Yancai (Chinese: 奄蔡; pinyin: Yǎncài; Wade–Giles: Yen-ts’ai; lit. 'Vast Steppe' < LHC *ʔɨam-sɑ < OC (125 BCE) *ʔɨam-sɑs, a.k.a. 闔蘇 Hésū < *ĥa̱p-sa̱ĥ; compare also Latin Abzoae) was the Chinese name of an ancient nomadic state centered near the Aral Sea during the Han dynasty period (206 BC—220 AD). They are generally considered to have been an Iranian people of the Sarmatian group. After becoming vassals of the Kangju in the 1st century BC, Yancai became known as Alan (Chinese: 阿蘭; pinyin: Ālán; Wade–Giles: A-lan). Yancai 奄蔡 is often connected to the Aorsi of Roman records, while 阿蘭 Alan has been connected to the later Alans.
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👉 Yancai in the context of Alans
The Alans (Latin: Alani) were an ancient and medieval Iranic nomadic pastoral people who migrated to what is today North Caucasus; some continued on to Europe and later North Africa. They are generally regarded as part of the Sarmatians, and possibly related to the Massagetae. Modern historians have connected the Alans with the Central Asian Yancai of Chinese sources and with the Aorsi of Roman sources. Having migrated westwards and becoming dominant among the Sarmatians on the Pontic–Caspian steppe, the Alans are mentioned by Roman sources in the 1st century CE. At that time they had settled the region north of the Black Sea and frequently raided the Parthian Empire and the South Caucasus provinces of the Roman Empire. From 215 to 250 CE the Goths broke their power on the Pontic Steppe, thereby assimilating a sizeable portion of the associated Alans.
Upon the Hunnic defeat of the Goths on the Pontic Steppe around 375 CE, many of the Alans migrated westwards along with various Germanic tribes. They crossed the Rhine in 406 along with the Vandals and Suebi, settling in Orléans and Valence. Around 409 they joined the Vandals and Suebi in crossing the Pyrenees into the Iberian Peninsula, settling in Lusitania and Hispania Carthaginensis. The Iberian Alans, soundly defeated by the Visigoths in 418, subsequently surrendered their authority to the Hasdingi Vandals. In 428 CE, the Vandals and Alans crossed the Strait of Gibraltar into North Africa, where they founded a kingdom which lasted until its conquest by forces of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I in 534.
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Yancai in the context of Aorsi
The Aorsi, known in Greek sources as the Aorsoi (Ἄορσοι), were an ancient Iranian people of the Sarmatian group, who played a major role in the events of the Pontic Steppe from the 1st century BC to the 1st century AD.
They are often regarded as connected to the contemporaneous Eurasian steppe state of Yancai (or Yentsai) mentioned in ancient Chinese records. The Alans, first mentioned by Middle Eastern and European scholars in the 1st century AD, are regarded as successors of the Aorsi.