Hungarians

Hungarians, also known as Magyars, are an ethnic group native to present day Hungary ( ), and the Carpathian Basin who share a common culture, language, history and ancestry. They have a notable presence in parts of the former Kingdom of Hungary. The Hungarian language belongs to the Ugric branch of the Uralic language family, alongside the Khanty and Mansi languages. There are an estimated 14.5 million ethnic Hungarians and their descendants worldwide, of whom approximately 9.6 million live in today's Hungary. About 2 million Hungarians live in areas that were part of the Kingdom of Hungary before the Treaty of Trianon in 1920 and are now parts of Hungary's seven neighbouring countries, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, and Austria. In addition, significant groups of people with Hungarian ancestry live in various other parts of the world, most of them in the United States, Canada, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Chile, Brazil, Australia, and Argentina, and therefore constitute the Hungarian diaspora ( ). The diaspora can be divided into several subgroups according to local linguistic and cultural characteristics; subgroups include the Székelys (in eastern Transylvania as well as a few in Suceava County, Bukovina), the Csángós (in Western Moldavia), the Palóc, the Matyó and the Magyarabs (in Nubia).

Hungarians, also known as Magyars, are an ethnic group native to present day Hungary ( ), and the Carpathian Basin who share a common culture, language, history and ancestry. They have a notable presence in parts of the former Kingdom of Hungary. The Hungarian language belongs to the Ugric branch of the Uralic language family, alongside the Khanty and Mansi languages. There are an estimated 14.5 million ethnic Hungarians and their descendants worldwide, of whom approximately 9.6 million live in today's Hungary. About 2 million Hungarians live in areas that were part of the Kingdom of Hungary before the Treaty of Trianon in 1920 and are now parts of Hungary's seven neighbouring countries, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, and Austria. In addition, significant groups of people with Hungarian ancestry live in various other parts of the world, most of them in the United States, Canada, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Chile, Brazil, Australia, and Argentina, and therefore constitute the Hungarian diaspora ( ). The diaspora can be divided into several subgroups according to local linguistic and cultural characteristics; subgroups include the Székelys (in eastern Transylvania as well as a few in Suceava County, Bukovina), the Csángós (in Western Moldavia), the Palóc, the Matyó and the Magyarabs (in Nubia).

Name

The Hungarians' own ethnonym to denote themselves in the Early Middle Ages is uncertain. The exonym "Hungarian" is believed to have derived from the Huns and the Oghur-Turkic Onoğur (literally "Ten Arrows" or "Ten Tribes"). Prior to the Hungarian conquest of the Carpathian Basin when the Hungarian conquerors lived east of the Carpathian Mountains, on the Pontic-Caspian Steppe, written sources called the Hungarians: "Ungri" by Georgius Monachus in 837, "Ungri" by Annales Bertiniani in 862, and "Ungari" by the Annales ex Annalibus Iuvavensibus in 881. The Hungarians probably belonged to the Onoğur tribal alliance, and it is possible that they became its ethnic majority. In the Early Middle Ages, the Hungarians had many names, including "Węgrzy" (Polish), "Ungherese" (Italian), "Ungar" (German), and "Hungarus". In their own language, the Hungarian people call themselves "Magyar". "Magyar" possibly derived from the name of the most prominent Hungarian tribe, the "Megyer". The tribal name "Megyer" became "Magyar" in reference to the Hungarian people as a whole. The Greek cognate of "Tourkia" ( ) was used by the scholar and Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus in his of c. AD 950, though in his use, "Turks" always referred to Magyars. However, although the Magyars do have some Turkic genetic and cultural influence, including their historical social structure being of Turkic origin, they still are not widely considered as part of the Turkic people. The obscure name kerel or keral, found in the 13th-century work The Secret History of the Mongols, possibly referred to Hungarians and derived from the Hungarian title király ('king'). The historical Latin phrase "Natio Hungarica" ("Hungarian nation") had a wider and political meaning because it once referred to all nobles of the Kingdom of Hungary, regardless of their ethnicity or mother tongue.

