Their arrival was probably not before the 13th century, when the Mongols broke the power of the Cumans, who had assimilated the previous population on that territory. It is unclear when people other than the Brodnici and Berladnici (which had a Romanian origin with large Slavic influences) began to settle in the lower reaches of major rivers such as the Don and the Dnieper after the demise of the Khazar state. Map of the Wild Fields in the 17th century

8.5.1 Registered Cossacks of the Russian Federation.5.10 Anticommunist Cossacks in exile and World War II, 1920вЂ“1945.5.9 Cossacks in the Soviet Union, 1917вЂ“1945.5.8 Bolshevik uprising and Civil War, 1917вЂ“1922.5.7 After the February Revolution, 1917.4.3 Black Sea, Azov and Danubian Sich Cossacks.Cossack organizations operate in Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belarus and the United States. Between 3.5 and 5В million people associate themselves with the Cossack cultural identity across the world. In the 2002 Russian census, 140,028В people declared Cossack ethnicity, while 67,573 people identified as Cossack in the 2010 census. During the 1990s, many regional authorities agreed to hand over some local administrative and policing duties to their Cossack hosts. In 1988, the Soviet Union passed a law allowing the re-establishment of former Cossack hosts and the formation of new ones.

During the Perestroika era in the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, descendants of Cossacks moved to revive their national traditions. Cohesive Cossack-based units were organized and fought for both Germany and the Soviet Union during World War II.ДЄfter World War II, the Soviet Union disbanded the Cossack units in the Soviet Army, and many of the Cossack traditions were suppressed during the years of rule under Joseph Stalin and his successors. The Cossack way of life persisted into the twentieth century, though the sweeping societal changes of the Russian Revolution disrupted Cossack society as much as any other part of Russia many Cossacks migrated to other parts of Europe following the establishment of the Soviet Union, while others remained and assimilated into the Communist state. Each host had a territory consisting of affiliated villages called stanitsa. The various Cossack groups were organized along military lines, with large autonomous groups called hosts.

The rulers of the Russian Empire endowed Cossacks with certain special privileges in return for the military duty to serve in the irregular troops (mostly cavalry). They inhabited sparsely populated areas in the Dnieper, Don, Terek, and Ural river basins, and played an important role in the historical and cultural development of both Ukraine and Russia. The Cossacks were particularly noted for holding democratic traditions. They were a semi-nomadic and semi-militarized people, who, while under the nominal suzerainty of various Eastern European states at the time, were allowed a great degree of self-governance in exchange for military service. The Cossacks are a predominantly East Slavic Orthodox Christian people group originating in the steppes of Ukraine.

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