Martyn M. “Khazarian myth” in historical thought and the national identity of the Crimean Karaites

The thesis is dedicated to a complex interdisciplinary study of the functioning of the so-called Khazar theory of the origin of the Crimean Karaites as a historiographical concept and an integral part of the national identity of the Crimean Karaites. The trajectory of the development of Khazar theory in historical thought, from dominance in historiography to criticism, and, finally, a complete revision and denial, is studied. The special role which A. Firkowicz played in development of the Khazar theory is defined. His fantastic theory, which deduced the origin of the Crimean Karaites from the lost Ten Tribes, was quickly forgotten. The debate over his collections, the detection of forgeries, and the selection of truly valuable material continues to this day. The Khazar theory is deconstructed as a historiographical myth that for several decades existed only due to an established tradition, ignoring the data of known sources. The connection of the Karaites with the Khazars is not confirmed, but directly contradicts most written sources, which clearly indicate the Talmudic nature of Judaism in Khazaria. Archeology in Crimea and mainland of Khazaria does not provide an unambiguous answer to most questions related to the hypothetical link of the Khazars to the Karaite population of mountainous Crimea, but there is no reason to speak of any significant influence of the Khazars on Crimea, according to archaeologists. As for other sources, even Karaite legends (those reliably collected by disinterested respondents of the 19th century) do not say a word about the Khazars. The transition of the historical concept from the academic sphere to the sphere of group (national) identity, and functioning and development there, practically independently of the historiographical process, is studied. It is shown, that the adoption of the Khazar version of the origin by Karaite intellectuals was accompanied by two parallel and interconnected processes of identity change, namely militarization and Turkization. Militarization manifested itself in the appearance in the Karaite historical narrative of stories related to the military past of the Karaites, that are almost entirely fictional. We call Turkization a number of changes in culture that took place during the interwar period among the Karaites of the Second Rzeczpospolita, namely the expansion of the use of Turkic dialects and even the publication of the Turkic-language press. The research was based on the historiography of Khazar issues and Karaite periodicals and historical journalism of the 20th and 21th centuries. The work is written in the genre of the history of ideas.