Belendger

Cities of Khazaria. Kromos Estatium
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     The khazar cities here include not only those cities that were built by the khazar architects, but also those that were built before the arrival of the khazars, were used by the khazars for their needs and tasks for a long time.
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Belendger **
     Also Belendgar, sometimes Semender, Varachan, Sabandar.
     An ancient Ghost town on the territory of Khazaria. Since the 9th century, the city was part of the sphere of interests of Rus, since it was located at the intersection of many trade routes through which Rus received the goods it needed, carried out diplomatic contacts with Byzantium, Armenia, and Persia.
     It was a real Ghost town that could not be located with sufficient certainty. Sometimes, according to the chronicle, he appeared in one place, then suddenly at the same time he found himself in another, much removed from the first place.
     Ancient historians considered Belendger to be one of the first capitals of the Ancient Khazaria, which was called Varachan, Balendgar, Semender. But in general, all descriptions of the location of the city are reduced to one place, which has not yet been definitively identified with any settlement.
     They say that different settlements had the same name. It is believed that different names are due to different areas of the city, as it was in Itil.
     If the word Belendger is considered an iranian word, it consists of two parts, the word «boland» and the word «jor», which can mean long and cleft. This is what the Belendger Country looks like in the Sulak river valley.
     Tabari, an islamic theologian and author of the History of Prophets and Kings who wrote in the early 10th century, named the city Bulkar. The country of the bulgars was called Balandger by the arabs.
     Balandger, as a name, is mostly found only in arabic and persian sources. At the same time, they apply this term to a certain river beyond Derbent, and to a fortress, and to a city, and to a country, and to a possession in Khazaria, and to a part of the city. The name of Belegere were also passages in the mountain spurs of Balandger.
     Karaite scholar M.Agha explains that the arabic pronunciation of the names of localities and cities is currently unknown. In addition, arabic writers did not always write vowels in these names. M.Agha notes a similar situation in drena, the hebrew language.
     In the 6th century, according to Tabari, there was a balanjar tribe in the Belendger area, who lived next to the abkhazians, alans and bandgar people. On behalf of this people, or on behalf of the mountain or from the river name the city got its name.
     As suggested by R.Bariev belangeri presented in the 6th century, a significant ethno-political union, which until the early 8th century maintained its influence in the eastern part the Central Caucasus, where stay the country Belendger. Balangary was included in the Khazar Union, although they completely can not be considered as the khazars.
     Yakut noted that according to arabic written sources and a generalized arabic map of the Caucasus, the first city of Khazaria on the way through Bab-al-Abwab was Belendger.
     At the beginning of the 6th century, according to Ya'qubi, the khazars conquered all the regions of Armenia and Ancient Albania. The persian Shachinshah and King of Kings Kavad the First returned these territories to Persia, after which his son Khosrov Anushirvan fortified the passes through the Caucasus range from Bab Abwab to Bab Allan, including 360 cities along this line. Among the cities conquered by Anushirvan, was Bab al-Abvab, Tabasaran and Belendger.
     After these conquests, Anushirvan, according to 9th-century arab authors, built fortresses in Belendger and Samandar. Since that time, arab authors have been counting the foundation of the city.
     Minorsky, and before him D'arsson, tried to identify Belendger with the city of Bashly, which Artamonov considered unconvincing.
     Artamonov believed that the Balandger corresponds to the Ulluchay river, and the Balandger mountains are spurs of the Caucasus range to the north of the Ulluchay river. These spurs descend very close to the coast, which allowed the ancient inhabitants of this land to use these spurs as passages, which they called on the Balanjar river, to the banks of which these spurs reached. The city of Balandger itself and the mountain were located in the lower reaches of the Ulluchay.
     According to the assumptions of Artamonov and Vestberg, Belendger-Varachan should have been located on the site of modern Buinaksk.