History

Pre-4th century AD

During the 4th-3rd millennium BC, the Uralic-speaking peoples in Siberia began to split up. Some dispersed towards the west and came into contact with Turkic- and Iranic-speaking peoples who were spreading northwards. From at least 2000 BC onwards, Ugric-speakers became distinguished from the rest of the Uralic-speaking peoples. Judging by evidence from burial mounds and settlement sites, they interacted with the Indo-Iranian Andronovo culture and Baikal-Altai Asian cultures.

4th century to c. 830

In the 4th and 5th centuries AD, Ugric-speakers moved to the west of the Ural Mountains, to the area between the southern Ural Mountains and the Volga River, known as Bashkiria (Bashkortostan) and Perm Krai. Oghuric-speaking peoples from Inner Asia migrated to the Pontic-Caspian steppe around the mid-5th century. In the early 8th century, some Ugric-speakers moved to the Don River, to an area between the Volga, Don and the Seversky Donets rivers. Those around the Don River were subordinates of the Khazar Khaganate. Tradition holds that the Hungarians were organized in a confederacy of seven tribes: Jenő, Kér, Keszi, Kürt-Gyarmat, Megyer, Nyék, and Tarján. Most of the tribal names are believed to be of Turkic origin. The Hungarians neighboured the Oghuric Bulgars on the Pontic-Caspian Steppe, with cooperation in gardening, cattle breeding and agriculture.

c. 830 to c. 895

Around 830, a rebellion broke out in the Khazar khaganate. As a result, three Kabar tribes of the Khazars joined the Hungarians and moved to what the Hungarians call the Etelköz, the territory between the Carpathians and the Dnieper River. The Hungarians faced their first attack by the Pechenegs around 854. The new neighbours of the Hungarians were the Varangians and the eastern Slavs. From 862 onwards, the Hungarians (already referred to as the Ungri) along with their allies, the Kabars, started a series of looting raids from the Etelköz into the Carpathian Basin, against Great Moravia, the Eastern Frankish Empire, the First Bulgarian Empire, and the Balaton principality.

Entering the Carpathian Basin (c. 862–895)

