CC BY
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HISTORICAL SCIENCES
UDC 93/94
Ismailzade Saida Jafar
PhD in History, Associate Professor Ganja State University Ganja, Azerbaijan ORCHID: 0000-0002-2877-8944 DOI: 10.24412/2520-6990-2024-1194-4-6 ABOUT THE SOCIO-CULTURAL LIFE OF THE BULGARS
Abstract.
As we know the Turkic tribes that inhabited the steppes of the Northern Black Sea region to the Caspian Sea and the North Caucasus from the IV century and migrated in the 2nd half of the VII century partially to the Danube region, and later to the Middle Volga region and a number of other regions, the Bulgars participated in the eth-nogenesis of such modern peoples as the Balkars, Bashkirs, Bulgarians, Gagauz, Karachai Kumyks, Tatars and Chuvash. They had a pronounced hierarchy in social life, a rich system of military service, as well as cultural life. The Bulgars had several religions.
Since the Bulgars had developed industrial relations to a certain extent, they established trade relations with other countries. Written sources and archaeological materials provide a number of information about everyday life, religious views and cultural development of the Bulgars.
From this point of view, in this article we will consider in detail the trade relations of the Bulgars, their everyday life, religious views, cultural development, etc.
Keywords: Bulgars, socio-cultural life, trade relations, religious views
Introduction: The Bulgars, occupying an important page of history, arouse the interest of researchers around the world. Arab authors, reporting on the Bulgars, noted their trade relations not only with neighboring countries, but also with distant states.
Although the Bulgars had a river fleet, and they went north along the Volga and its tributaries to the Visu people, and through the Volga and Oka to the Russian lands, but the sources suggest that a more active role in trade through the Volga belonged to Russia, the Khazars and the countries of the Muslim East. Muslim countries also had caravan trade at their disposal, although caravans from Bulgaria went east. Ibn Fadlan clearly states: when a ship came from the country of the Khazars to the country of the Slavs, the king rode on horseback and believed that he was in the ship, and took a tenth of all property. When Russians or other tribes came with slaves, the tsar took one of every ten heads for himself. Russians come from their own country and keep their ships on the banks of the Atoll River, which is a large river. (1, 130)
The main part; Masudi reports on caravans heading East from Bulgaria. Caravans marched from the east to the Khazar khaganate and the Bulgars. Ibn Fadlan traveled to the Bulgars on camels and horses. (2)
Trade with the Visu people was conducted by exchange. Various fur goods were exported from the Vistula lands to Bulgaria. Reporting this, Rubin notes that to purchase these goods, merchants usually went to the Visu country via Itil (3, 133). Qazvini reports that (thirteenth century) the Bulgars reached the Land of vizular after a three-month journey, where the night lasted no more than an hour, and sometimes longer. Everyone puts their product with a special sign and leaves. Then he comes, finds the goods needed for his land, if he
likes this product, he changes it and gives his goods instead. If he doesn't like it, he takes his product back. The buyer and the seller do not see each other. In the 20s of the XIV century, Batute, who personally visited Bulgaria, can be said to have conducted this trade, he describes the same thing. (1, 130).
According to Aufin, the Visu people were 20 days away from the Bulgars. He reports that on the other side of Visu, to the north, there are people of Yugra, and on the other side of Yugra there are people who are engaged in the marine industry on the coast. Given the archaeological materials and the settlement of the Ugri-ans around the Northern Urals, we can settle the Visu people only in the upper Kama according to Aufin. Visu is one of the ancestors of Komi. Obviously, these methods of trade were related to the peculiarities of social relations among the Vistulans and Ugrians and could not characterize the situation and accepted methods of trade in the Bulgarian Khanate.
