Cumans
Battles in Kievan Rus', in Hungary, and in the Balkans

The Cumans first encountered the Rus' in 1055, when they advanced towards the Rus' Pereyaslavl principality, but Prince Vsevolod reached an agreement with them thus avoiding a military confrontation. In 1061, however, the Cumans, under the chieftain Sokal, invaded and devastated the Pereyaslavl principality; this began a war that would go on for 175 years. In 1068 at the Battle of the Alta River, the Cumans defeated the armies of the three sons of Yaroslav the Wise, Grand Prince Iziaslav I of Kiev, Prince Sviatoslav of Chernigov, and Prince Vsevolod of Pereyaslavl. After the Cuman victory, they repeatedly invaded Kievan Rus', devastating the land and taking captives, who became either their slaves or were sold at markets in the south. The most vulnerable regions were the Principality of Pereyaslavl, the Principality of Novgorod-Seversk and the Principality of Chernigov.

The Cumans invaded and plundered the eastern part of the Kingdom of Hungary in 1091. The invading Cumans were leading by chieftain Kapolcs, they broke first in Transylvania, then the territory between the Danube and Tisza rivers. The Cumans tried to leave Hungary with their huge booty and prisoners, but King Ladislaus I of Hungary reached and defeated them near the Temes river. King Ladislaus offered the Christianity for the Cuman survivors, the majority of them accepted, thus the king settled them in Jászság. The rumor of the losing battle reached the Cuman camp, the Cumans threatened King Ladislaus with revenge and demanded to free the Cuman prisoners. King Ladislaus marched to the Hungarian border to prevent the next invasion. The two armies clashed near Severin, the Hungarian army was victorious, King Ladislaus killed Ákos, the Cuman chieftain.

The Cumans initially managed to defeat the Grand Prince Vladimir II Monomakh of Kievan Rus' in 1093 at the Battle of the Stugna River, but they were defeated later by the combined forces of Rus principalities led by Monomakh and were forced out of the Rus' borders to the Caucasus. In these battles some Pecheneg and Oghuz groups were liberated from the Cumans and incorporated into the Rus' border-guard system. Khan Boniak launched invasions on Kiev in 1096, 1097, 1105, and 1107.

In 1096, Boniak attacked Kiev and burned down the princely palace in Berestove; he also plundered the Kievan Cave Monastery. Boniak was defeated near Lubny in 1107 by the forces of the Kievan Rus' princes. The Cumans led by Boniak crushed the Hungarian army led by Coloman in 1099 and seized the royal treasury. In 1109, Monomakh launched another raid against the Cumans and captured "1000 tents". In 1111, 1113, and 1116, further raids were launched against the Cumans and resulted in the liberation and incorporation of more Pecheneg and Oghuz tribes.

During this time, the Cumans raided the Byzantine Empire and Volga Bulgaria. Volga Bulgaria was attacked again at a later stage, by Khan Ayepa, father-in-law of Grand Prince of Kiev Yuri Dolgorukiy, perhaps at his instigation. The Volga Bulgars in turn poisoned Ayepa "and the other princes; all of them died." In 1089, Ladislaus I of Hungary defeated the Cumans after they attacked the Kingdom of Hungary. In 1091, the Pechenegs, a semi-nomadic Turkic people of the prairies of southwestern Eurasia, were decisively defeated as an independent force at the Battle of Levounion by the combined forces of a Byzantine army under Emperor Alexios I Komnenos and a Cuman army under Togortok/Tugorkan and Boniak. Attacked again in 1094 by the Cumans, many Pechenegs were again slain. Some of the Pechenegs fled to Hungary, as the Cumans themselves would do a few decades later. In 1091/1092 the Cumans, under Kopulch, raided Transylvania and Hungary, moving to Bihor and getting as far as the Tisza and Timiș rivers. Loaded with goods and prisoners they then split into three groups, after which they were attacked and defeated by King Ladislaus I.

In 1092, the Cumans resumed their raids against the Rus' and also attacked the Kingdom of Poland: and reportedly reached northern cities located in Lithuania. In 1094-1095 the Cumans, led by Tugorkan, in support of the exiled Byzantine pretender Constantine Diogenes (as a pretext to plundering), invaded the Balkans and conquered the Byzantine province of Paristrion. The Cumans then advanced all the way to Adrianople and Anchialos but could not conquer them. In the following years, when knights of the First Crusade were passing through the empire, Byzantium offered the Cumans prestige titles and gifts in order to appease them; subsequently good relations ensued. From 1097 to 1099, Sviatopolk II of Kiev requested help from the Cumans against Coloman, King of Hungary, who was involved in a feud with Volodar of Peremyshl, Prince of Przemyśl. King Coloman and his army crossed the Carpathian Mountains and laid siege on Przemyśl, which prompted David Igorevich, an ally of Volodar Rostislavich, to persuade the Cumans, under Khan Boniak and Altunopa, to attack the Hungarians.

