HUNNS, a fierce and savage nation, who formerly inhabited that part of Sarmatia bordering on the Palus Maeotis and the Tanais, the ancient boundary between Europe and Asia. Their country, as described by Procopius, lay north of Mount Caucasus, which, extending from the Euxine to the Caspian Seas, separates Asiatic Sarmatia from Colchis, Iberia, and Albania, and occupies the isthmus between the two seas above mentioned. Here they resided, unknown to other nations, and themselves ignorant of other countries, till the year 376. At this time, a hind pursued by the hunters, or, according to some authors, an ox stung by a gad-fly, having passed the marsh, was followed by some Hunns to the other side, where they discovered a country much more agreeable than their own. On their return, having acquainted their countrymen with what they had seen, the whole nation passed the marsh, and having attacked the Alans, who dwelt on the banks of the Tanais, almost exterminated them. They next fell upon the Ostrogoths, w hom they drove out of their country, and forced to retire to the plains between the Borysthenes and the Tanais, now known by the name of Podolia. They next attacked the Visigoths, whom they obliged to shelter themselves in the most mountainous parts of their country; and at last the Gothic nations, finding it impossible to withstand such an inundation of barbarians, obtained leave from the Emperor Valens to settle in Thrace.

The Hunns thus became in 376 masters of all the country between the Tanais and Danube, where they continued quietly till the year 388, when great numbers of them were taken into the pay of Theodosius I.; but, in the mean time, a party of them, called the Nephthalite or White Hunns, who had continued in Asia, overran all Mesopotamia, and even laid siege to Edessa, where they were repulsed with great slaughter by the Romans. The European Hunns frequently passed the Danube, and committed the greatest ravages in the western empire; sometimes they also fell upon the eastern provinces, where they put all to fire and sword. They were often defeated and repulsed by the Romans; but the empire was now too weak to subdue or prevent them from making excursions; so that they continued to make encroachments, and became every day more formidable than before. In 411, the Hunns, under Attila, threatened the western empire with total destruction. This monarch, having made himself master of all the northern countries from the confines of Persia to the banks of the Rhine, invaded Maesia, Thrace, and Illyricum, and made such progress, that t’ħe emperor not thinking himself safe at Constantinople, withdrew into Asia. Attila then broke into Gaul, where he took and destroyed several Cities, and massacred the inhabitants with the greatest cruelty. At last he was driven out with great slaughter by Aetius the Roman general, and Theodoric king of the Goths, and could never afterwards make any great progress. About the year 452 or 453 Attila died, and his kingdom was immediately split into a number of small ones by his numerous children, who waged perpetual war with one another. The Hunns then ceased to be formidable, and became daily less able to cope with the other barbarous nations whom Attila had kept in subjection. Still, however, their dominion was considerable; and in the time of Charles the Great they were masters of Transylvania, Wallachia, Servia, Carniola, Carinthia, and the greater part of Austria, together with Bosnia, Sclavonia, and that part of Hungary which is situated beyond the Danube. In the year 776, whilst Charles was in Saxony, two princes of the Hunns, Caganus and Jugunus, sent ambassadors to him, desiring his friendship and alliance. Charles received them with extraordinary marks of friendship, and readily complied with their request. However, they not long afterwards entered into an alliance with Taffila duke of Bavaria, who had revolted from Charles, and raised great disturbances in Germany. Charles dissembled his resentment till he had entirely reduced Bavaria, when he resolved to revenge himself on the Hunns for the underhand succours they had given to his enemy. Accordingly, he ordered levies to be made throughout his dominions, and having assembled a very numerous army, divided it into two bodies, one of which he commanded himself, and the other he committed to the care of his generals. The two armies entered the kingdom of the Hunns at different places, ravaged their country far and wide, burned their villages, and took all their strongholds. This he continued for eight years, till the people were almost totally extirpated; nor did the Hunns ever afterwards recover the blow, or appear as a distinct nation.

There were two different nations which went by the name of Hunns; the Nephthalite or White Hunns, and the Sarmatian or Scythian Hunns. The former inhabited a rich country bordering to the north on Persia, and at a great distance from the Sarmatian or Scythian Hunns, with whom they had no intercourse, nor the least resemblance either in their persons or manners. They were a powerful nation, and often served against the Romans in the Persian armies; but in the reign of the Emperor Zeno, being provoked by Perozes king of Persia laying claim to part of their country, they defeated the Persians in two pitched battles, slew their king, overran all Persia, and held it in subjection for the space of two years, obliging Cabades, the son and successor of Perozes, to pay them an annual tribute. These Hunns, called by the writers of those times the White Hunns, did not wander, like the others, from place to place; but, contented with their own country, which supplied them with all necessaries, they lived under a regular government, subject to one prince, and seldom made inroads, unless provoked, either into' the Persian or Roman territories. They lived ac [7:11:734]cording to their own laws, and dealt uprightly with one another, as well as with the neighbouring tribes. Each of their great men used to choose twenty or more companions to enjoy with him his wealth, and partake of all his diversions; but, upon his decease, they were all buried with him in the same grave. This custom savours of extreme barbarity; but in every other respect the Nephthalite were a less ferocious race than the Scythian Hunns, who, breaking into the empire, filled most of the provinces of Europe with blood and slaughter.

The latter were, according to Ammianus Marcellinus, a savage race, exceeding in cruelty the most barbarous nations. According to Jornandes, they began to practise their cruelty upon their own children the very first day they came into the world, cutting and mangling the cheeks of their males, to prevent the growth of hair, which, contrary to the sentiments of other nations, they must have looked upon as unbecoming and unmanly. They had, perhaps, in this practice another view, which Jornandes seems to insinuate elsewhere, namely, to strike terror into the enemy with their countenances thus deformed and covered with scars. They had no other food but roots and raw meat, being quite unacquainted with the use of fire; they had no houses at all, not even huts; they lived constantly exposed to the air, in the woods and on the mountains, where, from their infancy, they were inured to hunger, thirst, and all manner of hardships; and they had such an aversion to houses, which they called the sepulchres of the living, that, when they migrated into other countries, they could hardly be prevailed upon to come within the walls of any house, not thinking themselves safe when shut up and covered. They used even to eat and sleep on horseback, scarcely ever dismounting; a circumstance which, in all likelihood, induced Zosimus to assert that the Hunns could not walk. They covered their nakedness with goats’ skins, or the skins of a sort of mice sewed together. Day and night were indifferent to them, as to buying, selling, eating, and drinking. They had no law, nor any kind of religion, but complied with their inclinations, whenever these prompted them, without the least restraint, or distinction between good and evil. In war they began the battle with great fury and a hideous noise; but if they met with a vigorous opposition, their fury began to abate after the first onset; and when once put into disorder, they never rallied, but fled in the utmost confusion. They were quite unacquainted with the art of besieging towns; and authors observe, that they seldom or never attacked the enemy’s camp. They were a faithless nation, and thought themselves no longer bound by the most solemn treaties than they found their advantage in observing these. Hence we often find them, upon the least prospect of obtaining more advantageous conditions, breaking into the Roman empire, in defiance of the most solemn oaths and engagements. Several corps of Hunns, after their coming into Europe, served in the Roman armies against the Goths and other nations; nay, they were ready for hire to fight against each other, being blind to every consideration excepting that of interest. For further information on this subject, the reader is referred to the learned and profound work of De Guignes, of which some account is given in the biographical notice of the author. See article Guignes.