So now we will relate out of what occasion that battle arose, and how it
was fought.
NOTE 1. - +The COMANIANS, a people of Turkish race, the Polovtzi[or
"Dwellers of the Plain" of Nestor, the Russian Annalist] of the old
Russians, were one of the chief nations occupying the plains on the north
of the Black Sea and eastward to the Caspian, previous to the Mongol
invasion. Rubruquis makes them identical with the KIPCHAK, whose name is
generally attached to those plains by Oriental writers, but Hammer
disputes this. [See a note, pp. 92-93 of Rockhill's Rubruck. - H.C.]
ALANIA, the country of the Alans on the northern skirts of the Caucasus
and towards the Caspian; LAC, the Wallachs as above. MENJAR is a subject
of doubt. It may be Majar, on the Kuma River, a city which was visited
by Ibn Batuta, and is mentioned by Abulfeda as Kummajar. It was in the
14th century the seat of a Franciscan convent. Coins of that century, both
of Majar and New Majar, are given by Erdmann. The building of the
fortresses of Kichi Majar and Ulu Majar (little and great) is ascribed in
the Derbend Nameh to Naoshirwan.