(Chronicon Pictum, 1358) The Hungarians arrived in the Carpathian Basin, a geographically unified but politically divided land, after acquiring thorough local knowledge of the area from the 860s onwards. After the end of the Avar Kaganate (c. 822), the Eastern Franks asserted their influence in Transdanubia, the Bulgarians to a small extent in the Southern Transylvania and the interior regions housed the surviving Avar population in their stateless state. The downfall of the Avar Khaganate at the beginning of the 9th century did not mean the extinction of the Avar population, contemporary written sources report surviving Avar groups. According to the archaeological evidence, the Avar population survived the time of the Hungarian conquest of the Carpathian Basin. In 862, Prince Rastislav of Moravia rebelled against the Franks, and after hiring Hungarian troops, won his independence; this was the first time that Hungarians expeditionary troops entered the Carpathian Basin. In 862, Archbishop Hincmar of Reims records the campaign of unknown enemies called "Ungri", giving the first mention of the Hungarians in Western Europe. In 881, the Hungarian forces fought together with the Kabars in the Vienna Basin. According to historian György Szabados and archeologist Miklós Béla Szőke, a group of Hungarians were already living in the Carpathian Basin at that time, so they could quickly intervene in the events of the Carolingian Empire. The number of recorded battles increased from the end of the 9th century. In the late Avar period, a part of Hungarians was already present in the Carpathian Basin in the 9th century, this has been supported by genetic and archaeological research, because there are graves in which Avar descendants are buried in Hungarian clothes. An important segment of this Avar era Hungarians is that the Hungarian county system of King Saint Stephen I may be largely based on the power centers formed during the Avar period. According to some genetic studies, there is a genetic continuity from the Bronze Age, a continuous migration of the Steppe peoples from east of the Carpathian Basin. The foundation of the Hungarian state is connected to the Hungarian conquerors, who arrived from the Pontic steppes as a confederation of seven tribes. The Hungarians arrived in the frame of a strong centralized steppe-empire under the leadership of Grand Prince Álmos and his son Árpád, they became founders of the Árpád dynasty, the Hungarian ruling dynasty and the Hungarian state. The Árpád dynasty claimed to be a direct descendant of the great Hun leader Attila. Medieval Hungarian chronicles from the Hungarian royal court like the Gesta Hungarorum, Gesta Hunnorum et Hungarorum, Chronicon Pictum, Buda Chronicle, Chronica Hungarorum claimed that the Árpád dynasty and the Aba clan are the descendants of Attila. Árpád, Grand Prince of the Hungarians, says in the : The Hungarians took possession of the Carpathian Basin in a pre-planned manner, with a long move-in between 862 and 895. This is confirmed by the archaeological findings, in the 10th-century Hungarian cemeteries, the graves of women, children and elderly people are located next to the warriors, they were buried according to the same traditions, wore the same style of ornaments, and belonged to the same anthropological group. The Hungarian military events of the following years prove that the Hungarian population that settled in the Carpathian Basin was not a weakened population without a significant military power. Other theories assert that the move of the Hungarians was forced or at least hastened by the joint attacks of Pechenegs and Bulgarians. According to eleventh-century tradition, the road taken by the Hungarians under Prince Álmos took them first to Transylvania in 895. This is supported by an eleventh-century Russian tradition that the Hungarians moved to the Carpathian Basin by way of Kiev. Prince Álmos, the sacred leader of the Hungarian Great Principality died before he could reach Pannonia, he was sacrificed in Transylvania. In 895/896, under the leadership of Árpád, some Hungarians crossed the Carpathians and entered the Carpathian Basin. The tribe called Megyer was the leading tribe of the Hungarian alliance that conquered the centre of the basin. At the same time (c. 895), due to their involvement in the 894–896 Bulgaro-Byzantine war, Hungarians in Etelköz were attacked by Bulgaria and then by their old enemies the Pechenegs. The Bulgarians won the decisive battle of Southern Buh. It is uncertain whether or not those conflicts contributed to the Hungarian departure from Etelköz. From the upper Tisza region of the Carpathian Basin, the Hungarians intensified their campaigns across continental Europe. In 900, they moved from the upper Tisza river to Transdanubia, which later became the core of the arising Hungarian state. By 902, the borders were pushed to the South-Moravian Carpathians and the Principality of Moravia collapsed. At the time of the Hungarian migration, the land was inhabited only by a sparse population of Slavs, numbering about 200,000, who were either assimilated or enslaved by the Hungarians. Archaeological findings (e.g. in the Polish city of Przemyśl) suggest that many Hungarians remained to the north of the Carpathians after 895/896. There is also a consistent Hungarian population in Transylvania, the Székelys, who comprise 40% of the Hungarians in Romania. The Székely people's origin, and in particular the time of their settlement in Transylvania, is a matter of historical controversy.

