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The appearance of Germanic-speaking Gothic tribes in the Volga-Don interfluve, the steppes of the Ciscaucasia and the Black Sea region. The Goths wage war with the Roman Empire and capture Bosporus.


Materials:

History of Adygea. Gubzhokov 2009

At the beginning of the 1st millennium AD, throughout modern Western Georgia and Abkhazia, the migration of tribes such as the Soani, Manrali, Apsilae, Abasgians, etc. continued. Colchis was conquered by the Iberians and gradually disintegrated. The Iberians called the Manrali Megrelians or Egri, hence the name of the country of the ancient Megrelians – Egrisi.

In the first half of the 1st millennium AD, the movement of tribes in Western Transcaucasia slowed down. During this period, the Svans temporarily inhabited modern Mingrelia, and later penetrated through the Kodori Gorge to the west as far as Dioscurias (modern Sukhum). Then, in the 2nd century AD, the Kartvelian tribes of the Lazi moved into Western Transcaucasia. They mixed with the Manrali, occupied most of the Colchian Lowland and pushed the Abkhazians and the Svans to the northwest. The state created by the newcomers – Lazica, or the Kingdom of Egrisi – became a stronghold and conduit for the dominion of Rome, and later Byzantium. With the help of the latter, Lazica briefly established control over Svaneti and Apsilia in the 6th century, while Abasgia retained its kings.

In the 4th century, the rulers of Egrisi subjugated the population of northern Colchis (Svans, Apsilae, Abasgians). Significant urban centers were: the capital of Egrisi — Archaeopolis (modern Nokalakevi), Rhodopolis (modern Vartsikhe), Vashnari, Petra (modern Tsikhisdziri), Apsarus (modern Gonio) and others.

From the end of the 5th century, Lazica began to weaken; in the mid-6th century, Abasgia and Apsilia became effectively independent from the Lazi, and Svaneti completely seceded from Byzantium; the power of the kings of Lazica extended only to Central Colchis. In 523, Christianity was introduced in Lazica; in the 6th century, all states of Western Transcaucasia became Christian, although paganism maintained its position there; in Abkhazia it peacefully coexisted with Christianity up to the present day.

From the 6th century, the territory of the kingdom became an arena of wars between Byzantium and Iran. According to the treaty of 562, Lazica remained dependent on Byzantium. From 697, it was under the rule of the Caliphate. Having seceded from Lazica, Abasgia, together with other Black Sea principalities, became subordinate directly to Byzantium. At the same time, the dynasty of the Anosid kings established itself in Abasgia. Abasgia under the Anosids became (like Lazica before) a pillar of Byzantine power in Transcaucasia and gradually subjugated Sanigia and Apsilia. The Lazican kingdom grew weaker and weaker. In 697, the ruler of Lazica seceded from the Byzantines and handed the country over to the Arab Caliphate.

At the beginning of the 8th century, Lazica was liberated from the Arabs and became part of the Abkhazian Kingdom.


Maps 0–500 AD

MATERIALS OF THE XXXIII CENTRAL ASIAN-CAUCASIAN READINGS 2008–2009:



The Masguts and their king were first recorded in written sources approximately in 293 in the famous inscription from Paikuli. Considering that Sassanid inscriptions from the 60s of the 3rd century make no mention of them, it can be asserted that the Masguts appeared on the territory south of Derbent in the 70s–80s of the 3rd century. Thus, the appearance of the Masgut culture in the northeast of Caucasian Albania can be dated to this time.

In the 30s of the 4th century — during the period of the greatest power of the Masgut Kingdom — its southwestern border reached the confluence of the Kura and Araxes, but the country of the Masguts proper was located on the plain part of the historical Albanian region of Chol — between the cities of Derbent and Shabran, bounded on the north by the Derbent, on the south by the Gilgilchay defensive walls, on the east by the Caspian Sea, and on the west by the foothills of the Greater Caucasus. This zone coincided with the area of the Masgut culture.

In medieval sources, the parallel name of the country of the Masguts — Abkhaz — is preserved. This name was also borne by one of the medieval cities, as well as an ethnic group of this region. Based on this, it is assumed that the movement of the Masguts (Massagetae) from Central Asia to the Eastern Caucasus was led by the Apasiaci — a tribe of Massagetae origin. The early kings of the Masguts belonged to a branch of the Arsacid dynasty. Strabo (XI, 8, § 8) also reported that in his time the founder of this dynasty, Arsaces (Arshak), found refuge in the country of the Apasiaci. A certain part of the tribes of Hunnic origin also stayed within the Masgut union.

The Masgut culture existed from the end of the 3rd century to the end of the 8th century. The residence of the Masgut kings until the 5th century was apparently located in Southeastern Dagestan, south of Derbent. At the end of the 5th century, after the founding of the city of Masgat, their capital moved to Northeastern Azerbaijan. This city is presumably localized at the site of the medieval village of Muskar near the modern village of Niyazoba. But so far, archaeological monuments associated with the cities of Abkhaz and Masgat have not been identified. Masgut settlements have been recorded in Palasa-syrt (Derbent District of Dagestan), Gukhur-oba (Kusar District of Azerbaijan) and in other places. Of these, the Palasa-syrt settlement of the 4th–6th centuries has been better studied so far, where two types of dwellings have been identified. One of them — above-ground dwellings of pole construction, which were characteristic of nomads transitioning to a settled life, however, the main structural details of the dwelling (pole frame, wooden support pillars) bear the features of a traditional nomad's dwelling (L.B. Gmyrya).

