The Huns were pastoral nomads who originally lived north of China. To the Chinese, they were known as the Hsiung-Nu, and the Turks, Khirgiz, and Magyars of Hungary were descended from them. The Huns were made up of a number of tribes, each with its own chieftain. The chiefs, however, did not exercise absolute control, as the administration of each tribe was essentially democratic. Like many groups in Central Asia, the Huns learned to ride horses and use weapons from an early age, and they depended a great deal on the animals which they raised for both food (meat and milk) and clothing (leather).

In Hun society, warriors were the most respected individuals. Their raiding expeditions constituted a serious menace to northern China between 1400 and 200 BCE. As a result, Emperor Chin-Shi-Hwang-Ti began constructing the Great Wall during the third century BCE. By the first century BCE, things began to change. Due to internal feuding, the Huns split into two groups, a southern group known as the Southern Shanyus, and a northern group which lived on the far side of the Gobi desert in the regions of Mongolia and Baikal. Because of this split, the Huns lost much of their former power. The southern Huns became dominated by the Chinese. They were attacked by a group known as the Hsien-Pi, and by 177 CE, the southern Huns effectively ceased to exist as a separate group. The northern Huns, in 93 CE, likewise suffered a disastrous defeat at the hands of the Hsien-Pi. Remnants of the northern Huns then began migrating westward, and by the second half of the fourth century CE, they had reached the plains of southeastern Europe. The Huns proceeded to deliver crushing blows to the Alani and the Goths, who fled westward into the Roman Empire.

In 445 CE, Attila emerged as leader of the Huns, and he embarked on a wave of conquest throughout northern Italy and Gaul. The Huns were finally defeated in Gaul at the Battle of Châlons in 451 CE. They fell back across the Rhine but returned the following year, this time in northern Italy. But again they were turned back, probably due to disease and a lack of supplies. Attila died in 453 and internal dissension rapidly brought about the disintegration of the Huns as a political and military power. The Huns then scattered through Europe and Asia. Some settled in the old Roman provinces of Pannonia and Dacia, and their descendants gave rise to the modern state of Hungary. Other groups settled in Turkestan and Persia, where they were absorbed by the local populations.

Attila

The Huns were widely demonised by the Europeans who feared them. But the Huns left more than just a legacy of conquest and terror. It is believed that they brought to Europe some key Central Asian technological innovations, such as improved saddles and harnessing for horses. It is also held that they introduced to Europe another key item of equestrian technology, the stirrup, which would revolutionise the conduct of mounted warfare.

Stirrups