The Khazars, having been compelled to shift the center of their empire northward after 737, establish their capital at Itil (located near the mouth of the Volga River) and accept the Caucasus Mountains as their southern boundary.

During the same period, however, they expand westward.

The most striking characteristic of the Khazars is the apparent adoption of Judaism by the khagan—a secluded supreme ruler of semireligious character—and the greater part of the ruling class in about 740.

The circumstances of the conversion remain obscure, the depth of their adoption of Judaism difficult to assess; but the fact itself is undisputed and unparalleled in central Eurasian history.

A few scholars have asserted that the Judaized Khazars are the remote ancestors of many eastern European and Russian Jews, later known as Ashkenazim.

Whatever the case may be, religious tolerance is practiced in the Khazar empire, and paganism continues to flourish among the population.

Russian archaeologists will announce in 1999  that they had successfully reconstructed a Khazarian vessel from the Don River region, revealing four inscriptions of the word “Israel” in Hebrew lettering.

It is today the accepted opinion among most scholars in the field that the conversion of the Khazars to Judaism was widespread, and not limited merely to the royal house and nobility.

According to tenth-century Khazar King Joseph, in his Reply to Hasdai ibn-Shaprut (c. 955): “After those days there arose from the sons of [khagan] Bulan's sons a king, Obadiah by name.

He was an upright and just man.

He reorganized the kingdom and established the Jewish religion properly and correctly.

He built synagogues and schools, brought in many Israelite sages, honored them with silver and gold, and they explained to him the 24 Books of the Bible, Mishnah, Talmud, and the order of prayers established by the Khazzans.

He was a man who feared God and loved the law and the commandments.”

The Khazar empire has reached the peak of its power by the second half of the eighth century, extending along the northern shore of the Black Sea from the lower Volga and the Caspian Sea in the east to the Dnieper River in the west.

The main source of revenue for the empire stems from commerce and particularly from Khazar control of the east-west trade route that links the Far East with Constantinople and the north-south route linking the Arab empire with northern Slavic lands.

The Khazars control and exact tribute from the Alani and other northern Caucasian peoples dwelling between the mountains and the Kuban River; from the Magyars (proto-Hungarians) inhabiting the area around the Donets River; from the Goths; and from the Greek colonies in the Crimea.

The Volga Bulgars and numerous Slavic tribes also recognize the Khazars as their overlords.

The proto-Magyars around the Don River are subordinates of the Khazar Khaganate.

Their neighbors are the archaeological Saltov Culture, i.e.

Bulgars (Proto-Bulgarians, descendants of the Onogurs) and the Alans, from whom they learned gardening, elements of cattle breeding and of agriculture.

The Bulgars and Magyars have shared a long-lasting relationship in Khazaria, either by alliance or rivalry.

The system of two rulers (later known as kende and gyula) is also thought to be a major inheritance from the Khazars.

Tradition holds that the Magyars are organized at this time in a confederacy of tribes called the Hét Magyar, whose tribes are Jenő, Kér, Keszi, Kürt-Gyarmat, Megyer (Magyar), Nyék, and Tarján.

The confederacy had been formed as a border defending allies of Khazaria, mainly during the reign of Khagan Bulan, the Khazar king who led the conversion of the Khazars to Judaism, and Ovadyah, with the Magyar tribe as ascendant.

A civil war breaks out in the Khazar khaganate around 830.

As a result, three dissident tribes of the Khazars, called Kabars, join the seven Magyar tribes and they move to ...

...what the Magyars call the Etelköz, i.e., the territory between the Carpathians and the Dnieper River (today's Ukraine).

The exact location of Etelköz is disputed.

"Etel", which means Volga in Old Turkic, could stand for the river Volga, or Etil.

According to Hungarian tradition, Etelköz was located between the river Volga and the lower Danube.

Modern historians, however, usually name slightly different locations, such as around the Dnieper, etc.

In any case, the Magyars appear around 830 on the west banks of the Don River.

Genghis Khan had directed his Mongol forces as far west as the Persian Gulf in 1222 before turning them north toward Tabriz, entering the Russian steppes north of the Caucasus region.

After making it through the Caucasus, the Mongols are met by an alliance consisting of the Lezgians, the Alans and the Cherkesses, tribes who are living north of the Caucasus who have mustered an army of around fifty thousand men.

They are joined by the Cumans, a Turkish people who own an expansive khanate stretching from Lake Balkhash to the Black Sea.

The Cumans have also convinced the Volga Bulgars to join.

The Cuman Khan, Koten, places his army under the command of his brother, Yuri, and his son, Daniel.

The first battle between the league and the Mongols is indecisive, but the Mongols manage to persuade the Cuman to abandon the alliance by reminding them of the Turkish-Mongol friendship and promising them a share of the booty gained from the Caucasian tribes.

With this arrangement settled, the Mongols attack the alliance's army and rout it.

The Mongols then proceed to attack the Cumans, who had split into two separate groups as they were returning home, destroying both armies and executing all the prisoners before sacking Astrakhan.

The Mongols begin pursuing the Cumans as they flee in a northwesterly direction.

The Venetians send a delegation to the Mongols, and they conclude an alliance in which it is agreed that the Mongols will destroy any other European trading post they came across.

As the Mongols pursue the Cumans, Jebe sends a detachment to Crimea, where the Republic of Genoa has trading stations.

The Mongols' influence and their intermarriage with the Russian aristocracy has a lasting effect on Russia.

Despite the destruction caused by their invasion, the Mongols have made valuable contributions to administrative practices.

Through their presence, which in some ways had checked the influence of European Renaissance ideas in Russia, they have helped reemphasize traditional ways.

This Mongol—or Tatar as it becomes known—heritage has much to do with Russia's distinctiveness from the other nations of Europe.

The effects of Timur's victory, as well as those of devastating drought and plague, are both economic and political.

The Golden Horde's central base had been destroyed, and trade routes are moved south of the Caspian Sea.

Political struggles lead to the split of the Golden Horde into three separate khanates: Astrakhan, Kazan, and the Crimea.

Astrakhan—the Golden Horde itself—is destroyed in 1502 by an alliance of Crimean Tatars and Muscovites.

he last reigning descendant of Chinggis, Shahin Girai, khan of the Crimea, will be deposed by the Russians in 1783.

Astrakhan, situated in the delta of the Volga River about sixty miles (one hundred kilometers) from the northwest shore of the Caspian Sea, becomes prominent around 1466 as the capital of one of the Tatar khanates that has emerged from the breakup of the Golden Horde.

The Golden Horde had broken up subsequent to Timur’s conquest into the separate khanates of Astrakhan, ...

Sokollu Mehmed Pasa, the Ottoman Grand Vizier, had dispatched troops to Azov in 1568 with the intention of seizing Astrakhan from Russia.

Simultaneously, troops had moved up the Don River to initiate canal construction.

Technical problems force a halt to the project after the canal is about one-third complete, and Turkish vessels must be portaged to the Volga River, from which the Turks invest Astrakhan in early 1569.

The Turkish troops, failing to reduce the Russian city, withdraw and are lost on the return journey in a storm on the Black Sea.

Sultan Selim orders Mehmed Pasa to cancel the Volga-Don canal project for which the war was begun.