The Caucasian Avars are a modern people of the Caucasus, mainly of Dagestan. The Avars were a nomadic people of Eurasia who established a state in the Danube River area of Europe in the early 6th century.

Caucasian Avars and their Language

A connection between the European Avars and the Caucasian Avars and Kabard is severely questioned, but evidence is mounting in favour of the theory that the Avars who settled in Transylvania were only a "pseudo" (Kabar?) portion of other "true" Avars who remained in the Caucasus region under Khazar control. The faction which is supposed to have remained in the Caucasus formed a powerful khanate in the 10th century contributing to the collapse of Khazaria from within that kingdom.

Anthropological Origins

There are three popular points of origin suggested for the Avar peoples. One is in the Caucasus as a branch of the Protoiberians, another is in the Hindu Kush around present day Kabul, and another, associating them with the Parni, is the region beyond the Jaxartes (Transiaxartesia) around Lake Balkhash in north-east Kazakhstan. Perhaps a suitable synthesis of these ideas may be that they were originally inhabitants of Khwarezmia and had thus influence in all three areas. The skeletons found in European Avar graves are mostly Mongolian [Istvan Erdelyi's "Kabari (Kavari) v Karpatskom Basseyne" specifically page 179 from Sovietskaya Archeologiya 4 (1983)], but many items usually associated with Hebrews have been found with them [A. Scheiber "Jewish inscriptions in Hungary from the 3rd Century to 1686" (1983); V.L.Vikhnovich "From the Jordan to the Dneiper" from Jewish Studies 31 (1991)]. Whether they had some kind of Hebraic origin connected to the quasi-"Jewish" tribes discovered in China and were a major influence in Khazaria or were simply influenced by the alleged Khazar conversion is a question demanding further investigation. Others have described them as "Amerinoid" (?source) loosely described as 'similar to a Mongolian Type with prominent noses'.

Literature to Archaeology

E. Breuer, Chronological studies to early-medieval findings at danube region. An introduction to byzantine art at barbaric cemeteries. (Tettnang 2005)