The Hungarian army was soundly crushed by the Cumans; the Illuminated Chronicle mentions that "rarely did Hungarians suffer such slaughter as in this battle." In 1104 the Cumans were allied with Prince Volodar. In 1106, the Cumans advanced into the Principality of Volhynia, but were repelled by Sviatopolk II. In 1114, the Cumans launched an invasion, from the western Romanian Plain, into the Byzantine Balkans once more. This was followed up by another incursion in 1123/1124. In 1135, the Cumans again invaded the Kingdom of Poland. During the second and third crusades, in 1147 and 1189, crusaders were attacked by Cumans, who were allied to the Asen dynasty of the Second Bulgarian Empire, or who were in Byzantine service.

Cumans at that time also resettled in the Kingdom of Georgia and were Christianized. There they achieved prominent positions, helped Georgians to stop the advance of Seljuk Turks, and helped make Georgia the most powerful kingdom of the region (they were referred to as naqivchaqari). After the death of the warlike Monomakh in 1125, Cumans returned to the steppe along the Rus' borders. Fighting resumed in 1128; Rus' sources mention that Sevinch, son of Khan Boniak, expressed the desire to plant his sword "in the Golden gate of Kiev", as his father had done before him.

On 20 March 1155, Prince Gleb Yuryevich took Kiev with the help of a Cuman army under the Cuman prince Chemgura. By 1160 Cuman raids into Rus' had become an annual event. These attacks put pressure on Rus' and affected trade routes to the Black Sea and Constantinople, in turn leading Rus' to again attempt action. Offenses were halted during 1166–1169, when Grand prince Andrey Bogolyubsky, son of Khan Ayepa's daughter, took control of Kiev in 1169 and installed Gleb as his puppet. Gleb brought in "wild" Cumans as well as Oghuz and Berendei units. Later, the princes of the Principality of Chernigov attempted to use Khan Konchek's army against Kievan Rus' and Suzdal. This Chernigov-Cuman alliance suffered a disastrous defeat in 1180; Elrut, Konchek's brother died in battle. In 1177, a Cuman army that was allied with Ryazan sacked six cities that belonged to the Berendei and Torkil. In 1183, the Rus' defeated a large Cuman army and captured Khan Kobiak (Kobek) as well as his sons and other notables.

Subsequently, Khan Konchek concluded negotiations. Like his son Khan Köten, preceding the Mongol invasion, Khan Konchek was successful in creating a more cohesive force out of the many Cuman groups—he united the western and eastern Cuman–Kipchak tribes. Khan Konchek also changed the old Cuman system of government whereby rulership went to the most senior tribal leader; he instead passed it on to his son Koten. Igor Svyatoslavich, prince of the Principality of Novgorod-Seversk, attacked the Cumans in the vicinity of the Kayala river in 1185 but was defeated; this battle was immortalized in the Rus' epic poem The Tale of Igor's Campaign, and Alexander Borodin 's opera, Prince Igor. The dynamic pattern of attacks and counterattacks between the Rus' and the Cumans indicates that both rarely, if ever, were able to attain the unity needed to deal a fatal blow. The Cuman attacks on the Rus' often had Caucasian and Danubian European implications.

In the Balkans, the Cumans were in contact with all the statal entities. They fought with the Kingdom of Hungary, allied with the Bulgarians of the Second Bulgarian Empire (they were the empire's most effective military component) and with the Vlachs against the Byzantine Empire. A variant of the oldest Turkic chronicle, Oghuzname (The Oghuz Khan's Tale), mentions the Cumans fighting the Magyars, Rus', Romanians (Ulak), and Bashkirs, who had refused to submit to their authority.

In alliance with the Bulgarians and Vlachs, the Cumans are believed to have played a significant role in the uprising led by brothers Asen and Peter of Tarnovo, resulting in victory over Byzantium and the restoration of Bulgaria's independence in 1185. István Vásáry states that without the active participation of the Cumans, the Vlakho-Bulgarian rebels could never have gained the upper hand over the Byzantines, and ultimately without the military support of the Cumans, the process of Bulgarian restoration could never have been realized.

The Cuman participation in the creation of the Second Bulgarian Empire in 1185 and thereafter brought about basic changes in the political and ethnic sphere of Bulgaria and the Balkans. The Cumans were allies in the Bulgarian–Latin Wars with emperor Kaloyan of Bulgaria. In 1205, at the Battle of Adrianople (1205), 14,000 Cuman light cavalry contributed to Kaloyan's crushing victory over the Latin Crusaders.

Cuman troops continued to be hired throughout the 13th and 14th century by both the Bulgarians and Byzantines. The Cumans who remained east and south of the Carpathian Mountains established a county named Cumania, which was a strong military base in an area consisting of parts of Moldavia and Wallachia.
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