New linguistic findings suggest that the Huns—once feared across Europe—did not come from Turkic-speaking origins, as long believed. Instead, they appear to trace their roots to a much older and more northerly heritage: the Palaeo-Siberian world. This revelation comes from a joint study by Dr Svenja Bonmann of the University of Cologne and Dr Simon Fries of the University of Oxford.
A Shared Language Across Continents and Centuries
Drawing on a wide range of linguistic sources, the researchers reconstructed the idea that the ethnic core of the Huns—including Attila and his European ruling dynasty—shared a language with their Asian ancestors, the Xiongnu. This language, they argue, was not Turkic, but belonged to the Yeniseian family—a branch of the so-called Palaeo-Siberian languages. These ancient tongues were spoken across Siberia before being displaced by the arrival of Uralic, Turkic, and Tungusic peoples. Remarkably, small Yeniseian-speaking communities still exist today along the Yenisei River in Russia.
The Xiongnu had formed a loose tribal confederation in Inner Asia from the third century BCE to the second century CE. In recent years, archaeological excavations in Mongolia uncovered a city believed to be Long Cheng, the capital of the Xiongnu empire. Centuries later, the Huns established a short-lived but formidable empire in southeastern Europe during the fourth and fifth centuries CE. Though scholars have long traced their origins to Inner Asia, the Huns’ linguistic and ethnic background remained uncertain—largely due to the absence of surviving texts written in their own language. What we know about the Huns and the Xiongnu mostly comes from records written in other languages, including Chinese, from which the term ‘Xiōng-nú’ derives.
Rethinking Attila’s Legacy
It was previously assumed that the Xiongnu—and by extension the core of the Huns—spoke a Turkic language, especially as Turkic peoples expanded westward from the seventh century CE. But Bonmann and Fries present linguistic evidence suggesting otherwise: that these groups spoke an early form of Arin, a Yeniseian language, as early as the turn of the millennium.
On the River Yelogui, a tributary of the Yenisei in Siberia. A few speakers of a Yenisei language, Ket, still live in the region. The language of the European Huns belonged to the same language family. Photo by Edward Vajda / University of Cologne
“This was long before the Turkic peoples migrated to Inner Asia and even before the splitting of Old Turkic into several daughter languages,” says Dr Bonmann. “This ancient Arin language even influenced the early Turkic languages and enjoyed a certain prestige in Inner Asia. This implies that Old Arin was probably the native language of the Xiongnu ruling dynasty.”
Their conclusion rests on an analysis of several types of linguistic data: loanwords, glosses in Chinese texts, and proper names from the Hun dynasty, as well as place and water names. While no single piece of evidence would be conclusive on its own, taken together the findings form a compelling picture. The ruling elite of the Xiongnu and the Huns likely spoke Old Arin.
The study also offers an intriguing explanation for how the Huns ended up in Europe. Place and river names still visible today support the theory that an Arin-speaking population migrated westward from the Altai-Sayan region in southern Siberia. Even the name of Attila the Hun may have Siberian roots. Previously understood as a Germanic nickname meaning “little father,” the study argues that ‘Attila’ could instead be interpreted as a Yeniseian epithet meaning “swift-ish, quick-ish.”
A New Chapter in Eurasian History
These linguistic discoveries align with earlier archaeological and genetic evidence linking the European Huns to the Xiongnu of Inner Asia. “Our study shows that, alongside archaeology and genetics, comparative philology plays an essential role in the exploration of human history.” notes Dr Fries. “We hope that our findings will inspire further research into the history of lesser-known languages and thereby contribute further to our understanding of the linguistic evolution of mankind.”
For a long time, researchers assumed that the European Huns spoke a Turkic language. New research shows that it was a Palaeo-Siberian language. Photo by Edward Vajda / University of Cologne
This new research adds a dramatic twist to the story of the Huns—one that begins not in the steppe lands of Central Asia, but in the ancient forests and rivers of Siberia.
The article, “Linguistic Evidence Suggests that Xiōng-nú and Huns Spoke the Same Paleo-Siberian Language,” by Svenja Bonmann and Simon Fries, appears in Transactions of the Philological Society. Click here to read it.
