A 32nd great grandmother of Betty Jane Rollins was a Cuman princess born on

the Russian steppe in 932ce. Her name is unknown but she was of the ruling

famliy of the Cumans and she married Taksony, prince of Hungary, in 947 at the

age of 15. [Although we have reliable sources to trace our ancestory back to the

royal families of England and the records kept of the royal lineages in Europe

are easily accessible, absolute accuracy across 1,000 years of history is not

possible. Therefore, this information should not be considered to be any more

or any less than what it is.]

Through their descendants, their DNA passed west through the royal families of

Europe and crossed the Atlantic with the Puritans to New England, then west

with the Anglo migration across America to Texas and Oklahoma in the late

1800’s. This lineage passes through two routes of Maverick-Ladd-Harvey family

connections and several routes through Ogle-Reid-Harvey connections.

A granddaughter of Taksony and the Princess married Ottone "Pietro" Orseolo,

the Doge (Duke) of Venice, one of the most powerful rulers in Europe. These

Turkish genes traveled through the kings and queens of Hungary, Poland,

Bohemia, Castille, Aragon, France and England. Even through a few saints (and

non-saints) along the way.

Our Princess may have been born on the expanse of the Russian steppe, north

of the Black Sea in what is now the Republic of Ukraine. Or, she may have been

born further east. Her people came originally from Siberia and were a link in the

seemingly endless chain of nomadic peoples moving west into conflict with

Europeans and Arabs. They were known by different names to the different

peoples with whom they came into contact: Cumans or Qumani to the Arabs;

Polovtsy to the Russians; Komanoi to the Byzantines; and others. In Turkic,

they were Kipchaks. They were ruled by a royal family headed by a khan. The

Kipchak Turks pushed the Petcheneg Turks west into Europe where the

Petchenegs eventually disappeared, caught between the Kipchak and Byzantine

armies. The Kipchaks in turn were pushed west by the Mongols of Ghengis

Khan. This chain of migrations went on for centuries.

The Cumans moved along the north shore of the Caspian Sea and crossed the

Volga River. They were the northern neighbors of the Georgians and

Armenians. Spreading further west, they crossed the Don and the Dnieper

Rivers to occupy southern Ukraine. Here they were initially enemies to the

Kievan Rus’, but, with the arrival of the Mongols, the Russians and the Cumans

joined forces, albeit unsuccessfully.

In 1223, Kuthan, the khan of the Cumans along with the grand prince of Kiev, led

an 80,000 man army against the Mongols at the Kalka River, but, they were cut

to pieces. Kuthan managed to escape and by 1240 had led "40,000 huts" into

what is now Hungary where they finally settled. The Cumans were pagans when

they moved through the eastern orthodox Russians with the Muslims on their left

flank. Settling in Hungary, they converted to christianity. Kuthan was probably a

grand nephew (an unknown number of generations descended) of our Princess.

Kuthan’s daughter married Mstyslav The Bold, prince (equivilant of king) of

Galicia, an area just east of Kiev.

The Princess’ husband Taksony also had Turkish heritage. His grandfather,

Arpad, prince of Hungary, led the Magyars (another nomadic people, although

Finno-Ugric instead of Turkic) into the Carpathian Basin to establish what

eventually evolved into Hungary. The Arpad Dynasty may have been a Turkic

noble family ruling over the Finno-Ugric Magyars. The Magyars or Hungarians

came from the Oka River area to the east of Finland.

This part of the world was surely a melting pot of Finnish Magyars, eastern Slavs

ruled by Viking Rus’, numerous Turkic and Mongol tribes, Caucasian Georgians

and Ossetians, Poles and Lithuanians (also Slavs), and Byzantine Greeks. The

Princess, at the age of 15, entered into this maelstom of political-racial-religious

forces which existed almost constantly in a permanent state of warfare. This is

the genesis of the Balkan world of 2000.

With the downfall of the Mongols came the end of the forces pressuring the

nomadic peoples westward. The people left in this area turned most of their

attention away from Asia towards their European neighbors, the Poles,

Germans, Serbians, Croats, etc. The Princess’ people had traveled half way

across Asia to Europe and her descendants went half way around the world over

the next 1,000 years.

sources:

Rene Grousset, "The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia", Rutgers

University Press.

Orest Subtelny, "Ukraine: A History", University of Toronto Press.

Nicholas V. Riasanovsky, "A History of Russia", Oxford University Press.

Anne Taute, "Kings and Queens of Europe", University of North Carolina Press.

various genealogical sources---RCM.