The Cumans (Turkish: kuman/plural kumanlar Hungarian: kun/plural kunok; Greek: Κο(υ)μάνοι, Ko(u)mánoi; Latin: Pallidi, Comani, Cuni, Romanian: cuman/plural cumani, Polish: Połowcy, Plauci (Kumanowie), Russian: Половцы, Polovtsy; Ukrainian: Половці, Polovtsi; Bulgarian: Кумани, Czech: Plavci, Georgian: ყივჩაყი, ყიფჩაღი, German: Falones, Phalagi, Valvi, Valewen, Valani) were a Turkic nomadic people comprising the western branch of the Cuman-Kipchak confederation. After the Mongol invasion (1237), many sought asylum in Hungary. The Cumans had also settled in Hungary and Bulgaria before the Mongol invasion. Related to the Pecheneg, they inhabited a shifting area north of the Black Sea and along the Volga River known as Cumania, where the Cuman-Kipchaks meddled in the politics of the Caucasus and the Khwarezm Empire. Many eventually settled to the west of the Black Sea, influencing the politics of Kievan Rus', the Galicia–Volhynia Principality, the Golden Horde Khanate, the Second Bulgarian Empire, Kingdom of Serbia, the Kingdom of Hungary, Moldavia, the Kingdom of Georgia, Abkhazia, the Byzantine Empire, the Empire of Nicaea, the Latin Empire and Wallachia.: The Cumans also had a pre-eminent role in the Fourth Crusade and in the creation of the Second Bulgarian Empire. Cuman and Kipchak tribes joined politically to create the Cuman-Kipchak confederation. The Cuman language is attested in some medieval documents and is the best-known of the early Turkic languages. The Codex Cumanicus was a linguistic manual which was written to help Catholic missionaries communicate with the Cuman people. The Cumans were fierce and formidable nomadic warriors of the Eurasian steppe who exerted an enduring impact on the medieval Balkans They were numerous, culturally sophisticated and militarily powerful. The basic instrument of Cuman political success was military force, which dominated each of the warring Balkan factions. Groups of the Cumans settled and mingled with the local population in regions of the Balkans. Those Cumans that settled in the Balkans were the founders of three successive Bulgarian dynasties (Asenids, Terterids, and Shishmanids) and the Wallachian dynasty (Basarabids).] But in the cases of the Basarab and Asenid dynasties, medieval documents refer to them as Vlach (Romanian) dynasties. They played an active role in the Byzantine Empire, the Kingdom of Hungary, the Second Bulgarian Empire and Kingdom of Serbia, with Cuman immigrants being integrated into each country's elite. The Cumans' name in Russian and German means "yellow", in reference to the color of the Cumans' hair. The Ukrainian word Polovtsy (Пóловці) means "blond", "pale yellow", since the old Ukrainian word polovo means "straw". Kuman (quba, quw) means "pale yellow", "yellowish grey", "pale, sallow, cream coloured" in Turkic. Some authors put forward the idea that the name Polovtsy referred to "men of the field, or of the steppe" (from the Ukrainian word pole: open ground, field), not to be confused with polyane (cf. Greek polis: city). In Slavic languages the word polyane literally means "open ground, field". According to O. Suleymenov polovtsy came from a word for "blue-eyed", since the Serbo-Croatian word plav means "blue": the Eastern Slavic equivalent would take the regular form *polov. A west-Rus' chronograph refers to the Cumans as being called Половцы (Polovtsy) and Кум (Kum). The western Cumans, or Polovtsy, were also called Sorochinetses by the Rus, this word deriving from sary chechle, which means yellow-haired in Turkic; the word was also evident in the Sary people, who went ahead of or were pushed by the Qun.

• published: 10 Oct 2015
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