HUNS, a name given to at least four peoples, whose identity remains obscure. (1) The Huns, who invaded the East Roman empire from about A.D. 372 to 453 and were most formidable under the leadership of Attila. (2) The Hungarians or Magyars who crossed the Carpathians into Hungary in A.D. 8g8 and mingled with the races they found there. (3) The White Huns (A€vKoL Ouvvot or Ephthalites q.v.), who troubled the Persian empire from about 420 to 557 and were known to the Byzantines. (4) The Hums, who invaded India during the same period. It is most probable that the last two are identical and although it cannot be proved that the Magyars are descended from the horde which sent forth the Huns in the 4th century, it is pos sible that they were originally Ephthalites. Our present know ledge of the history and distribution of the Huns tends to sup port this view. In the 1st century A.D. the Chinese drove the Hiung-nu westward, and while one division of the Huns re mained in Transoxiana and Afghanistan, another pushed further west and rested near the southern Urals. From this point the Huns invaded Europe, and when their power collapsed, after the death of Attila, many of them may have returned to their original haunts. Possibly the Bulgarians and Khazars were off shoots of the same horde. The Magyars may very well have gradually spread first to the Don and then beyond it, until in the gth century they entered Hungary. Authorities are not even agreed as to the branch of the Turanians to which the Huns should be referred; the physical characteristics of these nomad armies were very variable and there is no certain ethnic or linguistic identification. Hiung-nu seems not to be a partic ular but a general term for warlike nomads. The warlike and vigorous temper of the Huns has led many writers to regard them as Turks. The Turks were perhaps not distinguished by name or institutions from other tribes before the 5th century, but the Huns may have been an earlier offshoot of the same stock. Apart from this the Hungarians may have received an infusion of Turkish blood not only from the Osmanlis but from the Kumans and other tribes who settled in the country.
History.—The authentic history of the Huns in Europe prac tically begins about the year A.D. 372, when under a leader named Balamir (or, according to some mss. Balamber) they began a westward movement from their settlements in the steppes lying to the north of the Caspian. After crushing, or compelling the alliance of various nations unknown to fame (Alpilzuri, Alcidzuri, Himari, Tuncarsi, Boisci), they at length reached the Alani, a powerful nation which had its seat between the Volga and the Don ; these also, after a struggle, they de feated and finally enlisted in their service. They then proceeded, in 374, to invade the empire of the Ostrogoths (Greutungi), ruled over by the aged Ermanaric, or Hermanric, who died (perhaps by his own hand) while the critical attack was still impending. Under his son Hunimund a section of his subjects promptly made a humiliating peace; under Withemir (Winithar), however, who succeeded him in the larger part of his domin ions, an armed resistance was organized; but it resulted only in repeated defeat, and finally in the death of the king. The representatives of his son Witheric put an end to the conflict by accepting the condition of vassalage. Balamir now directed his victorious arms still farther westward against that portion of the Visigothic nation (or Tervingi) which acknowledged the authority of Athanaric. The latter entrenched himself on the frontier which had separated him from the Ostrogoths, behind the "Greutung-rampart" and the Dniester; but he was surprised by the enemy, who forded the river in the night, fell suddenly upon his camp, and compelled him to abandon his position. Athanaric next attempted to establish himself in the territory between the Pruth and the Danube, and with this object set about heightening the old Roman wall which Trajan had erected in the north-eastern Dacia; before his f ortificatior}s, however, were complete, the Huns were again upon him, and without a battle he was forced to retreat to the Danube. The remainder of the Visigoths, under Alavivus and Fritigern, now began to seek, and ultimately were successful in obtaining (376), the permission of the emperor Valens to settle in Thrace; Athanaric meanwhile took refuge in Transylvania, thus abandoning the field without any serious struggle to the irresistible Huns. For more than fifty years the Roman world was undisturbed by any aggressive act on the part of the new invaders, who contented themselves with over-powering various tribes which lived to the north of the Danube. In some instances, in fact, the Huns lent their aid to the Romans against third parties; thus in certain Hunnic tribes, under a chief or king named Uldin, assisted Honorius in the struggle with Radagaisus (Ratigar) and his Ostrogoths, and took a prominent part in the decisive battle fought in the neighbourhood of Florence. Once indeed, in 409, they are said to have crossed the Danube and invaded Bul garia under perhaps the same chief (Uldin), but extensive desertions soon compelled a retreat.
About the year 432 a Hunnic king, Ruas or Rugulas, made himself of such importance that he received from Theodosius II. an annual stipend or tribute of 35o pounds of gold (Ci4,000), along with the rank of Roman general. Quarrels soon arose, partly out of the circumstance that the Romans had sought to make alliances with certain Danubian tribes which Ruas chose to re gard as properly subject to himself, partly also because some of the undoubted subjects of the Hun had found refuge on Roman territory; and Theodosius, in reply to an indignant and insulting message which he had received about this cause of dis pute, was preparing to send off a special embassy when tidings arrived that Ruas was dead and that he had been succeeded in his kingdom by Attila and Bleda, the two sons of his brother Mundzuk (433) • Shortly afterwards the treaty of Margus (not far from the modern Belgrade) was ratified; this treaty provided for Roman tribute to Attila, the surrender of fugitives, the insti tution of free markets and regulations as to alliances with other powers. The Romans held to the treaty and during the ensuing eight years the Huns made their extensive conquests in Scythia, Media and Persia.
In 445 Bleda died, and two years afterwards Attila, now sole ruler, undertook one of his most important expeditions against the Eastern empire; on this occasion he pushed southwards as far as Thermopylae, Gallipoli and the walls of Constantinople; peace was cheaply purchased by tripling the yearly tribute (which accordingly now stood at 2,100 pounds of gold, or £84, 000 sterling) and by the payment of a heavy indemnity. In again occurred various diplomatic negotiations, and espe cially the embassy of Maximinus, of which many curious details have been recorded by Priscus his companion. Then followed, in 451, that westward movement across the Rhine which was only arrested at last, with terrible slaughter, on the Catalaunian plains (according to common belief, in the neighbourhood of the modern Chalons, but more probably at a point some som. to the south-east, near Mery-sur-Seine). The following year (452) that of the Italian campaign, was marked by such events as the sack of Aquileia, the destruction of the cities of Venetia, and that historical interview with Pope Leo I. which resulted in the return of Attila to Pannonia, where in 453 he died (see ATTILA). Almost immediately afterwards the empire he had amassed rather than consolidated fell to pieces. His too numerous sons began to quarrel about their inheritance, while Ardaric, the king of the Gepidae, was placing himself at the head of a general revolt of the dependent nations. The inevitable struggle came to a crisis near the river Netad in Pannonia, in a battle in which 30,000 of the Huns and their confederates, including Ellak, Attila's eldest son, were slain. The nation, thus broken, rapidly dispersed, exactly as the White Huns did after a similar defeat about a hundred years later. One horde settled under Roman protection in Little Scythia (the Dobruja), and others in Dacia Ripensis (on the confines of Serbia and Bulgaria) or on the southern borders of Pannonia. Many, however, appear to have returned to what is now South Russia, and may perhaps have taken part in the ethnical combinations which produced the Bulgarians.
The chief original authorities are Ammianus Marcellinus, Priscus, Jordanes, Procopius, Sidonius Apollinaris and Menander Protector.
See also Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; H. H. Howorth, History of the Mongols (1876-88) ; J. B. Bury, History of the Later Roman Empire (188q) ; J. Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders (1892) ; E. H. Parker, A Thousand Years of the Tartars (19o5).
(C. El; A. N. J. W.)