     Belendger is best identified with a settlement near the village of Chir-Yurt on the Sulak river in Dagestan. The size of this settlement is 1.5 hectares. This is 130 by 130 meters. Chir-Yurt closes the entrance to the fertile valley of the Sulak. This valley was densely populated during the early middle ages. There were 12 fortified settlements along 15 kilometers of its coast.
     Around the settlement there are many cemeteries of unburned catacomb and simple pit graves, as well as of catacombs under mounds, which archaeologists refer to the 7th-9th centuries.
     On the field side, the city is fortified by a grand moat and a wall 10 meters wide made of stone and glinobit bricks with layers of reeds that soften the blows of frequent earthquakes in these places. The fortress wall was fitted with a semi-circular projecting towers. In addition, round outrigger towers were connected to the wall by lintels, the base of which was a huge mound-type embankment.
     Ibn al-Asir, a kurdish-born Islamic historian, who wrote in the 13th century, noted that it was the most famous of the khazar fortresses of early times.
     The arabs wrote a lot about the powerful fortifications of Belendger. Tabari noted that from the towers of this city, the khazars inflicted great damage on the arabs.
     In arabic sources, Belendger is referred to as a country, as well as a possession of Belendger, by this term they meant many cities. At the end of the 8th century, after the transfer of the Khazarian capital to Itil, the city could be owned by representatives of the rich nobility.
     Armenian sources of the 7th century is called the Belendger as Varacan, claiming that it was the capital of Bersilia.
     In 654, according to the mid-10th-century persian historian Bal'ami, the arab leader Abd-ar-Rahman decided to move further to north from Derbent, against Belendger, which Masudi, an arab traveler of the first half of the 10th century, called the ancient capital of the khazars.
     According to one version, Abd-ar-Rahman captured Belendger without loss. Then the famous arab cavalry allegedly penetrated even further into Khazaria, reached Al-Beida, a city located 12 horse marches from Belendger, where later the city of Itil appeared in the lower reaches of the Volga.
     According to another version, the city, which at that time had good fortifications, offered stubborn resistance. The description of the battle mentions a tower from which the khazars threw stones heated in the fire. The arabs also used mortars, they did not break through the walls of the fortress and towers.
     For several days there was a persistent struggle around the city. Finally, the Belendgers waited for the moment when the arabs began to rebuild, making an unexpected sortie at the very moment when the khazar support unit hit the besieging arabs from the rear. Abd-ar-Rahman was killed and the arabs retreated to Derbent. Four thousand arabs were killed that day.
     Abd-ar-Rahman was considered a great conqueror by the turks. They remembered him from their encounters with him in 646, when he had already reached both Belendger and Al-Beida. His body was sealed in an earthen vessel that they carried with them, believing that in this way the gods would help the khazars in wars, and also give the earth a lot of rain.
     Ibn al-Asir noted that the arab muslims breaked the resistance of the defenders, while receiving a good 300 dinars for each warrior with a horse, and there were thirty thousand such soldiers.
     Balazuri and Yaqubi do not know any Abd-ar-Rahman or the city of Belendger. They relate the first acquaintance of the khazars with the arabs to the second half of the 7th century, when the khazars were attacked by the arab leader Selman, who died on the Belendger river along with thousands of his soldiers.
     There is news that at the end of the 7th century, the Belendger river flowed in Khazaria, in the lower reaches of which there were the largest khazar camps.
     News of the city appears in stories when the khazars moved their capital to Samandar in the 720s. From that moment on, Belendger did not leave the pages of chronicles and stories for several hundred years.
     According to the information of ancient monks who passed through these regions in search of places for christian prayers, two christian churches were built in the city of Belendger.
     The karaites the Belendger called the capital of savir and barsil. They decipher the name of this city in their own way. Among them, the word «bala» means baby, the word «endir» means swaddling, and the word «er» means cradle.
     In 721, an arab leader named Jarrah leads his cavalry to Derbent, where he meets the vanguard of the khazar army. The khazars retreated into the interior of the country. Jarrah took several khazar cities, and among them was the city of Turku, after which he came to the country of Belendger. The arab chroniclers of the deeds of Jarrah report that the owner of this country, whom the arabs called Sahib, disappeared in his capital Semendea.
