There is something wrong about the official Russian history - and here is why

People we nowadays call tatars are not really tatars, these people have turkish roots and in Russia they lived in Volga area called Bolgar.

Real Tatars were a tribe among other tribes which inhabited Mongolia and which Tsingis Khan subjuagated ( also subjuagated Bolgars area near Volga ) and destroyed then . The name "Tatars" and subsequently began in Europe and elsewhere and as a "name" it hold people and areas of Mongolia and Bolgars ( nowadays called as tatars ) areas which Tsingis Khan conquered.
In mid 1400 the Golden Orda Mongol broke up ( area formed by the Kazan Khanate ) and Ivan the Terrible conquered area at the beginning of 1550 ever since so "Tatar" areas has been part of the Russia.

originally posted by: evilcommunist
a reply to: TonyS

The history books tell us that Peter needed "a window to Europe", hence he transferref the capital there. However, if you look at Russia's map, almost at the same time he gained control over the Baltic countries which are even more convenient for a new capital. Yet he decided on a less convenient place. There is some interesting info on the origins of Saint Petersburg, I might do a thread on it later.

Also, the south Black sea direction has always been crucial to Russia (and relatively easily accessible), yet he decided to scrap it and construct a capital in a place hardly accessible from major trade and supply routes (it remained so until railroads appeared).

The whole thing looks quite illogical.

Interesting topic. In my quickie research at lunch time, I noted Peter had his eye on Crimea, as did Catherine the Great. So, yea, the Black Sea was primary and of course, the area was contentious and apparently controlled by the Turks or their allies.

As to St. Petersburg, it certainly is a beautiful creation. And as to the need for a window to Europe, it makes me want to research the extent to which Peter had his eye on making it possible for Russia to access European capital markets. I'd like to research that, although, I don't know if there was anything such as a Russian central bank. I do seem to recall that the Russians, at some point in the early history, arranged lines of credit through the Medici Bank in Florence for trade exchange purposes. And I was surprised to learn that Peter, who spent quite a bit of time touring western Europe, apparently had amassed quite a large sum of wealth.

originally posted by: evilcommunist
This theory is popular on the Russian web, but I haven't found a single mention of it in any foreign sources, so I decided this deserves a thread.

Ever heard of Tartaria?

Strange as it may sound, but this gigantic country in Eurasia continued appearing on different maps till the 19th century.

Here are a couple of examples:
map 1
map 2
map 3

Here is a 1,2 Gig pack of different old maps featuring Tartaria

Now, what does Wikipedia think of this?

Tartary (Latin: Tartaria) or Great Tartary (Latin: Tartaria Magna) was a name used in the Middle Ages until the twentieth century to designate the great tract of northern and central Asia stretching from the Caspian Sea and the Ural Mountains to the Pacific Ocean after the Mongol-Turkic invasion inhabited mostly by Turkic peoples. It incorporated the current areas of Pontic-Caspian steppe, Volga-Urals, Caucasus, Siberia, Turkestan, Mongolia, and Manchuria.

And here is a mention of Tartary (Tartaria) in Encyclopedia Britannica, Vol. III, Edinburgh, 1771:

TARTARY, a vast country in the northern parts of Asia, bounded by Siberia on the north and west: this is called Great Tartary. The Tartars who lie south of Muscovy and Siberia, are those of Astracan, Circassia, and Dagistan, situated north-west of the Caspian-sea; the Calmuc Tartars, who lie between Siberia and the Caspian-sea; the Usbec Tartars and Moguls, who lie north of Persia and India; and lastly, those of Tibet, who lie north-west of China

So basically Tartaria is featured on all the maps till the end of 18th century. It has distinct borders with "Muscovia" - the early Russian kingdom that later turned into Russian empire. The historians' explanations is that Tartaria is no country, but a name for a land mass with a population in the form of nomad tribes. Since western geographers knew these lands badly, they just called them Tartaria. As the Russian empire grew, Tartaria grew smaller and gradually vanished from the maps as these lands were explored.

Several things are not clear though?

1) Why would someone even mention Tartaria in 18th century when according to official Russian history the majority of Siberia was colonized by Russians in the 17th century and ignorant western geographers would have to call it Muscovia and Russian empire?