Even about the trade of the Bulgars, Ibn Rust describes the earliest trade in a different way. The Khazars trade with the Bulgars, just as the Russians bring their goods to them. Everyone living on both banks of the mentioned river (Volga) brings them their goods, squirrels, sables, squirrel furs and so on. (1, 131)
The Russians send their prisoners to the Khazar khaganate and the country of the Bulgars and sell them there. When Muslim merchant ships arrive, they take tithes with them. Their wealth is squirrel fur. They do not have certain money, and here they are replaced by squirrel fur. Each fur is equal to two and a half dirhams. White round dirhams come to them from Muslim countries in exchange for goods. Al-Balkhi, who wrote in the first half of the tenth century, gives a fairly complete list of goods on the Bulgarian markets and indicates trade routes connecting Bulgaria with other countries:
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prisoners and furs come here from Slavic, Khazar and other neighboring countries. In Bulgaria, these goods go east to the Samanid state, and from there to distant Islamic lands. Honey and wax also go from Bulgaria to the Khazar Khaganate. (3, 134)
An Arab geographer of the 10th century also adds fish, arrow trees, hats, fish teeth, nuts, swords, armor, sheep, cattle, etc. to the ink of these goods originating from Holy Bulgaria, some of these goods were not domestically produced, but were imported from other countries. (1, 131)
According to these data, Bulgaria maintained trade relations with Russia, the Khazars and Muslim countries. The main product from Russia is fur. Russian Russians did not need Russian furs for their own use, which means that the Russians sent furs here for subsequent shipment to the east along the Volga. The Khazars did not have their own fur. The Khazars received furs as tribute from the Slavic tribes under their control, and also sent them to Bulgaria beyond the eastern countries.
The Bulgars distributed goods of their own production throughout the state and in neighboring countries. According to archaeological materials, it has been established that Bulgar objects flocked to the areas of the Middle and Upper Kama. During this period (X-the beginning of the XIII century) there appeared women's jewelry made of silver, crystal, etc., which were the products of Bulgarian jewelers. There is certain information about the goods that merchants brought to Bulgaria from eastern countries. Ibn Rustam reports that the Bulgars brought armor. Khvolson believes that the armor came from the East, although he also mentioned armor in his list of goods going East from Holy Bulgaria. Al-Balkhi reports that the clothing of the Khazars and their neighboring peoples consists of galig and outerwear. Basically, the clothes of the Khazars, Bulgars and Pechenegs are very long jackets. And they prepare the material themselves, bring it here from Korjan, Tabaristan, Azerbaijan and the Byzantine state. (1, 132) You can also find out about the oriental goods brought by the Arabs to the Bulgars, based on the things that the Arab embassy handed over to the person they encountered on the way to Bulgaria and in Bulgaria itself. In 922, the Arabs presented the head of the Guz-Turkic army with silk and cloth clothes, pearls, walnuts, pepper, 50 dinars, musk, leather, jaligs, boots, silk veils and rings. (2, 106)
The ambassadors of the Caliph presented the Bulgarian tsar and his lady with aromatic substances, clothes, pearls and robes. It is also known that Russians, Khazars and Bulgars were very worried about the white silver money in the Arab gira. There was a great need for this money. The Khazars never had such sliced money, the Bulgars and Russians cut them into small pieces. Arab dirhams sold well in both regions. Ibn Rustam notes on this occasion that Russians in the Bul-gar and Khazar khaganates sold furs and captives for money and tied them tightly to their belts.(1, 132)
Ibn Fadlan also tells us that the Russians prayed to their idols that the gods would send them merchant buyers with a large number of dinars and dirhams. Dirhams
play a prominent role in the court ceremony of the Bulgarian tsar. When the king met with the ambassadors of the Caliph, the king gave dirhams to the ambassadors. When the ambassadors gave the king expensive gifts that they brought to tea, including clothes, his court women sprinkled him with dirhams. According to the author, the wealth of Russians was measured by the number of dirhams they had. If a man has 10,000 dirhams, then he gives his wife one monisto, if he has 20,000 dirhams, he gives her two monistos, so that every 10,000 dirhams added to his wealth are reflected in his wife in the form of a monisto. (2, 106-107). Arab money was common in Bulgaria as early as the 7th century. One of the oldest treasures found on the territory of Tatarstan is a treasure in the village of Almetyevsky, 20 km from Billiards. 150 silver dirhams of the VIII-IX centuries were found there. 38% of them date back to the time of the Arab Caliph Harun al-Rashid (the last quarter of the VIII century). In the 10th century, coins from the Samanid state, at that time the most powerful state in Central Asia, were distributed in Bulgaria. (1, 133)
In the 10th century, faceted money appeared in the Bulgarian state, in addition, the Samanid monetary system had a direct impact on the Bulgarian monetary system. The first Bulgarian coins date back to 918 and were not skillfully made and imitated Samanid coins. In their writings, they even copied the names of medieval cities. Shashchi (Tashkent), Balkh, Samarkand, Nishabur. It should be noted that this money was not minted in these cities. Some of the money was not even cut at first: it was in a molten form. The molds for melting such money were preserved. Based on numismatic analysis, it has been established that this money belongs to the money of the Bulgars. Based on them, it was also possible to find out the name of one of the early Bulgarian khans: Mikail ibn Jafar.
