Old Great Bulgaria

According to the Nominalia of the Bulgarian khans, Kubrat was from the royal clan Dulo and a rightful heir to the Bulgar throne. He was awarded the title of patrician (honorary, high title for a nobleman) by the Byzantine emperor Heraclius.[21] Hermann Zotenberg (1883), while translating John of Nikiu's Chronicles from Old Ethiopian, intentionally replaced the name Qetrades to Kubrat. Since then, the historiography holds a misconception that Kubrat was raised and baptized by the Byzantine court, while John's character Qetrades has no real-life connection to the ruler of the Great Bulgaria Kubrat.[2][21]

Kubrat quickly managed to overthrow Avar domination, extending Onogur influence among the Bulgars in Pannonia in what became known as Hungary. Ultimately, although there is no evidence that the Utigurs were independent of the Onogurs until after Kubrat's empire disintegrated, it is believed he seceded from the Onogurs when they became entangled in dynastic wars. After Kubrat's burial in Mala Pereshchepina, the Khazars, who had triumphed in the collapse of Onoguria, subjugated Kubrat's eldest son and heir Batbayan, forcing his other sons to flee north up the Volga (2nd son Kotrag) and west into the Balkans (4th son Kuber and 3rd son Asparukh) and Italy (5th son Alcek, Alzek)[22]

Some also believe that the present-day Balkars of the Caucasus are the descendants of the Batbayan horde even though they speak a Turkic language of the Kipchak type.

After Kotrag, the leader of the Kutrigurs, took control on the western steppe, Batbayan led them into the upper Volga-Ural region. There they established Volga Bulgaria, at the confluence of the Volga and Kama. As the Volga or Silver Bulgars (Bessermens), they converted voluntarily to Islam in the 9th century. They managed to preserve their national identity well into the 13th century, by repelling the first Mongol attacks in 1223. However, they were eventually subdued, their capital Bolghar city became one of major cities of the Golden Horde of the Mongols and the Bulgars mixed with the Tatars. The citizens of the modern Russian republics of Tatarstan and Chuvashia are considered to be descendants of those Bulgars.

Kuber ruled in Sirmium over a mixed group of peoples – Bulgars, Byzantine subjects, Slavs, and Germanic tribes – as a vassal of the Avar Khagan. After a revolt he led his people to Macedonia. There he settled in the region of Keremisia and made an unsuccessful attempt to capture the city of Thessaloniki. After this, he disappears from history and his people were later consolidated into the First Bulgarian Empire by Khan Krum.

Other Bulgars, circa 662, led by their "Duke Alzeco" (Alcek) sought refuge from the Avars with the Lombards and requested land from the Lombard King Grimoald I in exchange for military service "for an uncertain reason", initially staying near Ravenna and later moving further south. Grimoald sent Alcek and his followers to his son Romuald in Benevento and they were then granted by Romuald land northeast of Naples in the "spacious but up till that time deserted" towns of Sepino, Bovianum (Boiano), and Isernia, in the present-day region of Molise in the Apennines. Instead of the title "Duke", Altzek was granted the Lombard title of "Gastald". Paul the Deacon in his Historia Langobardorum writing after the year 787 says that in his time Bulgars still inhabited the area, and that even though they speak "Latin", "they have not forsaken the use of their own tongue".[24]

Excavations in the necropolis of Vicenne-Campochiaro near Boiano, which dates from the 7th century, found among 130 burials that there were 13 human burials alongside horses along with artifacts of Germanic and Avar origin.[25][26][27] Horse burials are characteristic of Central Asian horse-nomads, and therefore these burials are clearly those of the Bulgar settlers of Molise and Campania.[28]

After the state disintegrated under Khazar attack in 668, Asparukh parted ways with his brothers and led some of the Bulgars to seek a secure home. He was followed by 30,000 to 50,000 Bulgars.[29]

After the Battle of Ongal, Asparukh founded the First Bulgarian Empire, which was officially recognized as an independent state by the Byzantine Empire in 681.