Page:Notes upon Russia (volume 2, 1851).djvu/77

Concerning the Tartars and their origin: besides what is contained in the annals of the Poles, and in the little books upon the two Sarmatias, much has been written by various authors, which it would be more tedious than useful to repeat here. I have, however, thought it right briefly to write down such things as I have learned from the Russian annals, and from the accounts given me by a great number of persons. They say that the Moabites, who were afterwards called Tartars, and who differed from the rest of mankind in language, manners, and dress, came to the river Calka; but that no one knew whence they came, or what religious doctrine they held. Although they were called by some Taurimieni, by others they were known as Pieczenigi, and by others under another name. Methodius, bishop of Patanczki,^[1] says that they wandered out of the deserts of Ieutriskie, lying between the north and east, and gives the following as the reason of their emigration. He says, that a certain man of the highest rank amongst them, named Gideon, filled them with terror, by saying that the end of the world was at hand; and that they being led away by his preaching, and anticipating the destruction of the boundless wealth of the globe, made expeditions with an innumerable multitude to plunder the surrounding provinces, and cruelly ransacked the whole territory westward as far as the Euphrates and the Persian Gulf; and thus, after ravaging the provinces which lay in their way, routed at the river Calka, a.m. 6533 [a.d. 1025], the nations of the Polovtzi, who alone, with the assistance of the Russian