Cities of Khazaria. Kromos Estatium
======================
The khazar cities here include not only those cities that were built by the khazar architects, but also those that were built before the arrival of the khazars, were used by the khazars for their needs and tasks for a long time.
=======================
Savgar **
This khazar city is often associated with the cities of Saltov and Sarada. Rybakov noted some linguistic similarities in the naming of these cities. It is known that georgians called osetians as saviars, from which we can conclude that the city of Savgar was founded by these saviars, and maybe savirs.
Archaeologists and historians, studying the cities of Khazaria, did not agree on the exact location Savgar, city of the Khazaria state. It is only known that it appeared together with the formation of Khazaria in the 8th century, and in history it began to appear in the 9th century. Since the 12th century, historians have stopped mentioning the city in their chronicles.
There is a version that Netaylov settlement belongs to Savgar, which is located on the left bank of the Pechenezhsky reservoir of the Seversky Donets. This settlement is located just in front of Verhnesaltov settlement.
The main Netaylov cultural monuments are pit-type burial grounds that belong to the turkic-speaking proto-bulgars and to the pra-bulgars of the 7th century. Judging by the huge number of graves, more than 15 thousand of them, the city that was located here was very large even by khazar standards.
The population here was different-ethnic, there were many merchants from different countries: from Asia, from North Africa, from Pannonia, from the Volga region. Artisans were engaged in the repair and manufacture of various agricultural utensils, the manufacture of clothing from leather, there were jewelry masters here.
The city is located on the trade route between Europe and the Volga region, which corresponds to the descriptions of Savgar's position as a city of international trade.
In Ancient Khazaria there were many large fortified cities. Savgar, apparently, was one of the centers of saltov-mayatsk culture of the Khazar Khaganate.
The beginning of Savgar as a city with fortifications can be attributed to the middle of the 9th century, which is a hundred years later than Saltov. This was the time of the final formation of the trade and economic system in the Volga-Don interfluve, whose carriers were the alans, bulgars, khazars and savirs. In the Don steppes, there is a transition to a sedentary lifestyle, to agriculture and crafts.
By this time, all the settlements and cities of Khazaria were created, of which Saltov, Savgar and Sarada were distinguished by the fact that there were no other religions except Tengri. The kings of judaism did not come here, but the Kagan visited other cities twice a year, when he toured his possessions.
In the middle of the 10th century, Savgar is mentioned in a letter from the last king of Khazaria, Joseph, as a city with active trade and skilled artisans. Joseph tried to enlist the support of the jews of Spain in order to send his diplomats, merchants to Khazaria, so he tried to present his country in the best possible way.
At the beginning of the 10th century, the arab geographer Ibn Khordadbeh mentions among the important khazar cities also Savgar, which has strong walls and is very rich.
At the end of the 10th century persian authors of Hudud-al-Alam almost repeats the words of Khordadbeh, adding that the city was probably the center of the western part of Khazaria. This, by the way, does not allow us to identify him with either Sarad or Saltov.
Both the one and the other authors give two identical lists of ten Khazar cities, among which Savgar is repeated: Itil, Semender, And Hallig, Baida The Belendger, Savgar, Htlg, Lkn, Sur, Masmuda. The appearance of this list is attributed to the end of the 9th century.
Also, from the ancient chronicle statements about this city, it can be concluded that trade routes between Europe and the Volga region passed through it.
Philologists and lexicologists often conclude that Savgar of the ninth century, Sarada of the twelfth century, Saltanovsky of the sixteenth century, Saltov of the 8th century are names of the same city. They argue their findings that among the turkic-speaking tribes of the letters the consonants «l» and «R» merged into one sound, so in the original Savgar can match Savgalrtu and Sarada will be in the original Salada, which is almost the same.
The city was inhabited by people of various ethnicities, but a special position was occupied by savirs, who came from the Siberian regions. Apparently, they gave the name to the city, in accordance with their tradition of naming their cities, noting their ethnic name in the naming of cities.
Since the city was located on the ancient trade route between the Volga region and Europe, stone buildings were built here for permanent residence of holders of trading posts of Western merchant unions.
There were residential buildings and habitations in the form of semi-earthen houses with post walls above the ground, which were common for the khazars and later slavs. There were also yurts.
After the defeat of the Khazarian capital Itil, the city of Savgar, like all other settlements of the saltov-mayatsk culture, falls into decline.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++