Both the Huns of Attila
and those of Arpad came from the family of nomadic nations whose
primitive regions were those vast wildernesses of High Asia which are
included between the Altaic and the Himalayan mountain chains.
The inroads of these tribes upon the lower regions of Asia and into
Europe have caused many of the most remarkable revolutions in the
history of the world. There is every reason to believe that swarms of
these nations made their way into distant parts of the earth at periods
long before the date of the Scythian invasion of Asia, which is the
earliest inroad of the nomadic race that history records. The first, as
far as we can conjecture, in respect to the time of their descent, were
the Finnish and Ugrian tribes, who appear to have come down from the
Altaic border of High Asia toward the northwest, in which direction they
advanced to the Uralian Mountains. There they established themselves;
and that mountain chain, with its valleys and pasture lands, became to
them a new country, whence they sent out colonies on every side; but the
Ugrian colony which under Arpad occupied Hungary and became the
ancestors of the bulk of the present Hungarian nation did not quit
their settlements on the Uralian Mountains till a very late period, and
not until four centuries after the time when Attila led from the primary
seats of the nomadic races in High Asia the host with which he advanced
into the heart of France.
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