Naryn-Kala

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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Naryn-Kala **
     This city existed independently until the 9th century and was a separate part in a single defensive system of fortresses along the Great Silk Road on the Caspian platform.
     By the end of the 9th century, the city becomes part of Derbent, and its further history becomes the history of Derbent.
     The city with a fortress is considered one of the most ancient of those that belong to Rus. The beginning of the fortress is attributed to the rule of the Roman Empire. However, as part of a unified system of control over trade routes, including the Great Silk Road, through the Chora pass, which included, according to persian scholars, 360 fortresses, along with Derbent, Naryn was formed during the reign of the persian Shahinshahs.
     The fortress gets its modern name during the reign of Anushirvan, who named this fortress in honor of one of his daughters. Naryn in persian means beautiful, Sunny. The fortress, indeed, was illuminated by the sun all year round, and had an appearance worthy of the Princess of Shahinshah.
     Earlier on this site there was a fortress that belonged to Ancient Albania, but in the middle of the 5th century, the Naryn fortress was completely rebuilt by Yazdigerd II, the persian Shahinshah, using raw brick for the construction of the fortress walls.
     In the 6th century, the fortress was worn out, the mud brick began to erode, Shahinshach Anushirvan rebuilt it again, now the walls of the fortress are built of stone. The strengthening of the walls of the Caspian fortresses was associated with the influx of turkic peoples to the Caspian platform, who sought to penetrate the territory of Transcaucasia.
     In the fortress there was a Citadel with an area of 4 hectares. Watchtowers stood at the corners of the Citadel walls. Here lived the rulers of this country, along with their families and clerks. The walls of the Citadel were up to 4 meters thick, and their width at the base reached 20 meters. The wall outside and inside had a shell of large stones, inside of which there was a blockage with small stones on clay.
     The fortress had a reservoir with water reserves, which was supplied by a water supply system from mountain springs. This increased the fortress's ability to withstand a long siege, which was useful during the arab-khazar wars for control of the Chora Gate.
     There was a prison here, the most noble nobles of the times of the Golden Horde were buried at the local cemetery. On the territory of the fortress there was a Christian Temple of the end 5th century, which can be explained by the fact that Anushirvan had good relations with Byzantium, which sought to establish a Christian community here.
     The city with its fortress was one of the main bases of the persians in the continuous wars between the huns and the persians, then between the persians and the turks, and then with the khazars. But the fortress experienced the most severe tests during the arab-khazar war. Under its walls, the fate of peoples, kingdoms, states of the Early Middle Ages was decided.
     The khazars, coming here to replace the persians, who at the end of the 7th century themselves faced arab expansion, did not destroy the system of fortresses that had developed under the sarmatians, the last Aryans, who came here in the 4th century before Christ, and became the ethnic basis for the spread of power here of the persian kings, their half-blood.
     All this was inherited by the khazars and adapted to their new strategic tasks in the North Caucasus. Having concluded an eternal Alliance with Byzantium, Khazaria begins to attract autochthonous tribes of the Caspian platform to its annual trade and military campaigns in Transcaucasia and the Crimea, which was not under the Persians.
     Now the military garrisons of fortresses are formed mainly from the local population, to whom the khazar fortresses were rented out. The khazars needed not so much the income from passing caravans here, but the possibility of using the Kumyk tract for military and strategic purposes.
     The participation of local tribes in the khazar armies during the campaigns in Transcaucasia, as well as in the Azov and Crimea, enriched the culture of the tribes and peoples of the Terek-Sulak interfluve. Gradually, in the depths of the Khazarus state, a new ethnic type was formed on this territory, which was a mixture of local autochthonous sociocults and alien savar-bulgar ones.
     At the end of the 9th century, the Naryn-Kala fortress with its townships was absorbed by the metropolis of Derbent.
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