Huns, Avars, Hungarians or Mongols: Asian cavalry warriors repeatedly spread fear and terror in Europe. The image of uncivilized, murderous barbarian hordes has persisted to this day. Wrongly.
The invaders from the steppe seemed strange to the inhabitants of Europe and extremely frightening. The Huns could be taken “for two-legged beasts”, wrote in the 4th century AD. the Roman historian and former officer Ammianus Marcellinus. They had no lodgings and cultivated no crops, lived on horseback, wrapped themselves in dirty robes, ate half-raw meat and were said to be “the most terrible of all warriors”. “Like beasts that have no sense, they know no concept of honor and dishonor,” Ammianus remarked scornfully. They are also “filled with a terrible desire… to rob someone else’s property”.