Szilzibulosz, a türkök vezére-------

EIDOLA (Greek eidōlon "idol" - Translator's Note)

We seem to learn something about Hunnic sacrifices from a short passage in the Getica which probably goes back to Priscus: When the Huns first entered Scythia, they sacrificed to victory, litauere mctoriae, as many as they captured. This is the only time the Huns were accused of having sacrificed their prisoners. In Attila's time, and also before him, those captives who could not be sold or who were not ransomed were kept as domestic slaves. Priscus apparently transferred a Germanic custom, of which he knew from literature, to the Huns. Cimbri sacrificed the horses by drowning and the captives by hanging (Orosius, Hist. adv. Pagan. V, 6, 5-6) (This indicates that Cimbri may have followed the Türkic Tengrian beliefs, sending enemies to Tengri to be re-incarnated as friends instead of enemies - Translator's Note). But the Huns may have sacrificed animals to their gods. Did they worship gods in human or animal form?

Throughout northern Eurasia, from Lapland to Korea, the figures of the shamanistic pantheon, in particular the shaman's "helpers," were represented in various ways: painted on drums; cut out of felt; cast in bronze and iron and attached to the shaman's coat; carved out of wood and put up in the tent or glued to the drum. The shamanistic Huns, too, may have had eidola (I avoid the missionary term "idols"). There is, indeed, both literary and archaeological, though circumstantial, evidence of their existence.
-----------------

According to Malalas, Gordas, prince of the Huns near Bosporus in the Crimea, was baptized in Constantinople in the first year of Justinian's reign, 527-528. After his return to his country, he ordered the αγάλματα (Greek for statuary - Translator's Note), made of gold and electrum, to be melted down; the metal was exchanged for Byzantine money in Bosporus. Incensed at the sacrilege, the priests, in connivance with Muageris, Gordas' brother, put the prince to death.

-----------------

There is no reason to doubt Malalas' account. Besides, the statement that the figures were of gold and electrum, while the cliche would call for gold and silver, speaks in favor of the story. It does, of course, not prove that the Attilanic Huns, too, had figures of their gods made of precious metals. But the possibility cannot be ruled out, certainly not because of the low level of Hun metal work. The impressive bronze horseman from Issyk in Kazakhstan, datable to the fifth or fourth century в.с., shows the skill of metalworkers in the early nomadic societies of Eurasia. The Eastern Huns had their "metal men," and the silver figures at the court of the Turk Silzibulos (Menander's rendering of Istemi Yabgu's name - Translator's Note) greatly impressed the Byzantine ambassador. The common Htinnic eidola - provided that they did exist - were probably much more like those of the Sarmatians, about which we are fairly well informed.