     After capturing several cities in the country of Belendger, Jarrah came to Vanandar, a large city where at least 40,000 families lived, as the arab historian Ibn al-Asir wrote. Not wanting to fight them, the arabs agreed not to destroy the houses of the inhabitants if they would pay an annual tribute to the treasury of the Caliphate.
     In 723, the arabs again come to the North Caucasus. They took Belendger, and the prisoners were ordered to be drowned, as there were so many of them. Apparently it was the Sulak river, the only river in Dagestan where you can drown someone.
     Semender and Belendger have belonged to the khazars since the beginning of the 9th century. Previously, since the end of the 7th century, these cities were repeatedly captured by the arabs, but the khazars invariably returned them back.
     The arabs called vanandars and venentras bulgar, so that the city of Vanandar can be associated with the city of Bulkar, which was also called Belendger. Both names were applied by the arabs to both the country and its main city. Armenian geographies called this hunnic territory as Varachan.
     Ibn al-Asir reported that Belendger was the most impregnable and therefore famous of the khazar fortresses in the North Caucasus. Tabari called her Bulkar.
     Al-Kufi reports about the city of Belendger in connection with Maslama's campaign in Khazaria in 731. According to his information, the city has not yet recovered from the destruction that Jarrah caused ten years earlier.
     In 733, the arab Prince Ibn Abd al-Malik visits Khazaria. In his campaign, he passes Belendger, which did not resist for a long time, its residents went along the mountain spurs to the gorges of mount Belendger.
     In 737, Mervan successfully fought the Khazar Khagan, forcing him to recognize the power of the Koran, which the Khagan forgot the next year. On the way, Mervan forced the ruler of Belendger to convert to Islam. At the same time, they met outside the fortress, which was then a ruin.
     Some historians connect Belendger with the modern village of Tarki near Makhachkala, which was located a few kilometers from the sea. Ancient historians noted that the capital of Land Belendger was located near the big water. For a thousand years, the water of the Caspian sea could recede far from the city. But these comparisons between Belendger and Tarku seem dubious.
     Belendger in the course of its development is constantly evolving, in the form of new settlements. Hence was its many different names.
     Varachan belonged to the northern part of the hunnic Kingdom, which was spread out to the north of Derbent. It was the capital of the huns, around which eventually formed an independent possession of Belendger, also called Bulker and Bulgar. The population of this part of the hunnic Kingdom consisted of barsils, which formed one of the many divisions of the bulgarians.
     In some sources, information about Belendger and Semender is given as if they are geographically separated. After the arabs took the city of Varachan-Vanandar, whose country the arabs called Belendger, the khazars moved their capital to the Itil river, where their settlement of al-Beida was already located. Then the chief city of the country Belendger became the city Samandar. From this report, it can be understood that Belendger and Semender are different cities, but at the same time it can be assumed that Belendger in new circumstances at the end of the 8th century became known as Semender.
     Some archaeologists give arguments justifying the finding of Belendger in the area of the Agach-Kalin burial ground in the north of Dagestan. Here lived both the khazars and the closely related barsil tribe, sedentary and agricultural-pastoral, indistinguishable from the khazars.
     According to the Idrisi map, compiled long after Belendger's time, Semender lies to the south of Belendger. The arabs, describing their campaigns against the khazars, after Derbent met on their way first Belendger, and then Semender. Perhaps this was due to the ornate nature of the Caucasian roads.
     Masudi, calculating the distance between the cities of Khazaria, writes about Belendger as a country that was located on the Terek river, where the city of Semender also stood.
     In the 10th century, Ibn Fadlan passed through all of Khazaria, leaving extensive information about the country. He, trying to explain the many names of the city of Belendger, explains that Belendger among the bulgars was considered the ancestral home, the main economic unit. Just why their city was called Barangar.
     Ibn Fadlan also reports that these ancestral houses moved from their former country of Belendger, by which they meant the whole of Dagestan.
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