346 MAN : PAST AND PRESENT. [CHAP. 



Italy, who reoccupied Sirmium in 799, and brought back such 

 treasure that the value of gold was for a time enormously 

 reduced. 



Then came the opportunity of the Hitnagars (Hungarians), 

 who, after advancing from the Urals to the Volga (550 A.D.), had 

 reached the Danube about 886. Here they were invited to the 

 aid of the Germanic king Arnulf, threatened by a formidable 

 Ma ar coalition of the western Slavs under the redoubtable 



Origins and Zventibolg, a nominal Christian who would enter 

 the church on horseback followed by his wild re- 

 tainers, and threaten the priest at the altar with the lash. In the 

 upland Transylvanian valleys the Hunagars had been joined by 

 eight of the derelict Khazar tribes, amongst whom were the 

 Megers or Mogers, whose name under the form of Magyar 

 was eventually extended to the united Hunagar-Khazar nation. 

 Under their renowned king Arpad, son of Almuth, they first 

 overthrew Zventibolg, and then with the help of the surviving 

 Avars reduced the surrounding Slav populations. Thus towards 

 the close of the 9th century was founded in Pannonia the present 

 kingdom of Hungary, in which were absorbed all the kindred 

 Mongol and Finno-Turki elements that still survived from the 

 two previous Mongolo-Turki empires, established in the same 

 region by the Huns under Attila (430-453), and by the Avars 

 under Khagan Bayan (562-602). 



After reducing the whole of Pannonia and ravaging Cannthia 

 and Friuli, the Hungars raided Bavaria and Italy (899-900), 

 imposed a tribute on the feeble successor of Arnulf (910), and 

 pushed their plundering expeditions as far west as Alsace, Lorraine, 

 and Burgundy, everywhere committing atrocities that recalled the 

 memory of Attila's savage hordes. They were reported to drink 

 the blood of their captives, so that in medieval legends the term 

 hungar, ongar (the ogre of our fairy tales), indicated a man-eating 

 monster who devoured the flesh and drank the blood of children. 

 Later the same word seems to have been revived and associated 

 with the Uigur Turks who, as above seen, took part in the 

 Mongol invasions of Europe under Jenghiz-Khan and his suc- 

 cessors. 



This period of lawlessness and savagery was closed by the 



