Interesting article about Variags

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Originally Posted by Kuruharan

Khand is the connecting point between the East and the South. Culturally, since cultures in origin are so heavily impacted by the climates in which they develop, I think Khand was more arid than steppe making them possibly fit better into the milieu of Harad rather than Rhun.

While it's always dangerous to play sound-alikes with Tolkien's nomenclature, Khand could be a sort of sideways allusion to Khazar: the Turkic inhabitants of the medieval Crimea, likewise a "connecting point between the East and the South".

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The only issue I have with the otherwise attractive Varangian theory is that the Varangian Guard were the Norse (and Anglo-Saxon) expats in service to the Byzantine Empire -- upon which Gondor is clearly calqued -- not Byzantium's Slavic and Muslim enemies.