Ethnic affiliations and genetic origins

and Mansi people. Modern Hungarians stand out as linguistically isolated in Europe, despite their genetic similarity to the surrounding populations. The population of the Carpathian Basin has the common European gene-pool which formed in the Bronze Age through the admixture of three sources: Western Hunter-Gatherers, who were the first Homo sapiens appearing in Paleolithic Europe, Neolithic farmers originating from Anatolia, and Yamnaya steppe migrants that arrived in the late Neolithic to early Bronze Age. This common European gene pool in the Carpathian Basin, has been overlaid by migration waves originating from the east since the Iron Age. According to genetic studies, the Carpathian Basin was continuously inhabited from at least the Bronze Age. There is a genetic continuity from the Bronze Age, a continuous migration of the Steppe folks from east to the Carpathian Basin. The foundational population of the Carpathian Basin carrying the common European gene pool remained in a significant majority throughout the migratory periods in the Carpathian Basin. During the 9th century BC, smaller groups of pre-Scythians (Cimmerians) of the Mezőcsát culture appeared. The classic Scythian culture spread across the Great Hungarian Plain between the 7th–6th century BC, their genetic data represent the genetic profile of the local European population. The Sarmatians arrived in multiple waves from 50 BC, leaving a significant archaeological heritage behind, the examined Sarmatian individuals genetically also belong to the genetic legacy of the local European population. Various groups of Asian origin settled in the Carpathian Basin, such as Huns, Avars, Hungarian conquerors, Pechenegs, Jazyg people, and Cumans. The military leadership of the European Huns descended from the Asian Huns (Xiongnus), while the majority of them consisted of subjugated Germanic and Sarmatian populations. The most significant influx of genes from Asia occurred during the Avar period, arriving in multiple waves. The ruling elite of the Avars originated from the Rouran Khaganate in Mongolia, but a significant portion of the masses they brought in consisted of mixed-origin populations that had emerged in the Pontic-Caspian steppe during the Hunnic era. Foundation of the Hungarian state is connected to the Hungarian conquerors, who arrived from the Pontic steppes as a confederation of seven tribes. According to genetic study, the proto-Ugric groups were part of the Scytho-Siberian societies in the late Bronze Age to early Iron Age steppe-forest zone in the northern Kazakhstan region, near of the Mezhovskaya culture territory. The ancestors of the Hungarian conquerors lived in the steppe zone during the Bronze Age together with the Mansis. During the Iron Age, the Mansis migrated northward, while the ancestor of Hungarian conquerors remained at the steppe-forest zone and admixed with the Sarmatians. Later the ancestors of the Hungarian conquerors admixed with the Huns, this admixture happened before the arrival of the Huns to the Volga region in 370. The Huns integrated local tribes east of the Urals, among them Sarmatians and the ancestors of the Hungarian conquerors. The Hungarians arrived in the frame of a strong centralized steppe-empire under the leadership of Grand Prince Álmos and his son Árpád, they became founders of the Árpád dynasty, the Hungarian ruling dynasty and the Hungarian state. The Árpád dynasty claimed to be a direct descendant of the great Hun leader Attila. The elite of the conquering Hungarians established the Hungarian state, genetic studies revealed, the conqueror elite in both sexes has approximately 30% Eastern Eurasian components, while the commoner population appears to have carried the overlaid local European gene pool from previous eastern immigrations. In medieval Hungary, a legend developed based on foreign and Hungarian medieval chronicles that the Hungarians, and the Székely ethnic group in particular, are descended from the Huns. The basic premise of the Hungarian medieval chronicle tradition was that the Huns, i.e. the Hungarians coming out twice from Scythia, the guiding principle was the Hun-Hungarian continuity. The 20th century mainstream scholarship dismisses a close connection between the Hungarians and Huns. However, the archaeogenetics studies revealed the Hun heritage of the Hungarian conquerors, it was a significant Hun-Hungarian mixing around 300 AD, and the remaining Huns were integrated into the conquering Hungarians. The genomic analyses of the Hungarian royal Árpád family members are in line with the reported conquering Hungarian-Hun origin of the dynasty in harmony with their Y-chromosomal phylogenetic connections. According to the growing archaeological evidence that the Avar population lived through the period of the Hungarian conquest of the Carpathian Basin. The Carpathian Basin was demonstrably not empty when the Hungarian conquerors led by Árpád arrived. The conquering Hungarians mixed to varying degrees on individual level with the Avar population living in the Carpathian Basin, but they had Avar genetic heritage as well. According to Endre Neparáczki, it is no longer possible to narrow down the Hungarian population of the Carpathian Basin only of people of Árpád. Following the devastations caused by the Mongol and Turkish invasions, settlers from other parts of Europe played a significant role in establishing the modern genetic makeup of the Carpathian Basin. The Hungarian language belongs to the Uralic language family. While early Ugric-speakers can be associated with an ancestry component maximized in modern-day Khanty/Mansi and historical Southern Siberian groups such as the Pazyryk culture people, the earliest Uralic-speakers can be associated with an Ancient Northern East Asian lineage maximized among modern Nganasans and a Bronze Age specimen from Krasnoyarsk in southern Siberia (Krasnoyarsk_Krai_BA; kra001). This type of ancestry later dispersed along the Seima-Turbino route westwards. They may also stood in contact with other Ancient Northeast Asians (partially linked to the ethnogenesis of Turkic and Mongolic peoples ) and Western Steppe Herders (Indo-European). Modern Hungarians are however genetically rather distant from their closest linguistic relatives (Mansi and Khanty), and more similar to the neighbouring non-Uralic neighbors. Modern Hungarians share a small but significant "Inner Asian/Siberian" component with other Uralic-speaking populations. The historical Hungarian conqueror YDNA variation had a higher affinity with modern day Bashkirs and Volga Tatars as well as to two specimens of the Pazyryk culture, while their mtDNA has strong links to the populations of the Baraba region, Inner Asia, Eastern Europe, Northern Europe and Central Asia. Modern Hungarians also display genetic affinity with historical Sintashta samples. A deeper analysis of historical Hungarian conqueror mtDNA variation revealed that more than one third of their maternal lineages derived from Central-Inner Asian groups like the Saka and the Huns, while the rest originated from the Bronze Age Potapovka-Poltavka-Srubnaya cultures of the Pontic-Caspian steppe. Archeological mtDNA haplogroups show a similarity between Hungarians and Turkic-speaking Tatars and Bashkirs, while another study found a link between the Mansi and Bashkirs, suggesting that the Bashkirs are a mixture of Turkic, Ugric and Indo-European contributions. The homeland of ancient Hungarians is around the Ural Mountains, and the Hungarian affinities with the Karayakupovo culture is widely accepted among researchers. A full genome study found that the Bashkirs display, next to their high European ancestry, also affinity to both Uralic-speaking populations of Northern Asia, as well as Inner Asian Turkic groups, "pointing to a mismatch of their cultural background and genetic ancestry and an intricacy of the historic interface between Turkic and Uralic populations". The homeland of the proto-Uralic peoples may have been close to Southern Siberia, among forest cultures in the Altai-Sayan region and may be linked to an ancestry maximized in the early Tarim mummies. The arrival of the Indo-European Afanasievo culture and Northeast Asian tribes may have caused the dispersal and expansion of proto-Uralic languages along the Seima-Turbino cultural area. Neparáczki et al. argues, based on archeogenetic results, that the historical Hungarian Conquerors were mostly a mixture of Central Asian Steppe groups, Slavic, and Germanic tribes, and this composite people evolved between 400 and 1000 AD. According to Neparáczki: "From all recent and archaic populations tested the Volga Tatars show the smallest genetic distance to the entire Conqueror population" and "a direct genetic relation of the Conquerors to Onogur-Bulgar ancestors of these groups is very feasible." Genetic data found high affinity between Magyar conquerors, the historical Bulgars, and modern day Turkic-speaking peoples in the Volga region, suggesting a possible language shifted from an Uralic (Ugric) to Turkic languages. Hunnish origin or influences on Hungarians and Székelys have always been a matter of debate among scholars. In Hungary, a legend developed based on medieval chronicles that the Hungarians, and the Székely ethnic group in particular, are descended from the Huns. However, mainstream scholarship dismisses a close connection between the Hungarians and Huns. A genetic study published in Scientific Reports in November 2019¹ led by Neparáczki Endre had examined the remains of three males from three separate 5th century Hunnic cemeteries in the Pannonian Basin. They were found to be carrying the paternal haplogroups Q1a2, R1b1a1b1a1a1 and R1a1a1b2a2. In modern Europe, Q1a2 is rare and has its highest frequency among the Székelys. It is believed that conquering Magyars may have absorbed Avar, Hunnish and Xiongnu influences.

