Jordan says that after the death of Attila, at his grave, according to the custom of the Huns, there was a great feast, locally called strava. The Huns sang the glories and deeds of the deceased and drank a lot. They gave themselves up alternately to opposite feelings, and the revelry of the general feast intervened in the sad ceremony. With the death of Attila, the Hunnic horde disintegrated, because strife and strife began between his sons. The peoples ruled by the Huns rebelled against them and drove the Hunnic horde out of Pannonia. Part of the Huns settled on the right bank of the Danube in the so-called Lesser Scythia (Dobrudja) and in the Roman provinces, under Roman rule. Part went beyond the Danube, back to the Black Sea steppes. Jordan says that they occupied those parts of Scythia through which the course of the Dnieper River, called by the Huns in their language Var, passes.
Following the Hunnic horde, the Bulgarian horde appeared in our steppes at the end of the 5th century. Contemporaries (for example, the writer of the 6th century Procopius) considered the Bulgarians to be the same Huns. Maybe they were not the Huns from the horde of Attila, but it is very likely that it was a tribe related to the Huns, and that the Huns of Attila merged with this new horde. Remnants of the language of the Danube Bulgarians (especially personal names and titles), as well as news about their way of life, speak for the fact that it was a Turkic horde, or, at least, that stood under very strong influences of Turkic culture. In the 6th century, the Bulgarians were already divided into two branches - the Kuturgurs, who lived to the west of the Don, and the Uturgurs, who lived beyond the Don near Metody. From the very end of the 5th century, the Bulgarians almost continuously attacked the Byzantine lands, and the Slavs also participated in these attacks. In the middle of the 6th century, Byzantium paid a significant annual tribute to the Bulgarians-Kuturgurs, but still they constantly devastated the Danube lands.
In the middle of the 6th century, the Avars moved across our steppes into the vicinity of the eastern empire (obry of our chronicle). The Avar horde was indisputably of Turkic origin. They were close relatives and countrymen of the Huns. They are called in the sources Avaro-Huns: Var-Huns, Var-Honites. Such a tribe of the Umongolian Turks - the War-Huns - is still known in western Mongolia. In the 60s of the 6th century, the Avars struck up relations with Byzantium and began to demand for themselves the same gifts that the Bulgarians received from Byzantium. This "alliance" was adopted by the Byzantines, and the Avars were hired to fight the enemies of Byzantium. From the modern historian Menander, we learn that the Avars fought after that with some Savirs and Uturgurs and then with the Slavs-Antes. At the invitation of Emperor Justin, they fought the Franks,then they took part in the struggle of the Lombards with the Gepids on the middle Danube (567). Having exterminated the Gepids, the Avars, by agreement with the Lombards, settled in their place, together with their allies, the Bulgarians-Kuturgurs. Since soon, in 568, the Lombards moved to Italy, the Avars remained masters of the entire middle Danube lowland. The Avar invasion did not pass without a trace for the Bulgarian hordes of our south. The Avars shattered their eastern branch. Some of them retreated to the north - settled on the middle Volga and the lower Kama and, welded here with the Finns, founded the Bulgarian kingdom, which later appears in the news of the 9th and 10th centuries. Part moved to the south and settled on the eastern coast of Meotida (later Black Bulgarians), where it was conquered by the Khazars (at the end of the 6th century). The western hordes partly left with the Avars to Pannonia, and partly settled in the so-called "Corner" (˝Ογγλος),between the Dniester and the Danube, "in a safe and inaccessible place from all sides", protected by swamps and rivers. For some time these Bulgarians were dependent on the Avars, but in 630 they freed themselves from it and entered into an alliance with Byzantium. But this peaceful relationship did not last long. The Bulgarians began to attack the Byzantine lands, and then about 670, under the leadership of Asparuh, crossed the Danube and settled in Mizia. Subjugating seven Slavic tribes here, they founded the Danube Bulgarian Kingdom, in which the Bulgarian horde, after several generations, completely disappeared into the mass of Slavic settlers.but in 630 they freed themselves from it and entered into an alliance with Byzantium. But this peaceful relationship did not last long. The Bulgarians began to attack the Byzantine lands, and then about 670, under the leadership of Asparuh, crossed the Danube and settled in Mizia. Subjugating seven Slavic tribes here, they founded the Danube Bulgarian Kingdom, in which the Bulgarian horde, after several generations, completely disappeared into the mass of Slavic settlers.but in 630 they freed themselves from it and entered into an alliance with Byzantium. But this peaceful relationship did not last long. The Bulgarians began to attack the Byzantine lands, and then about 670, under the leadership of Asparuh, crossed the Danube and settled in Mizia. Subjugating seven Slavic tribes here, they founded the Danube Bulgarian Kingdom, in which the Bulgarian horde, after several generations, completely disappeared into the mass of Slavic settlers.