Russian archaeologists find long-lost Jewish capital

[DogPoundPup]

Source: Yahoo News

MOSCOW (AFP) - Russian archaeologists said Wednesday they had found the long-lost capital of the Khazar kingdom in southern Russia, a breakthrough for research on the ancient Jewish state.

"This is a hugely important discovery," expedition organiser Dmitry Vasilyev told AFP by telephone from Astrakhan State University after returning from excavations near the village of Samosdelka, just north of the Caspian Sea.

"We can now shed light on one of the most intriguing mysteries of that period -- how the Khazars actually lived. We know very little about the Khazars -- about their traditions, their funerary rites, their culture," he said.

The city was the capital of the Khazars, a semi-nomadic Turkic peoples who adopted Judaism as a state religion, from between the 8th and the 10th centuries, when it was captured and sacked by the rulers of ancient Russia.

At its height, the Khazar state and its tributaries controlled much of what is now southern Russia, western Kazakhstan, eastern Ukraine, Azerbaijan and large parts of Russia's North Caucasus region.

The capital is referred to as Itil in Arab chronicles but Vasilyev said the word may actually have been used to refer to the Volga River on which the city was founded or to the surrounding river delta region.

Itil was said to be a multi-ethnic place with houses of worship and judges for Christians, Jews, Muslims and pagans. Its remains have until now never been identified and were said to have been washed away by the Caspian Sea.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080903/lf_afp/russiahistoryculturearchaeology_080903160809

[applegrove]

1. Cool!

[Taverner]

2. This will bring a lively discussion

Some Jews deny that the Khazars ever existed, attributing the story to anti-semitic folks who want to sever the Biblical Jews from the Modern ones.

Other Jews see this as a thing of pride, something long buried by history.

[yurbud]

4. were the Khazars ethnically Jewish or converts?

[Taverner]

5. Hard to say - allegedly there were conversions in the Khazar empire

And one theory states that many of the Ashkenazi Jews are descendants of these converts

However, testing shows that all Jews share similar DNA, whether they be Ashkenazi, Sephardic or Mizrahi so that blows that theory out of the water.

[aquart]

8. Jewish men have the same DNA. Jewish women not so much.

Someone posited a theory based on the Hebraic names the Khazars used as to when they set up their kingdom. As with any other culture, some Jewish names were more popular in one period than another. And groups of Jews had lots of reasons to leave home. Often times we were forcibly resettled.

And our religion doesn't hate sex. So the DNA just pops up everywhere.

[Taverner]

9. Hmmmm wouldn't both carry the genes?

That seems strange

The names are one thing

The DNA an altogether different thing

[htuttle]

10. Genes tend to be passed on in affinity groups (caveat...I'm a layperson regarding genetics)

For example, I've read that there are numerous genes that tend to be associated with a Y chromosome. That would lead to a particular traceable gene being found more (or even exclusively) in men.

[harmonicon]

13. different chromosomes

While children have DNA from both parents, some gets passed down and can be traced back to women, other types through men. I think it has to do with mitochondrial DNA and Y chromosome type... it's been a long time since I actually learned this stuff in college. Check out the National Geographic "geneorgraphic" site - it's pretty interesting.

[bean fidhleir]

22. What happened was that Jewish men during the Diaspora took up with local, non-Jewish women

which is why Diaspora Jews look like everyone else in their local area, rather than like Arabs. So male dna still has a connection to the Semitic Region, but female dna doesn't. It's local to Italy or France or Germany or Ukraina or whereever.

I don't think it's known why the men didn't bring women with them when they left Palestine.

What's funny is that, religiously, Jewishness is determined through the female line rather than the male. It raises the question of whether Diaspora Jews are Jews under Jewish law. I bet any "conversions" were real quickies that wouldn't hold up today.

[Behind the Aegis]

23. Where did you come by this "history?"

[bean fidhleir]

26. The same places you could, if you were interested in history rather than mythology.

http://www.jogg.info/11/coffman.htm

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/jews-and-their-dna-12496

are just two sources that I trivially easily found.

