According to the anonymous author of the "Gesta Hungarorum", Samuel's family descended from two "Cuman" chieftains, Ed and Edemen, who received "a great land in the forest of Mátra" from Árpád, Grand Prince of the Hungarians around 900. In contrast, the "Illuminated Chronicle" and other 14th-century Hungarian chronicles describe Ed and Edemen as the sons of Csaba himself a son of Attila the Hun by a lady from Khwarezm. Since all Hungarian chronicles emphasize the Orientaleither "Cuman" or "Khwarezmian" origin of Ed and Edemen, Gyula Kristó, László Szegfű and other historians propose that the Aba clan descending from Csaba ruled the Kabars, a people of Khazar origin who joined the Hungarians in the middle of the 9th century, before the Hungarians' arrival in the Carpathian Basin around 895. Kristó argues that both Samuel's Khazar origin and his first name suggest that he was born to a family that adhered to Judaism.