the Old Testament Books of Genesis and Ezekiel; often equated with the Cimmerians (Gimirru), and identified by Flavius Josephus with the Galatians.
The Khazars were important allies of the Byzantine Empire against the Sassanid empire, and were a major regional power at their height. They fought a series of successful wars against the Arab Caliphates, probably preventing an Arab invasion of Eastern Europe. By the end of the tenth century, their power was broken by the Kievan Rus, and the Khazars largely disappeared from history. Armenian chronicles contain references to the Khazars as early as the late second century. These are generally regarded as anachronisms, and most scholars believe that they actually refer to Sarmatians or Scythians. Priscus relates that one of the nations in the Hunnish confederacy was called Akatziroi. Their king was named Karadach or Karidachus. Some, going on the similarity between Akatziroi and "Ak-Khazar", have speculated that the Akatziroi were early proto-Khazars.
The first significant appearance of the Khazars in history is their aid to the campaign of the Byzantine emperor Heraclius against the Sassanid Persians. The Khazar ruler Ziebel (sometimes identified as Tong Yabghu Khagan of the West Turks) aided the Byzantines in overrunning Georgia. Early Khazar history is intimately tied with that of the Gokturk empire, founded when the Ashina clan overthrew the Juan Juan in 552 CE. With the collapse of the Gokturk empire / tribal confederation due to internal conflict in the seventh century, the western half of the Turk empire itself split into two confederations, the Bulgars, led by the Dulo clan, and the Khazars, led by the Ashina clan, the traditional rulers of the Gok Turk empire. By 670, the Khazars had broken the Bulgar confederation, leaving the three Bulgar remnants on the Volga, the Black Sea and the Danube.

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The Khazars were a semi-nomadic Turkic people from Central Asia, whose ruling class converted to Judaism. The name 'Khazar' seems to be tied to a Turkic verb meaning "wandering" ('gezer' in modern Turkish). In the 7th century AD they founded an independent Khaganate in the Northern Caucasus along the Caspian Sea, where over time Judaism became the state religion. At their height, they and their tributaries controlled much of what is today southern Russia, western Kazakhstan, eastern Ukraine, large portions of the Caucasus (including Dagestan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, etc.), and the Crimea.
	Originally, the Khazars practiced traditional Turkic shamanism, focused on the sky god Tengri, but were heavily influenced by Confucian ideas imported from China, notably that of the Mandate of Heaven. The Ashina clan were considered to be the chosen of Tengri and the kaghan was the incarnation of the favor the sky-god bestowed on the Turks. A kaghan who failed had clearly lost the god's favor and was typically ritually executed. Historians have sometimes wondered, only half in jest, if the Khazar tendency to occasionally execute their rulers on religious grounds led those rulers to seek out other religions.