[Behind the Aegis]

27. And yet neither source proves your points.

Though females were less likely to carry DNA from the Middle East, there were more than a few that carried DNA from that region. Both sources also showed it was the Khazar Jewish population that was more likely to have intermarried, etc. Perhaps you are one of those trying to "prove" Jews of the Diaspora aren't real Jews?

[bean fidhleir]

28. Look, why don't *you* try to explain why Diaspora Jews don't look like Arabs

Those are two perfectly good sources, and if you don't like them that's tough shit.

[Behind the Aegis]

29. Actually, quite a few Jews in Diaspora DO look Arabs.

Besides, not all Arabs look alike anyway. Jews look like Jews. There are quite a few characteristics among Jews, which is why some people say one can "look Jewish." If you don't like your sources, disproving your idiotic remarks, you shouldn't have used them. I found them much more interesting and insightful than your bullshit.

[bean fidhleir]

30. Either refute the sources in the standard way or keep your garbage to yourself

You are not someone for whose politics I have any respect.

[Behind the Aegis]

31. You don't know my politics.

And your sources disprove your own crap, so why be so damn bitchy, you provided the sources. You pissed you can't prove Jews aren't really Jews?

[bean fidhleir]

32. I know everything about your politics that I need to know

Either refute the sources in the standard way or STFU.

[Behind the Aegis]

33. LOL! Sure you do.

You don't know shit about my politics.

I don't have to refute your bullshit, you did it for me with your fabulous sources! Perhaps you just didn't understand them. So, you STFU!

[frustrated_lefty]

34. Mitochondrial DNA may prove helpful. (eom)

[rockymountaindem]

3. Cool

Although as one of my Russian history professors pointed out, while the Khazars are known for adopting Judaism, nobody knows how many actually became Jews after it was made the state religion. Maybe this discovery will help answer that question.

[Raksha]

12. It's generally believed that the converts to Judaism

were the upper-class Khazars for the most part.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

6. Cue the white supremacists.

Boy, do they hate them some Khazars. They use the word as a curse.

Typical of state-of-the-art morons.

[Raksha]

14. The white supremacists are idiots (big surprise).

They are constantly accusing the Jews of trying to conceal something we've never denied! In fact, the original reports of the Khazar kingdom are from medieval Jewish sources. However, because of the obvious communications difficulties in those days, it was impossible to verify whether these reports were truth or urban legend.

As I've said more than once, my best evidence for the veracity of the Khazar "myth" is the nearest mirror. I look more Ukrainian than "Semitic" or "Hebrew," even though both my mother and father were Jewish. So I figure there were a few Khazars in the woodpile, and the white supremacists can go stick it up their rear ends. No reason to be ashamed of it just because they think I should be!

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

15. I have been on the Internet from near the beginning of it...

And Fidonet before that. I have heard and read all the ways that the state-of-the-art morons, the white supremacists like Kevin Strom(The Man of a Million Handles) can attack Jews. And Blacks. And Hispanics. And everyone else who ain't them. From the beginning of that sordid and nauseating education they afforded me I was certain of one true thing: These were the dumbest, most nauseating examples of the wastes of skin and gravity that could ever blight the face of the earth. Intellectually lazy, fundamentally paranoid, incessantly lying and willing to maintain the lies in the face of all truths offered up to prove that they are lying...just too dumb to exist. An existential embarrassment to me, as goyim.

The sad fact is that these people just won't go away.

My career in the music business blessed me with great friends from every ethnic type found in Greater Judaism. They were the finest, most ethical people. I was a guest in their homes. I celebrated Seder and other holidays with them. They watched my back like hawks. Loyal to a fault and beyond. I wish I had received such treatment and loyalty from some of the goyim I have known. Actually, most of them. ;-)

No, I have no truck with those sad, and silly little men who would make Judaism a curse. They are, I guess, the cross us WASP's have to bear.

[roguevalley]

16. archaeology is so great. This is wonderful news.