Burial monuments of the tribes of the Masgut union have been identified in Southeastern Dagestan (Palasa-syrt, Kuhmazkunt, Ashaga Stal Kazmalyar) and in Northeastern Azerbaijan (Gukhur-oba, some burials of Khudjbaly and Sandyqtepe). The burial grounds consist of kurgan catacomb (Palasa-syrt, Kuhmazkunt, Ashaga Stal Kazmalyar), niche and pit burials (Palasa-syrt), as well as catacomb (Gukhur-oba) and ground (Gukhur-oba, Khudjbaly, Sandyqtepe) burials without kurgan mounds.

In the 30s of the 4th century, three sons of the Masgut king adopted the Christian religion, and already at the end of the 4th century, the Hunnic bishop John lived in the country of the Masguts. However, after the residence of the Albanian Catholicos was moved from Chol, Christianity in this region lost its position.

In the medieval era, the country of the Masguts, Masgat, no longer extended to Derbent. The northern border of Masgat passed along the Samur River. The Masgut Kingdom was eliminated in 833 by the Derbent Emirate. Masgat became a region with a Muslim population. The adoption of the Islamic religion by the Masguts put an end to their distinctive pagan culture.

King of Abasgia during the reign of the Roman emperor Diocletian, a fierce persecutor of Christians.

It is known that Rigvadin received recommendations from the emperor regarding the conditions of imprisonment and maintenance of the 40 Antiochian Christian soldiers exiled to Abasgia, among whom were the martyrs Orentius, Longinus and five other brothers, venerated by the Christian church. Moreover, Longinus died in Abasgia and was buried in Pityus (Pitsunda). Later, in relation to the reign of Emperor Theodosius II (409–450), mention is made of the best unit of the Abasgians in the Roman army (“Ala prima Abasgorum”) in Thebes. This is a direct indication of the participation of the Abasgians in Rome's military enterprises as an organized and permanent military formation.


Materials:

All rulers of Abkhazia

Abkhazian Kingdom. 786 CE
Anthroponymic repertoire of the "Divan of the Abkhazian kings". G. A. Amichba
Chronicle of the Abkhazian kings. F. Jordania 1902
Bgazhba O. Kh., Lakoba S. Z. History of Abkhazia from ancient times to the present day. 2007
Culture and ideology of early medieval Abkhazia (5th–10th centuries). Amichba 1999
"History of Abkhazia in dates". T. A. Achugba 2011
Circumnavigation of the Euxine Sea. Flavius Arrian
Naturalis Historia. Pliny the Elder 77–79. Latin-English 1969
Reports of ancient Greek and Latin writers about Scythia and the Caucasus. Latyshev 1947
Constantine Porphyrogenitus. On the Administration of the Empire: Text, translation, commentary. Litavrin 1991

Abkhazia has always been a place of confluence of various cultures — Greek, Roman, Iranian, Arab, Turkic, etc. According to church tradition, the Abkhazians received Christianity from the apostles of Christ himself — Simon the Canaanite and Andrew the First-Called, and later from the apostle Matthew. Christianity also came to Abkhazia after the apostles through the first persecuted Christians exiled by Rome to Pitsunda. There are sources indicating the participation of the Abkhazian bishop Stratophilus of Pityus in the First Ecumenical Council (Nicaea, 325 AD), which speaks of the significance of the event for the region. Stratophilus of Pityus belonged to the Pontic (Cappadocian) Church. In this church, the first bishop of the Armenian church, Gregory the Illuminator, was ordained, who then ordained a bishop for Abkhazia.


Source:

History of Christianity in Abkhazia in the First Millennium. D. Dbar 2001

Ammianus Marcellinus (333–391 AD) "Res Gestae"

8, 20. Not far from there (i.e., from the Thermodon) rises gently the mountain Carambis, projecting opposite Helice, opposite which is the Tauric cape "Criu Metopon," separated by a space of two thousand five hundred stadia6. From here the entire seacoast, beginning from the Halys River, as if stretched out in length along a straight line, has the appearance of a bowstring attached to the two ends of a bow. (21) Adjacent to these regions are the Dagae, the bravest of all warriors, and the Chalybes, who were the first to mine and forge iron. Behind them occupy vast lands the Bizarae, Sapires, Tibareni, Mossyneci, Macrones and Philyri, peoples completely unknown to us (Romans). (22) At a short distance from them are the monuments of famous men: there are buried Sthenelus, Idmon and Tiphys: the first an ally of Heracles, mortally wounded in the war with the Amazons, the second a soothsayer of the Argonauts, the third a very careful helmsman of their ship. (23) Beyond the mentioned regions is the cave of Aulon and the river Callichorus (...) (24) Adjacent to these places are the famous settlements of the Camaritae, and the river Phasis in its noisy course washes the land of the Colchians, who from ancient times descended from the Egyptians; here among other cities are Phasis, named after the river, and the very famous now Dioscurias; its founders, according to tradition, were the Spartans Amphitus and Cercius, charioteers of Castor and Pollux, from whom the people of the Heniochi descended. (25) From them are separated by a little the Achaei, who after the end of some more ancient war at Troy (not that which was waged for Helen), according to some writers, were carried by contrary winds into Pontus during their wanderings, and since all the natives were hostile to them and they could nowhere find a place for permanent residence, they settled on the tops of mountains covered with eternal snow; under the influence of the terribly harsh climate, they themselves became accustomed to obtaining the means of life by dangerous plunder and consequently later became extremely wild and savage. Of the Kerkets, who live next to them, nothing noteworthy is reported.


Materials:

Ammianus Marcellinus. Roman History.

A new alliance of nomads led by the Huns from Northern China and Mongolia, having suppressed the resistance of the Alans, moved to the northern shores of the Black Sea. Within months, the Huns destroyed the Bosporan Kingdom. The Maeotians and Siraces were driven from the banks of the Kuban southward into the mountains.


Materials:

History of Adygea. Gubzhokov 2009