2) Why would a piece of land have its own flag, heraldy and capital (current Russian town of Tobolsk is mentioned as a capital on many maps)?

Here are some examples from old books:

American encyclopedia published in 1865

collection of different documents dated 16th-19th century

some more here and here

3) Why would someone mention "Muscovian Tartaria", "Chinese Tartaria", "Independent Tartaria" of this was a Terra Incognita on itself, doesn't this sound to you more like federal districts of the same state?

4) Tartaria is mentioned in many sources wikipedia calls it all fiction though: travels of Marko Polo, Macbeth by Shakespeare, Puccini's Turandot, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, Great Expectations by Dickens and so on.

5) The Great "Chinese" Wall basically repeats Tartaria's south-eastern borders on the old maps. Guess what? The fortifications look south, not north, as opposed to the official Chinese history that says the wall was built to fight off the nomads from the north.

So, where did this country go?
According to theories, Tartaria died in a major civil war that happened in the 18th century. Fun fact: the majority of Russian history was written in 17th-18th century by foreign (mostly German historians). Researchers claim emperor Peter the Great was an ally of the western dynasties. Under him Russia went through major reforms - changed the calendar, changed the capital (from Moscow to Saint Petersburg), partly changed the alphabet and was greatly westernized.

Change of the capital is especially interesting - why would anyone build a new capital from scratch in a distant place where western countries could easily capture it? Just look at the map - major maritime countries just needed a small fleet to cut off the capital from the rest of the country. This would make sence, however, if Tartaria really existed (this would mean Moscow would be really close to its borders).

I'll continue in the next post.

Very interesting.

However, where is your evidence for the Great Wall facing south?

We have lots of accounts regarding the construction of the Great Wall, including exactly when it was built and by whom...

Really interesting post and nice research.

As to the question about the north American Indians having standards or domains, we know they did. Why they disappeared or vanished with out a trace is another historic conspiracy theory. Unfortunately the history is worse for wear then the Tartar question. We simply don't know all that much because much of the recorded material was either destroyed or handed down verbally and lost.

There have been empires in north America that are known to have existed (discoveries of mounds, mounds shaped like animals, pyramids made of dirt, ect), but the exact time periods are also muddy.

What is generally known is whatever empires and borders that did exist where pretty much gone by the time the colonist arrived (to coincidental if you ask me) but that's all I know.

Personally my guess is that with the arrival of the first explorers in the 1400s caused a massive outbreak (much worse then people think that went far inland), and 100 years later there was nothing left but isolated and nomadic tribes that had almost no knowledge of them. Everything else made of wood or dirt got swallowed back up by nature or destroyed by the new comers.

You're missing the point, OP. "Tartaria" was the loosely-defined land conquered by the Mongols. "Tartars" is another term for MONGOL. Because the Mongols conquered all of this land, all the way to Poland and even Austria, although their khaganate remained active in Russia -even in conjunction with the Tsars- for several centuries.

So have Russians shared the same territories than Mongols? Yes. And the Mongols also were absorbed into the Russian culture, hence why today there's many people in Russia who look Mongol, because that's part of their ancestry. I had a 100% Russian friend that I first confused for a Mongol/Chinese.

Fact: the more you go back in History the more Nations and countries were blurry territories with roughly-defined or unstable borders. You just can't think of the Mongol empire the same way as you can think of the territory of Modern Russia (or Brazil, or Canada, etc). So Tartaria existed, but it was at the same time shared by the Russian empire. More precisely this empire just conquered over the lands of the Tartars.

Main ethnic consituency of Russians:

- Scythians (a.k.a. Caucasians)
- "Ros" scandinavians
- Mongols
- some turkic
- germanic

intresting but not really. we russians are a haphazard bunch. we just do # and the change it all up out of the blue.

and st petersburg was built to encourage trade with the west, fear of invasion didnt really play into the equation. it makes total sense to have built it.

originally posted by: AVoiceOfReason
intresting but not really. we russians are a haphazard bunch. we just do # and the change it all up out of the blue.

That sounds familiar..

haha..

USA!

version of what happened in 1812 6:46+ youtu.be...

originally posted by: mangust69
version of what happened in 1812 6:46+ youtu.be...

