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Atil, also Itil, was the capital of the Khazar Khaganate from the mid-8th century to the late 10th century. It is known historically to have been situated along the Silk Road, on the northern coast of the Caspian Sea, in the Volga Delta region of modern Southern Russia. Its precise location has long been unknown.

In 2008 a Russian archaeologist claimed to have discovered the remains of Atil in Samosdelka, a village in the Volga Delta approximately 30 km southwest of the city of Astrakhan. This claim has since been disproven.

Name

The historical Turkic peoples living on or near the Volga region called both the river and the Khazar capital city on the river Itil or Atil.^[1]

Modern Turkic languages have retained the historical name for the Volga. The Volga is known as İdel ( Идел) in Tatar, as Atăl (Атӑл) in Chuvash, as Iźelin in Bashkir, as Edıl in Kazakh, and as İdil in Turkish. The origin and meaning of the ancient Turkic form "Etil/Ertil" are uncertain.^[2]

History and description

Atil was located along the Volga delta at the northwestern corner of the Caspian Sea. Following the defeat of the Khazars in the Second Arab-Khazar War, Atil became the capital of Khazaria.

Ibn Khordadbeh, writing in ca. 870, names Khamlij as the capital of the Khazars.^[3] This is presumably a rendition of Turkic khaganbaligh "city of the khan" and refers to the city later (in the 10th century) named as Atil in Arab historiography.

At its height, the city was a major center of trade. It consisted of three parts separated by the Volga. The western part contained the administrative center of the city, with a court house and a large military garrison. The eastern part of the city was built later and acted as the commercial center of the Atil, and had many public baths and shops. Between them was an island on which stood the palaces of the Khazar Khagan and Bek. The island was connected to one of the other parts of the city by a pontoon bridge. According to Arab sources of the 10th century,^[4] one half of the city was referred to as Atil, while the other was named Khazaran.

Atil was a multi-ethnic and religiously diverse city, inhabited by Jews, Christians, Muslims, Shamanists, and Pagans, many of them traders from foreign countries. All of the religious groups had their own places of worship in the city, and there were seven judges appointed to settle disputes (two Christian, two Jewish, and two Muslim judges, with a single judge for all of the Shamanists and other Pagans).^[5] The numerous Christians of Atil were under the jurisdiction of their own bishop; the minaret of the Friday mosque of the Muslims of Atil is said to have been higher than the castle.^[6]

Miniature depicting payment of tribute to the Varangians and the Khazars, Radziwiłł Chronicle

The city was a major trade center, and managed the Khazar slave trade, in which slaves bought for export were transported from the Khazar Khaganate to either the Black Sea slave trade in the West via the Black Sea port of Kerch, or East from the capital of Atil via the Caspian Sea to Central Asia and from there to slavery in the Abbasid Caliphate.^[7]

Svyatoslav I of Kiev sacked Atil in 968 or 969 CE. Ibn Hawqal and al-Muqaddasi refer to Atil after 969, indicating that it may have been rebuilt.^[8] Al-Biruni (mid-11th century) reported that Atil was again in ruins,^[9] and did not mention the later city of Saqsin which was built nearby, so it is possible that this new Atil was only destroyed in the middle of the 11th century.

The search for archaeological remains

As of 2024, the archaeological remains of Atil have not been positively identified. An accepted hypothesis is that they were washed away by the rising level of the Caspian Sea.

Samosdelka site

In September 2008, Russian archaeologists excavating in the Volga Delta fishing village of Samosdelka announced their discovery of what they claimed were the remains of Atil.^[10]^[11] A 2020 assessment by the Russian Geographic Society concluded that Atil had not been found in Samosdelka, and announced that new excavations were underway at another site.^[12]

Semibugry site

The archaeological remains of a settlement from the Khazar period near the village of Semibugry (Russian: Семибугры) in the central part of the Volga Delta were discovered after Samosdelka and as of 2020 were being excavated in the hopes that the settlement was Atil.^[12] According to historian Alex Feldman, "it remains impossible to archaeologically prove" the location of Atil.^[13]

Gallery

References

^ "Atil or Itil| Jewish Virtual Library". www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 2024-10-10.
^ Akhmetyanov R. G. Brief Historical and etymological dictionary of the Tatar language. - Kazan: Tat. publishing house, 2001. p. 76. ISBN 5-298-01004-0 (In tatar: Әхмәтьянов Р. Г. Татар теленең кыскача тарихи-этимологик сүзлеге. — Казан: Тат. кит. нәшр., 2001. б. 76. )
^ Golden, Peter B. (1980). Khazar Studies: An Historico-Philological Inquiry into the Origins of the Khazars. Akadémiai Kiadó. p. 230.
^ Golden, Peter B. (1980). Khazar Studies: An Historico-Philological Inquiry into the Origins of the Khazars. Akadémiai Kiadó. p. 224.
^ Brook, Kevin A. (2018). The Jews of Khazaria (3rd ed.). Rowman & Littlefield. p. 52. ISBN 9781538103425.
^ https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/atil-or-itil-jewish-virtual-library
^ The World of the Khazars: New Perspectives. Selected Papers from the Jerusalem 1999 International Khazar Colloquium. (2007). Nederländerna: Brill. p. 233
^ Dunlop, Douglas M. (1954). The History of the Jewish Khazars. Princeton University Press. pp. 245–246, 248.
^ Dunlop, Douglas M. (1954). The History of the Jewish Khazars. Princeton University Press. p. 248.
^ Vasilyev, D. "Итиль-мечта (The Itil Dream)". Retrieved 2008-09-28.
^ "Scholar claims to find medieval Jewish capital". NBC News. 2008-09-21. Retrieved 2024-10-10.
^ ^a ^b "On the Threshold of the Great Discovery: Archaeologists Begin Excavations of the Legendary Capital of the Khazar Khaganate". Russian Geographical Society. 2020-06-15. Retrieved 2024-10-10.
^ Feldman, Alex Mesibov (2023). "Chapter 4: Khazaria: The Exception Which Proves the Rules". In Raffensperger, Christian (ed.). How Medieval Europe was Ruled. Routledge. p. 48. doi:10.4324/9781003213239-4. ISBN 978-1032100166.