The Khazar Economy: Economic Integration or Disintegration? 201
a border-line, but rather as a line of administrative and trade centers (road
stations). The Saltovo and Slavic population did not have any serious disputes
and thrived on a constant exchange and interaction.129 According to A. Tortika,
the subjugated Slavic population lived “in relatively peaceful conditions” in the
Khazar Khaganate. With the arrival of the Magyars, and the Pechenegs later
on, Northwestern Khazaria played the role of a “shelter” against their attacks.130
It is only natural to assume that not all of the fortified settlements had equal
status and functions. This is evidenced not only by the differences in their sizes
(ranging from 0.5 to 18 hectares), but also by the materials they were built from.
For example, several fortresses have brick walls, which indicates that the whole
area was part of the Khazar administrative system. According to Eastern sources
(e.g. Al-Istakhri), the use of this building material was a special privilege of the
khagan.131 Rectangular in plan brick fortifications existed in Dagestan already
from the third and fourth centuries onwards. They are also typical of the early
Khazar period (the seventh to the eighth century).132 In the Don Region, the
walls of Sarkel were made of brick—and this city was undoubtedly erected by
order of the Khazar khagan.133 The Semikarakorsk hillfort also had brick walls
and was square in shape.134
129 Quite important, though still quite obscure is the issue of the Uliches and Tiverians who
are mentioned as Slavic tribes in the Russian chronicles. According to the Novgorod First
Chronicle (from the fifteenth century), the Uliches lived downstream of the Dnieper,
south of the Polianians. Together with the Tiverans they later inhabited the territory
between the Bug and the Dniester, in the south up to the Danube. In Nasonov’s opinion,
their migration to these parts occurred during the ninth century at the latest, when the
Magyars came to the steppes, followed later on by the Pechenegs (Nasonov 1951, 41–42).
On the other hand, according to Mikhailov 1990, 109, the pressure of the Rus’ state caused
the Tiverians to move out first, followed by the Uliches in the mid-tenth century. The
Nikon Chronicle (from the sixteenth century) states that the Uliches’ migration occurred
during the reign of the Rus’ Prince Igor and was the result of the war, waged against them
by his warlord Sveneld (Polnoe sobranie russkih letopisei IX–X. Nikonovskaia letopis,
1965, 26). Dimitrov 1989, 13–14 concludes that both the Uliches and the Tiverians were
part of the Bulgar population, located north of the Danube. Bubenok 1997, 91 in his turn
believes that neither the Tiverians nor the Uliches were Slavs, but descendants of the
local Sarmatian population. And in Gumilev’s opinion, during the 940s the Uliches were
allies of the Khazars (Gumilev 1997, 221).
130 Tortika 2006a, 90.
131 Pletneva 1999, 86; Dunlop 1967, 92; Golden 1980, 102.
132 Pletneva 1999, 53–54.
133 This is explicitly stated by Constantine Porphyrogenitus (De Administrando Imperio, ch.
42, in Litavrin and Novosel’tsev 1989, 171–173). Pletneva 1999, 86.
134 See for instance Flerov 2001, 58–68.