Can someone translate the You Tube video ? I don´t understand one bit of it...
I did see the eye on top of the pyramid though.

a reply to: DISRAELI

I enjoyed reading this thread, and your replies to it Disraeli. I think you did a very good job of explaining things, and have an excellent grasp of the history around that area.

a reply to: evilcommunist

I'm enjoying reading this thread, I'll keep my opinions until I've read more, however I must ask, are you saying the Chinese may not have built the great wall?
I can see your point of the direction of the fortifications, I notice the one crenelated side....

Thank you guys, I'm glad you liked this thread.

Now for some answers. About the Great Wall.
On some old/unreconstructed parts of it you can clearly see the fortifications faced south (check out the sun shade on the walls and the side of the embrasures):
1 2
3 4

Also
A scholar who argued that the "Great Wall" of the state of Qi, in today's Shandong, was originally constructed to thwart salt smuggling from the north (see: Guo Hongguang, "Further discussion on why the construction of the Qi Great Wall was initiated" [Qi Changcheng zhaojian yuanyin zaitan], Historical Research [Lishi yanjiu], 2000:1), was taken to task by Zhang Huasong, a scholar writing in the 30 April 2004 issue of China Cultural Relics News, who cogently drew on textual and topographic evidence to assert that the Qi walls were built to confront military threats from the south.

Moreover, you can even see the wall drawn on some of the old maps, on border with Tartaria, for example map 3 in my first post.

I'm not saying its a 100% fact the Chinese didn't build it, but it's an interesting theory, isn't it?


Now, on to tatars, mongols and tartars. Like I said earlier many historians doubt there ever was a mongolian invasion. Just check out where Mongolia is and imagine how nomadic tribes travelled thousands of kilometres without any stable supplies through Siberia.

So, modern historians tell us tatars/tartars/mongolians are Chinese-like people with narrow eyes and yellow skin color.
Here is a collection of old paintings that give you food for thought.

From Marco Polo's book where he describes his tartarian travels: 1 2 3

Drawing by a French engineer Mallet (18th century)

Another one from a British "A Collection of the Dresses of Different Nations, Antient and Modern", 1757-1772 гг. (

French "Histoire Generale Des Voyages» (1760г.)" even says Russians and Tartars are the same people

And so on, you can find a lot more Russian and caucasian-looking tartars here as opposed to what we are told about mongoloid invasion

And some more:

find any differencies between the Russians and the Horde

Tamerlan is definitely Mongoloid 12

I don't know if there was anything such as a Russian central bank

According to what we know first banks appeared in the Russian empire in 1754.

a reply to: evilcommunist

The Great Wall of China:

'newearth' on YouTube. She has a very interesting way of looking at history.

a reply to: Sinter Klaas Translation is not relevant, see photos, and eyes it the one who win

a reply to: evilcommunist

I agree with user Disraeli about your OP

Just one little addition about your etymological riddle.

There is an expression in Russian "provalitsya v Tartarary" which means "to disappear" without a trace.

Tartaria/Tartari and similar all those words taken from Greek mythology Tartarus en.wikipedia.org...

And the Russian expression is also about ancient Greek abyss and not some organized state that modern historians refuse to admit or hiding.

a reply to: evilcommunist

as a very small side note to Peter and the russian lack of a real navy - Peter apprenticed himself to Dutch shipwrights that he "imported" to Russia, and built a naval base at Taganrog so he could start building ships to use in the fight to take Azov . About 2 decades later, Russia had 30-40 grand "ships of the line", some of which had 100 guns! The Swedish and English Navies never directly engaged Peter's tall ships, despite trying - as he use dmultiple smaller galleys to outmaneuver their large ships, in his amphibious assaults on Swedish towns. So, yes there was no Russian Navy until Peter created one!

