The Sabir live predominantly in the region of Azerbaijan and Dagestan bounded on the east by the Caspian Sea, on the west by the Caucasus Mountains.
Priscus mentions that the Sabir attacked the Saragur, Urog and Unogur tribes in 461, forcing them North to the Volga once more, as a result of having themselves been attacked by the "Avars".
In 515, having recovered from the Avar attacks of the 460s, they "advertised their power in a huge raid south of the Caucasus, in which they attacked Iranian and Byzantine lands with scrupulous impartiality".
However, in the face of the increasing Avar threat, the Sabirs, previously allied with Sassanid Persia, switch their allegiance to Constantinople in 551 and invade the Caucasus.
The imperial army and their Sabir allies (some six thousand men) under Bessas recapture the strategic imperial fortress of Petra, located on the coast of the Black Sea.
Bessas orders the city walls razed to the ground, but a new army under Mihr-Mihroe is able to establish Persian control over the eastern part of Lazica.
The imperial forces in Lazica withdraw west to the mouth of the Phasis, while the Lazi, including Gubazes and his family, seek refuge in the mountains.