[Raksha]

17. I'll never forget how shocked I was when I was a newbie

and first ran across a hardcore anti-Semitic hate site, and some of the whackjob fundie sites (which are always borderline ant-Semitic, if not over the line). Some of them were actually still perpetuating the blood libel!

Re My career in the music business blessed me with great friends from every ethnic type found in Greater Judaism. They were the finest, most ethical people. I was a guest in their homes. I celebrated Seder and other holidays with them. They watched my back like hawks. Loyal to a fault and beyond. I wish I had received such treatment and loyalty from some of the goyim I have known. Actually, most of them.

As a general rule, I'd say that's true (not that I'm prejudiced or anything), but ONLY "in general." Unfortunately we've also got homegrown neocon warmongers both American and Israeli. We are also cursed with a Religious Right that is the equal in craziness to anything the Christofascists or Islamic fundamentalists have to offer. About the only good thing I can say on that score is that there aren't as many of them.

But this "Khazar" thing used as an insult has always struck me as especially ludicrous. Historically Jews have tended to be endogamous and almost always marry within the tribe. But if a non-Jew converts that person is adopted into the tribe. Why are these fundie nutjobs so obsessed with the alleged "purity" of Jewish bloodlines? We'd have even more genetic disease than we do anyway if our DNA were as "pure" as they expect it to be.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

18. Sure, I met more than a few pricks, too.

But I did not befriend them and I washed my hands of them. But the good ones? I carry them in my heart forever and they inform me on my feelings towards the Jews.

[Codeine]

21. To be fair,

that sort of filth pops up everywhere. I longtime DUer just got banned a few days back - and about time, too! - for posting an anti-Semitic rant about Jews owning America.

Sadly, it's a sickness that respects no political boundaries.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

35. I have long pondered why...

So many people of Jewish provenance seem to be successful, or at least comfortable. Surely not all, that would be a silly gross generalization, but a lot. I think I have the answer:

It is because the Jewish people are truly loyal, as a community, to each other. They reach out to those amongst them, who struggle, and try to help them. Of course, they do not always succeed, no one ever does. But many times they do.

On the other hand, there are the WASPs, my tribe. When one amongst us is struggling, we make a bloody great circle and keep kicking the struggling person until he stays down. It's great sport and we do it incessantly. For some of us, it's the only real fun we know and we are addicted to it. The more successful the WASP, the more capable of reaching out with opportunity in hand, the more likely they will be right in that circle, at the earliest convenience.

I have seen this too many times. Far too many times.

[Behind the Aegis]

36. Another answer.

Though your answer does have some merit, I personally believe more Jews seem to be successful because of one particular cultural "trait," we value education. If you look back through history, Jews often (and certainly not all), were educated, when others were not. When most of Europe was illiterate except for the clergy, Jews were not. Though I would have to hunt down this stat, from memory, Jews have a higher level of education than non-Jews by comparison. There is an old joke that a Jewish boy doesn't become a man until he graduates Medical/Law school. :)

[Name removed]

7. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Raksha]

11. This is a very exciting discovery for those of us

who believe we have Khazar ancestry. Thank you for posting this article.

[BreweryYardRat]

19. Way cool!

This is very interesting.

[happyslug]

20. Some background on the Khazars:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khazars#Conversion_to_Judaism_and_relations_with_world_Jewry
http://www.khazaria.com/
http://www.iahushua.com/JQ/factsR3.html
http://www.christusrex.org/www2/koestler/index.html
http://www.geocities.com/egfroth1/Khazars
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/khazars1.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khazar_Correspondence
http://www.hebrewhistory.info/factpapers/fp023_khazars.htm

Watch these sites, they all have good information, but at times the prejudice of the writer comes through, just watch for it and enjoy these sites for the information in them and ignore the propaganda aspects. The biggest problem is some of the writers want to make the Jews of eastern Europe descendants of the Khazars NOT the Jews of ancient Israel. This theory originally started in some anti-Semitic books in the 1800s but has been contained not only by Anti-Semitics but by some people who are NOT anti-Semitic. Just a word of warning when reading the above and other sources on the Khazars.