Great posting -- I think there is definitely something to this. I've read a lot about it in Fomenko's books. He really gets into Russian history in History Fiction or Science Chronology IV. Do you read Russian? I've tried Google translate on Russian New Chronology websites, but it doesn't do too great of a job (especially with arcane subject matter such as this).

a reply to: evilcommunist

Hey guys. Saw this post yesterday and got me interested... I speak and understand Russian (not so great anymore at reading) and iv'e been watching a few youtube docs, signed in especially to report my findings
Well apparently this goes way back in history, they basically claim that tartaria was the empire of the Russian (which have been called a milion different names, they say they basically were one people like today, not tribes) people for more than 2000 years, and been erased from history. they had # load of flags (with a griffin or an owl) dating back to the 14-15 centuries, as well as multiple sailing flags for the empire. crazy stuff, they show an impressive amount of historical evidence.
But then they go on to claim that the Tartarians Russians Slavs etc were actually the mysterious Etruscans that pre -dated the Roman empire, and they had a few scientists claim they managed to decipher the supposedly untranslatable Etruscan writings using ancient Russian alphabet. too bad all written material is in Russian too, it will take me a few months to read one paper. bummer.
Thanks for introducing me to this! I'm hooked though sceptical. I feel a slight hinge of ethnocentrism from any claims of a sort.. but who knows, maybe we are just another nation robbed of its real history like many others..

edit: forgot how funny it is that Russian can't pronounce the letter "H". Gitler was a very bad man indeed.

What was called as Tartary by western scholars was known in Russia as Khanate of Sibir(sibirskoe hanstvo) or simply Siberia. There is no any mystery in that. You can check it by yourself. And the same story goes with other Khanates, for example Crimean Khanate was known as Little Tartary in the western world. So there is nothing wrong with the history of Russia.

@AnaPro
Interesting finds I want to add,
Etruscan's, It is believed that they came from Anatolia (Present day Turkey) And settled in Italy somewhere around the 8th C BC
The Romans/Latins called them Etruscan's even the first kings of the Romans where Etruscan's.
Etruscan's called themselves, Rassena (plural) To make it easier, Rasseni. Then the link, in the middle ages, The Serbian kingdom/country was called, Rashka/Raska/Rascia and the alternative name for Serbs is Rasseni, SAR people RAS People even when you write the other way you have the same people. Now we have a people called Russians/Russkiye and they call their country Rossija/RASsija (a/e/i/o/u) can always change by the way of pronouncing the word.
Etruscans btw wrote right to left.
So both Russians and Serbians are Slavic people same origin including the other Slavic people and Romanians/Hungarians/Austrians. By assimilation, the Latin language gained popularity in Romania, Hungarian language speakers where not much but since 1800 there was a huge magyarization meaning most Hungarians Are Slavic or German. Austrians went from Germany to the south and assimilated the Slavic people there.

Now Slav and Slavic means Glory, or in other words Glorious people (note the word glory cannot indicate as a name for a ethnic group)
The same can be said for the Celtic peoples, the word Celt also means Glory in their Celtic language.

So in the whole of Europe almost all countries are Slavic or Celtic origin (ore then 60% of the Germans are Celtic) if both groups did have some achievement in the ancient past then that' s is long forgotten.

Something else thats interesting about Siberia the region XIANBEI present day Mongolia/Northern China it was a strong nation, Here a quote of wiki:
The Book of the Later Han records a memorial submitted in 177:
Ever since the [northern] Xiongnu ran away, the Xianbei have become powerful and populous, taking all the lands previously held by the Xiong-nu and claiming to have 100,000 warriors. … Refined metals and wrought iron have come into the possession of the [Xianbei] rebels. Han deserters also seek refuge [in the lands of the Xianbei] and serve as their advisers. Their weapons are sharper and their horses are faster than those of the Xiong-nu.


Chinese Xianbei can also be written Syanbie (Sarbi)
It is believed that these Xianbei people are the ancestors of the Mongols, but if we assume above about the Tatar then perhaps these people are also the ancestors of the Tatars (mix White/Slavic and Mongol people)

To end it we know that in western china white people lived and still do live, Uyghurs are a mix of mongol/white people and all ancient remains and graves in the Taklamakan dessert in the chinese west are blonde/red haired people.
Sarmatians/Scythian people lived also in central Asia, again the word SARmatian (sar/ras).


P.s.
The Phaistos disc of crete of the Minoan civilization, Translated also in Slavic
www.youtube.com...

Interesting to note, The Minoan Civilization that suddenly collapsed and disappeared supposedly conquered by a mysterious sea people is only named after one of their kings named Minos but who they were remains a mystery. So in other words no one has any idea who these people are, but being able to translate this disc in a Slavic language says a lot, like i said about the Etrsucans who lived in Anatolia thats just around the corner of Crete, and the Sar/Ras people.