Cotrigurs

   A Turkic people from Central Asia who migrated westward across the steppe (q.v.), settling west of the Black Sea (q.v.) by the end of the fifth century. Justinian I (q.v.) tried to check the threat of Cotrigur raids by cultivating another Turkic people, the Utigurs (q.v.), who lived to the east of the Sea of Azov. In 551, when some 12,000 Cotrigurs, encouraged by their allies, the Geipids (q.v.), crossed the Danube (q.v.) on a plundering expedition, Justinian I incited the Utigurs to attack them and they were forced to withdraw. In 558 a Cotrigur chieftain named Zabergan invaded Thrace (qq.v.), sending one part of his forces into Greece (q.v.) as far as Thermopylae (q.v.). Another part moved against Constantinople (q.v.), which Belisarios (q.v.) defended heroically. Justinian I again stirred the Utigurs to attack the Cotrigurs, which they did once the Cotrigurs withdrew across the Danube. In the second half of the sixth century, the Cotrigurs were subjugated by the Avars (q.v.), who forced some to accompany them to Pannonia (q.v.). Other Cotrigurs were incorporated into Bulgaria (q.v.) in the seventh century.