Kozar on the Voronezh-river

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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Kozar on the Voronezh-river **
     Also Varanasi, Vantit, Kazar. Khazar, Kaza-grad, Voryn and Boryn in the chronicles of the Volga bulgars. Maybe Kozelsk, but most likely Voronezh.
     Local researchers attribute the formation of Kazagrad at the confluence of the Voro-nezh and Don river to the 4th Millennium BC. At the time of the exodus of the aryan population to the south and the formation of the indo-aryan vocabulary and indo-european community, the aryans set up their sacred city of Vara-nasi in this favorable geographical and natural location. There is a beautiful account of this fact in the Mahabharata. With some shifts in vocabulation, all the hydronyms of this ancient legend coincide with the current ones in the area of the Kozar settlement and Voro-nezh.
     About the Black city of Voro-nezh since the end of the 8th century, there are stories in the legendary Veles book, where this city is named among the cities of the state of Ruskolani. The Black city took part in the war against the goths, led by Germanaric. This message sends the time of the existence of the city of Kozar to the 5th century, when the khazars were not there yet, but the hunnic word «kazar», meaning black, was already present.
     The khazars left a significant mark on the life of the population in the southern Don regions. To the north, closer to the city of Voronezh, they are becoming less. However, even here khazar toponyms were preserved for a long time in the territories of the Voronezh province. This is the Kozar ford, and Kozar fields, and Kozar settlement.
     Boris Rybakov suggested that an important trade hub existed at the intersection of the Voronezh and Don rivers at the end of the 8th century. According to his calculations, there was a single community of Rus, alans and Volga bulgars, who built a pier and a fortified point at the mouth of the Voro-nezh.
     In the 10th century, arab sources, including Ibn Ruste, noted the presence of a trading city named Vantit, which served the trade route between Tmutorokan and Bulgaria, which went between Sura and Khopr to the mouth of the Voro-nezh river. It is interesting that later the Kozlovskaya road passed here, which was originally called the Kozarsky tract.
     The history of Tatishchev lost in the Moscow fire indicates that a certain Black city is present in ancient Chronicles on the site of present-day Voronezh.
     In the early 11th century, according to the history of Tatishchev, several attempts to build a fortress at the mouth of the Voro-nezh were made by Tmutorokan Princes, who represented not Khazaria, but the Russian Khaganate, which then consisted of bulgars, Rus and alans.
     In the middle of the 11th century, the Volga bulgars could put the city of Boryn on the Boro-nezh river. There used to be a khazar fortress, which the locals called Khazar.
     In the last third of the 12th century, an indirect hint of the existence of a city with a fortress at the mouth of the Voronezh river is in the Nikon chronicle, when Yaropolk Rostislavich, Prince of Ryazan, was beaten on the Koloksha and fled to the Black river in Voro-nozh, where he later surrendered and was taken to Vladimir.
     A Hungarian monk who was in the area of Voro-nozh during the mongol invasion, stayed in the city, which he named as Overich or Orgenhausen. According to his descriptions, it was a Fortress above the river, which is why he called it Overich. He also noted that the Horde stood before the walls of the city, but no one opened the gates.
     In 1370, lithuanian military maps were published showing the fortress at the mouth of the Voronezh river at its confluence with the Don-river.
     At the beginning of the 15th century, persian authors, who accompanied the lame Tamerlane on his march to Moscow reported that this Iron Khan reached the urus city of Karasau, which stood over the Black river, taking all his wealth. From both persian and turkic languages, the word «Kara» means black. The word «raven» in some variants means black, and the word «ney» or «nezh» means water.
     Apparently, the city of Kozar, in the name of the Horde as Karasau, stood on one of the trade roads of the Great Silk Road, which is why Tamerlane came to it, trying to deprive his political opponent Tokhtamysh of economic support.
     There are documents from the 17th century that mention the Kozar settlement, located on the right side of the Voronezh river, in the north of the city of the same name, on the cape above the river. Archaeologists identify this khazar city with the Kuznetsov settlement.
     In the 17th century, this place was still called the Old Kazarsky settlement. Here, on a high and dry place, they wanted to move the assumption monastery, which was flooded with water. But the transfer was postponed, having arranged a blind area around the monastery against flooding.
     The epithet «old» in russian archeology refers to the presence of an ancient city with a fortress and a settlement on the site. Thus, in the 17th century, the monks still saw the remains of the city of Kozara on the Kazar settlement, showed wisdom and canceled the move to a more favorable location. By the way, the authorities decided to build a monastery with a Temple below because the ancient settlement was preserved on the high cape in the 16th century.
     The name of the city of Kozar was assigned to the city three centuries after its abandonment by the inhabitants in the 14th century. No one knows how the city was called by the khazars themselves. There is no word or spirit of it in any chronicles, both russian and overseas.
     Among local historians, let's call them researchers, there is an assumption that this was the ancient Kozelsk of the Chernigov region, which was moved here after it was destroyed by the mongols. Either it was the city of Kozar, also from the Chernigov region, transferred to the Voronezh river, or the name was taken from the Chernigov Kozar, which, like Kozelsk, was destroyed by the mongols, or all taken together is the truth.
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