New linguistic findings suggest that the Huns—once feared across Europe—did not come from Turkic-speaking origins, as long believed. Instead, they appear to trace their roots to a much older and more northerly heritage: the Palaeo-Siberian world. This revelation comes from a joint study by Dr Svenja Bonmann of the University of Cologne and Dr Simon Fries of the University of Oxford.
A Shared Language Across Continents and Centuries
Drawing on a wide range of linguistic sources, the researchers reconstructed the idea that the ethnic core of the Huns—including Attila and his European ruling dynasty—shared a language with their Asian ancestors, the Xiongnu. This language, they argue, was not Turkic, but belonged to the Yeniseian family—a branch of the so-called Palaeo-Siberian languages. These ancient tongues were spoken across Siberia before being displaced by the arrival of Uralic, Turkic, and Tungusic peoples. Remarkably, small Yeniseian-speaking communities still exist today along the Yenisei River in Russia.
The Xiongnu had formed a loose tribal confederation in Inner Asia from the third century BCE to the second century CE. In recent years, archaeological excavations in Mongolia uncovered a city believed to be Long Cheng, the capital of the Xiongnu empire. Centuries later, the Huns established a short-lived but formidable empire in southeastern Europe during the fourth and fifth centuries CE. Though scholars have long traced their origins to Inner Asia, the Huns’ linguistic and ethnic background remained uncertain—largely due to the absence of surviving texts written in their own language. What we know about the Huns and the Xiongnu mostly comes from records written in other languages, including Chinese, from which the term ‘Xiōng-nú’ derives.
Rethinking Attila’s Legacy
It was previously assumed that the Xiongnu—and by extension the core of the Huns—spoke a Turkic language, especially as Turkic peoples expanded westward from the seventh century CE. But Bonmann and Fries present linguistic evidence suggesting otherwise: that these groups spoke an early form of Arin, a Yeniseian language, as early as the turn of the millennium.
“This was long before the Turkic peoples migrated to Inner Asia and even before the splitting of Old Turkic into several daughter languages,” says Dr Bonmann. “This ancient Arin language even influenced the early Turkic languages and enjoyed a certain prestige in Inner Asia. This implies that Old Arin was probably the native language of the Xiongnu ruling dynasty.”
Their conclusion rests on an analysis of several types of linguistic data: loanwords, glosses in Chinese texts, and proper names from the Hun dynasty, as well as place and water names. While no single piece of evidence would be conclusive on its own, taken together the findings form a compelling picture. The ruling elite of the Xiongnu and the Huns likely spoke Old Arin.
The study also offers an intriguing explanation for how the Huns ended up in Europe. Place and river names still visible today support the theory that an Arin-speaking population migrated westward from the Altai-Sayan region in southern Siberia. Even the name of Attila the Hun may have Siberian roots. Previously understood as a Germanic nickname meaning “little father,” the study argues that ‘Attila’ could instead be interpreted as a Yeniseian epithet meaning “swift-ish, quick-ish.”
A New Chapter in Eurasian History
These linguistic discoveries align with earlier archaeological and genetic evidence linking the European Huns to the Xiongnu of Inner Asia. “Our study shows that, alongside archaeology and genetics, comparative philology plays an essential role in the exploration of human history.” notes Dr Fries. “We hope that our findings will inspire further research into the history of lesser-known languages and thereby contribute further to our understanding of the linguistic evolution of mankind.”
This new research adds a dramatic twist to the story of the Huns—one that begins not in the steppe lands of Central Asia, but in the ancient forests and rivers of Siberia.
The article, “Linguistic Evidence Suggests that Xiōng-nú and Huns Spoke the Same Paleo-Siberian Language,” by Svenja Bonmann and Simon Fries, appears in Transactions of the Philological Society. Click here to read it.
See also: New Study Links Huns to Xiongnu Through DNA Evidence
Top Image: Huns by Georges Rochegrosse (1859–1938) / Wikimedia Commons
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