Where do slavs come from?

[Barnabas]

I have no idea

Poland?

What were they doing before the middle ages?

I know the germans were barbarians and used to fight the romans, but where were the slavs, it is like suddenly appear on stage and start expanding like crazy, why the expansion?

[Flip McWho]

The slavs moved into the region as the area was abandoned by the germans moving westward and the Lombards. Apparently before this they inhabited the region from Upper Vistula to the Carpathians and to the Dneiper.



Source:
Henri Pirenne, A History of Europe.

[LordShiva]

Re: Where do slavs come from?

Originally posted by Brachy-Pride
Where do Slavs come from?

Well, little Brachy, when a daddy Slav loves a mommy Slav very, very much...

[Cort Haus]

Re: Re: Where do slavs come from?

Originally posted by LordShiva
Well, little Brachy, when a daddy Slav loves a mommy Slav very, very much...

[Heresson]

The origin of Slavs is very much disputed and You can find numerous answers. But most include larger or smaller parts of Poland, Ukraine and Byelorus.

[Blaupanzer]

I'm under the impression that the Slavs arrived in Poland, Ukraine, and Byelorus during some historical, i.e., recorded timeframe. When a people "arrive" in a place, this implies they originated somewhere else.

[Heresson]

all Indoeuropeans arrived from somewhere else, You know.

[Blaupanzer]

Originally posted by Heresson
all Indoeuropeans arrived from somewhere else, You know.

Makes you wonder who drove them all out to the west. Must have been some mean dudes.

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by Blaupanzer


Makes you wonder who drove them all out to the west. Must have been some mean dudes.

Some of them went east instead

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Blaupanzer


Makes you wonder who drove them all out to the west. Must have been some mean dudes.

They didn't all go west. Some, like the Aryans and the Tocharians, went east. Others, like the Hittites, went south

[Barnabas]

at what time did turks move to central asia and kill expulse all scythian, iranian nomads?

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Brachy-Pride at what time did turks move to central asia and kill expulse all scythian, iranian nomads?

The Turks had arrived on the shores of the Aral sea in the sixth century A.D. They moved into the Mid-east in the 11th century A.D.

[Dr Strangelove]

I thought that the slavs originated on the Hungarian plains then after the demise of the Huns expanded south into the balkans and northeast into eastern europe.

The huns really screwed up a lot of people. Is it true that they were the remnants of the empire of Hsing-nu?

[Heresson]

Slavs did not origin from Hungarian plain. In the Roman times, peoples living there were iranian. Late IV century chronicle of Ammianus Marcellinus gives an interesting details of a treacherous attack of local people on emperor Constantine saying that they rushed at him crying out "Marha marha". That means "death" in persian (Marg bar Esroil! Marg bar Emriko!)...
Romans do not mention Slavs, at least over Donau, until V century or VI, I do not recall. Yet, there's an interesting story of X or XI century (I don't recall) Kievan historian who says that Poles originated from over Donau, but yet Wlachs were making harm to them, so they moved here.
Wlachs is a name for Latin-speaking people, especially Romanians and Italians, Italy's name in polish is Wlochy, and southern Romania = Woloszczyzna, which used to be the name of Moldavia in polish as well, until it switched names with its southern counterpart).
It is EXTREMLY interesting. Because Romanians do not, as they say, origin from Dacia. Not at all. they are remains of Roman settlers from southern banks of Donau, from Illyricum and Thrace. Were Poles inhabiting modern-day Romania before Romanians, pushed out from thrace by other Slavs, forced them north?
Or did Nestor mean Romans?
There's a story in Ammianus or some other late-antiquity historians whose work I've read about Sarmatians that some tribe of Sarmatians was enslaved by other. The emperor freed it, yet it attacked RE later on, so Romans forced it to move somewhere far away in the north.

Interestingly, polish nobility signs (herbs) have something to do with Sarmats they say... And in fact polish nobility claimed descendance from Sarmatians. It's absurd but in fact I've once read somewhere that while the peasants ideal was blond, the gentry was more dark-complexioned in Poland. But as a historian, I'm forced to say this is not a sure thing at all, may be completely false.
yet, the historical source I've mentioned is very interesting. It mentions as polish tibes Wieleci, Polanie, Mazowszanie. It doesn't mention Pomeranians or southern-Polish tribes as Silesians and Wislans, but it mentions as polish tribe Wieleci, adding that they were "of the clearest blood" of us.
This text was the source of reconstruction of early Polish history. Southern-polish tribes are not mentioned, because they did not exist in the beginning, other sources say after all that other tribes, like Croatians, lived there (in the place of Wislanie. There'a a croatian legend of their first prince coming from there I've read). Pomorzanie did not exist, because Wieleci lived where they lived, between Odra (Oder) and Wisla (Vistula) rivers. Wieleci moved west, behind Oder and even behind Laba (Elbe). Their original place of leaving is noted by the name of their most extreme western part, which later got independant from them and their greatest enemy, Obodrzanie. Name of this tribe means "the ones living next to Oder river". Pomorzanie tribes were created by mixture of remains of Wieleci and polish tribes from south. Indeed, their language is something between polish and wielet (polabian).

I think it is all very interesting, but all is not sure.

[Odin]

The Slavs are derived from a early Iron Age Indo-European culture based in Eastern Poland, Southern Belarus, and Western Ukraine. This culture was related to the Baltic peoples, but had a significant influence from Indo-Iranian nomads boardering them, such as the Scythians.