Furthermore the above tend to blame the Russians for the destruction of the Khazar Kingdom. There is strong evidence of the involvement of the Byzantine empire in that destruction. Remember when the Khazars were at the height of their power, the largest city in the world was Constantinople, the Capital of the Byzantine Empire (and had been the largest city since about 500 when Rome's population started to drop and move to Constantinople). Some historians estimate that during the period we are discussing, roughly 600-1200 AD, something like 1/2 of Europe's urban population lived in Constantinople (Yes, the other cities of Europe were minor compared to Constantinople). Baghdad would compete with Constantinople but would not pass Constantinople in Population till after the destruction of the Khazars (Constantinople would stay the largest city in the world till it fell to the Fourth Crusade in 1204, Baghdad would then become the largest city till Baghdad itself fall to the Mongol in 1258). Constantinople would stay the largest city in the world for some time after the fall of Baghdad, its population would never match what it was before 1204. Baghdad would fall even further.

I go into the history of Constantinople for after the Arab Conquest and the lost of Egypt the Byzantine Empire had to look for a new source of grain for the citizens of Constantinople (i.e. 639 AD). Thus after the 7th Century the Grain for Constantinople was from the Ukraine and any threat to that grain was grounds for war. The Rus were ready to supply the grain for unlike the Turkic and Gothic people of the Steppes, the Rus were Slavic and the Slavs all embraced the Heavy Plow as it was introduced to them. The heavy Iron plow had been introduced to the Slavs sometime in the 6th Century from Modern Turkey where it had been in use since the Time of Alexander the Great (This lead to the Slavic Invasions of the 7th Century that tied up Byzantine Troops at the time of the Arab Conquest). It is via the Slavs that the Plow made its way to Western Europe (Yes the Roman Empire had seen its use in modern Turkey, but no one ever thought of moving it yo Western Europe). Given the freeze and hardening of the Ground during Winter, the only way to farm in areas with cold winters is with the Heavy Plow. Thus the introduction of the Heavy Plow saw farming replace heading as the principal way of life in the Ukraine and that was tied in with the Slavs. The Byzantine Empire seems to support the Rus's attack on anyone who threaten that grain supply, and this included the Khazars who were a nomadic Turkic people.

Thus the most likely cause for the destruction of the Khazars was part of the Byzantine plan to keep its food supply safe. You can not have a city of over a million people (Which is the estimated population of Constantinople at the time we are discussing) with out a secure and steady supply of food and anyone who threaten it, even unintentionally, is a clear and present threat to that city and the country it is in. This was probably what caused the Rus to attack the Khazars, Byzantine wanted to secure its grain supply and that grain supply came down the Don. The Khazars were a threat to that supply and had to be destroyed. The Rus had come under string Byzantine Influence and were as dependent on shipping the Grain as Constantinople was on getting it. Thus the Rus were NOT going to cut off the supply of grain, but someone NOT in the Supply chain would do so and that threat had to be eliminated (Please note Byzantine was in the 9th and 1010th Century in a position to reconquer the Egypt and Syria, it only failed to do to the death of two of its Emperors just as each was to launch at attack on Egypt, this move was only stopped by the Moslem recruitment of the Selject Turks as their military arm. The Selject Turks would break into Asia Minor forcing the Emperor to ask for western help, and he received it in the form of the Crusades (But again AFTER the Khazars had been destroyed, through the Byzantine movements through the Middle east occurred at the time the Rus moved against the Khazars in the 900s).

[Loudmxr]

24. I haven't heard of them in years nice to have them back.

However, since it is my job, there is this bigotry in the Jewish community about the Khazars. First the rumor I heard was that they originally converted as a marketing tool to deal with the Christians to the west and the Muslims to the east. Pretty clever.

Then, here comes the bigotry, they were the ancestors of the Ashkenazim in Europe. You know good with money, clever. And their main claim to superiority was that the only famous Sephardic Jew was Espinoza. Oy!! :smoke:

[xchrom]

25. kicking for fascination. nt