The Suvar dirhams of Nasr ibn Ahmad, the Suvar and Bulgar dirhams of Talib ibn Ahmad belong to the years 921-958. Later, coins minted in 976 with the name of Imam Ibn Ahmad, and in 976-980 with the name of Imam Ibn al-Hasan are known. Ethnographic research suggests that the Bulgars were pagans.
During the reign of Islam, these ancient forms of religious thought not only lived as remnants, but also entered the Muslim belief system, simply taking a slightly different form. For example, Arabic inscriptions have appeared indicating a magical effect on hamails. The names of God bring happiness, strength, get rid of devilish and black forces, from predators, bring love, get rid of diseases, facilitate childbirth, bring good luck on the road, facilitate the payment of taxes, etc. The penetration and spread of Islam in Bulgaria is explained by the presence of strong economic ties with the East. Compared to primitive religion, the Islamic class was a new ideological phenomenon that arose in the interests of society. Other religious views, such as Christianity and Judaism, also had their positions here. There is religious tolerance in Bulgaria, as evidenced, on the one hand, by the absence of references to religious persecution in written sources, and on the other hand, by the fact that these sources indicate the presence of Christian Muslims and Jews among the
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Bulgars. Objects related to Christianity (the cross, etc.) were found in Bulgarian cities, which partially confirms this assumption. But he also doubts that Islam was in the first place here.
Local legends attribute the arrival of the first Arab Muslim preachers here to the time of the semi-legendary Emir Aidar. Rubin and other authors mark the year 922 as the date of the adoption of Islam in Bulgaria. They probably borrowed this information from Ibn Fadlan, not considering it accurate. Fadlan himself to some extent indicates that before his arrival in these territories, Islam already existed here. (4, 108)
Undoubtedly, the year 922 is an important date for Islam in Bulgaria. This religion is becoming an official, state religion and a major political force. The head of the Muslims who received the king took the name of the Arab Caliph Jafar and received various signs of patronage and support from him, which led to an increase in his political influence. Soon Almush-Baltavar Jafar began to wield a sword, referring to the divine origin of his rule. (1, 176). One of the motives for adopting Islam was the desire to strengthen their position in the fight against the Khazar khaganate. In this struggle, in addition to the sword, the goal was to resist religions - Islam against Judaism. The king sought help from the caliph, he sought help in building fortifications, he thought it could protect him from the Jews.
Soon the upper class of society appears, they accept Islam, and Islam begins to spread. Ibn Rustam, who wrote somewhat later than ibn Fadlan, reports that most of the Bulgars profess Islam. According to His Saint, the Suvar Jews converted to Islam at the end of the 10th century, while the Bulgars had long been invaded by Muslims. The information in the Russian chronicle about the Bulgarian Islamic missionaries who went to the Kiev Prince Vladimir Svyatoslavich dates back to 986.
Further successes of Islam can be learned from the data of Ibn al-Asir. According to him, in 435, the Kharki people from Desht- i-Kipchaks adopted Islam, their number is about 10,000 people. However, Ibn al-Asir adds that these were Turkic non-believers (not of the Islamic faith) who lived next to the Bulgars in the summer and spent the winter in the vicinity of the city of Taksagun. Such territorial indicators - the proximity of these steppe peoples to the Bulgars - give reason to believe that Islam among the steppe peoples was spread by the Bulgars. (3, 138) Over time, Islam became stronger and entrenched. In the 13 th century, Papal missionaries called the Bulgars the most faithful among Muslims. Many of the Cheremis, Chuvash and Bashkirs, who were subordinate to the Bulgarian tsar, converted to Islam. In the Mordovian city of Burtasy, some of the inhabitants professed Islam back in the 10th century. Although Islamic ideas have never won the hearts of the Bulgarian people, they have influenced their development. It is known that a huge number of religious laws and rules of Sharia and the Koran were a tool in the hands of the ruling class to crush the lower class, negatively affecting the development of art by prohibitions on the depiction of living beings.
List of used literature
1. Греков Б.Д., Калинин Н.Ф. Булгарское государство в домонгольское завоевание, с.97-185. Материалы по истории Татарии, 1, ТАТГОСИЗДАТ, 1948, 487 с.
2. Ковалевский А.П. Книга Ахмеда Ибн-Фад-лана о его путешествии на Волгу в 921-922 гг., Харьков, 1956, 345 с.
3. Пигулевская Н.В. Сирийские источники по истории народов СССР, М.Л., 1941
4. Смирнов А.П. Волжские булгары, М., 1951, 275 с.