Diaspora

Hungarian diaspora (szórványmagyarság) is a term encompassing the total ethnic Hungarian population located outside of the borders of present-day Hungary.

Folklore and communities

See also

References

Sources

Korai Magyar Történeti Lexicon (9–14. század) (Encyclopedia of the Early Hungarian History (9th–14th Centuries)) Budapest, Akadémiai Kiadó; 753. . Károly Kocsis (DSc, University of Miskolc) – Zsolt Bottlik (PhD, Budapest University) – Patrik Tátrai: Etnikai térfolyamatok a Kárpát-medence határon túli régióiban + CD (for detailed data), Magyar Tudományos Akadémia (Hungarian Academy of Sciences) – Földrajtudományi Kutatóintézet (Academy of Geographical Studies); Budapest; 2006.;

External links

Origins of the Hungarians from the Enciklopédia Humana (with many maps and pictures) Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin Hungary and the Council of Europe Facts about Hungary Hungarians outside Hungary – Map Genetic studies MtDNA and Y chromosome polymorphisms in Hungary: inferences from the Palaeolithic, Neolithic and Uralic influences on the modern Hungarian gene pool Human Chromosomal Polymorphism in a Hungarian Sample Hungarian genetics researches 2008–2009

Text derived from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1378546645 under CC BY-SA 4.0; modifications have been made.