Volga Tatars
татарлар • tatarlar • تاتارلار | |
|---|---|
Tatars of Idel-Ural region | |
| Total population | |
| c. 6.5 million | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
Russia:
| 5,310,649 |
| Uzbekistan | 467,829 |
| Kazakhstan | 203,371 |
| Ukraine | 73,304-400,000 |
| Turkmenistan | 36,355 |
| Kyrgyzstan | 28,334 |
| Azerbaijan | 25,900 |
| Turkey | 25,500 |
| China | 5,000 |
| Lithuania | 4,000 |
| Estonia | 1,981 |
| Finland | 600-700 |
| Languages | |
| Tatar, Russian | |
| Religion | |
| Predominantly Sunni Islam with Orthodox Christian and irreligious minority | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Bashkirs, Chuvash, Nogais, Crimean Tatars | |
The Volga Tatars or simply Tatars (Tatar: татарлар, romanized: tatarlar; Russian: татары, romanized: tatary) are a Turkic ethnic group native to the Volga-Ural region of western Russia. They are subdivided into various subgroups. Tatars are the second-largest ethnic group in Russia after ethnic Russians. The cultural center of Tatars is Tatarstan. Their native language is the Kipchak Turkic Tatar, and predominant religion is Sunni Islam.
"Tatar" as an ethnonym owns a very long and complicated history and in the past was often used as an umbrella term for different Turkic and Mongolic tribes. Nowadays it mostly refers exclusively to Volga Tatars (known simply as "Tatars"; Tatarlar), who became its "ultimate bearers" after the founding of Tatar ASSR (1920–1990; now Tatarstan). The ethnogenesis of Volga-Ural Tatars is still debated, but their history is usually connected to the Kipchak-Tatars of Golden Horde (1242–1502), and also to its predecessor, Volga Bulgaria (900s–1200s), whose adoption of Islam is celebrated yearly in Tatarstan. After the collapse of the Golden Horde, ancestors of modern Tatars formed the Khanate of Kazan (1438–1552), which lost its independence to Russia after the Siege of Kazan in 1552.