Huns

Tell me about Huns.

Were they really as fierce as they're made to be?

was Atilla white?

Artificial cranial deformation

There aren´t any surviving depictions of him in art (there is a short description of his appearance by Priscus in his writing though), but he was probably not white.
Also the Huns where ballers imo, sure they weren´t able to topple or destroy the Eastern Roman empire, but then again no one where able to at that point in time. One of the reasons they where even able to raid and extort the Eastern empire of money and valuables to the extent they actually did was helped alot by the fact that the Sassanids where keeping up a lot of Roman troops on the eastern front. Weird that their raids into Sassanid territory over the Caucasus in the late 4th century isn´t included in the map you posted though. A good book on the Huns is E. A Thompsons work The Huns, really fantastic work.
Here is my personal favorite depiction of Attila, but again this is no historically accurate depiction of him since we simple don´t know how he really looked.

Weren't Huns just another Turkic tribe driven into the region just like Avars or Bulgars?

>GIBE MONEY PLS OR I WILL THROW A TANTRUM.
Steppe "Terror"

The Huns got absolutely demolished by the Persians, it a big factor in why most historians believe they targeted the easier pickings of the weaker Eastern and especially Western Roman Empires. To my knowledge, the first attempt was trying to attack Ctesiphon and getting demolished by the Persians some 100 miles distant from the capital. The second time the Huns were engaged by a Sassanid Persian-Armenian army in the Caucasus and defeated again.

wasn't he born in hungary?

Confederation of Turkics, Mongolics, Europeans and Iranians actually

That's the military of the Hunnic Empire. Actual Hunnics are supposedly most closely related to the Mongols in particular.

Mongols carry C2 haplogroup mainly, Huns were Q so they were probably closest to Altai Turkics genetically.

I'm pretty sure we really don't know for sure but that might be the most plausable explanation currently, though I'm more inclined to them being Turkic

Weren't the Huns that attacked the Sassanids different from the ones that raided Rome?

Yeap.

The Hepthalites were just memefully called "White Huns" by late Roman historians because they had the same nomadshit lifestyle "with white bodies."

Well, Western Late Roman historians. The Eastern Romans just called every steppenig group "Scythian."

White Huns have nothing to do with the actual Huns. They were a similar confederation but were Iranics. The actual same Huns that attacked the Romans and Byzantines attacked Persia before attacking the Latins/Greeks.

>The actual same Huns that attacked the Romans and Byzantines attacked Persia before attacking the Latins/Greeks.
Please tell me more

The issues and conflicts the Persians had with the White Huns/Helpthalites are entirely separate from the two abortive failed invasions/wars the real Hunnics attempted in the early 5th century. This isn't surprising. Persia was still fairly stable after its first golden age in the 4th century and secure on most of its frontiers and borders. Meanwhile the ERE was having issues with Germanic tribes to its west and WRE was in its own neck deep in problems.

>In 395 the Huns began their first large-scale attack on the Eastern Roman Empire.[53] Huns attacked in Thrace, overran Armenia, and pillaged Cappadocia. They entered parts of Syria, threatened Antioch, and swarmed through the province of Euphratesia. The forces of Emperor Theodosius were fully committed in the west so the Huns moved unopposed until the end of 398 when the eunuch Eutropius gathered together a force composed of Romans and Goths and succeeded in restoring peace. It is uncertain though, whether or not Eutropius' forces defeated the Huns or whether the Huns left on their own. There is no record of a notable victory by Eutropius and there is evidence that the Hunnish forces were already leaving the area by the time he gathered his forces.[1]

Whether put to flight by Eutropius, or leaving on their own, the Huns had left the Eastern Roman Empire by 398. After this, the Huns invaded the Sassanid Empire. This invasion was initially successful, coming close to the capital of the empire at Ctesiphon; however, they were defeated badly during the Persian counterattack and retreated toward the Caucasus Mountains via the Derbend Pass.
Which explains why the Persians got much more serious about fortifying their northern territories due to the Huns.

Nice. Had the Huns managed to defeat the Persians, what do you think would have happened?

We Wuz Khanz n Shieet

No idea. The Persians suffered horribly at Herat but still recovered, I imagine it wouldn't be too different with the Huns had things gone further south.

bump

>We wuz hungarianz and shieeeeeet

White Huns and the Western Huns were part of the old Xiongnu/Hun confederacy. The eastern Xiongnu/Hun were the Xianbei, who later became the Rourans.

Also the White Huns/Hepthalites are basically scythians/yuezhi remnants whom the Kushans kicked out. Kushans themselves were one of the lesser Yeuzhi tribes who took over Bactria. The Greater Yeuzhi got absorbed by Xiongnu and became the Hepthalites later on.