Some researchers believe that  the ethnographic group of the Teryukhans living south of Nizhny Novgorod  is the same part of the Mordovian people as the Erzyas and the Mokshas. It is known that already in the 18th century, the Teryukhans used the Russian language, but for a long time they kept their national consciousness and  Mordovian beliefs and traditions . So rapid Russification is traditionally considered to be a result of the intense amalgamation of the Mordovians with the Russians . The author sets as a goal to assess the degree of the said amalgamation. The  paper «On the question of the anthropological type the Mordovians – Teryukhans» [2, 20-27 ] presents the     qualitative research of  three Mordovian and four Russian ethnic groups living in the anthropological zones determined  by the experts (Table . 1, columns 2-8 )  to identify the degree of their amalgamation. On the basis of the chi-squared distribution and Heincke and  Pearson's codes (Table. 1, figures 11-13), it was found that anthropologically the Teryukhans are close to the Mokshas and Erzyas.

Table 1

Anthropometric indicators of the representatives of the Volga regionethnic groups*

* [3, 154-165; 4, 307-312]

In this article, the author used the cluster analysis conducted on the basis of the absolute anthropometric data  to identify the degree of nearness of the Tteryukhans not only to the Russian groups , but also to their Eastern neighbors such as the Gorny Mari, northern Chuvashes and Tatars (Table . 1 , figures 1-10 ) . The author uses  the following notations: the Teryukhans - Var 1, the  Erzyas - Var 2 ,  the Mokshas - Var 3; the Russians of the Don and Sura region - Var 4, the Russians of the Upper Volga Region - Var 5, the Russians of the Middle Volga Region - Var 6 , the North East Russians -Var 7; the Mari - Var 8 , the Tatars - Var 9 , the Chuvashes - Var 10. The method of the nearest neighbour was used  for the following dendrogram (see . Fig. 1).

                                        Nearest-neighbor method, Euclidean distance

                                                                Figure 1

This dendrogram shows a clear amalgamation of the Russian people with certain groups of  the Mordovians on the one hand and  with the Mari, Tatars and Chuvashes on the other hand; the both  clusters demonstrate their autochthony. The Teryukhans come into the total Volga region cluster only at  level  4.5. The difference between the Teryukhans and all other local groups of population makes us wonder about the Teryukhans' origin . We can assume that this  anthropological type is the result of the amalgamation of the Erzyas with the the Russians of the Upper Volga region and also with the  representatives of the other ethnic group, whose historical homeland appears to be beyond the Volga region.

            The fact that a high, by local standards, percentage ( 22%) of the Teryukhans have  light hair  and a very high percentage (56%) of them have blue, green and grey eyes, combined with the the fact that the Teryukhans have the highest growth among the representatives of the ethnic groups under consideration suggests the conclusion that the said homeland was located somewhere in the north west? The Russian chronicles of the 18th   century say that in the north Mordovian ( Erzya) Duchy, so-called «Purgasova volost», there was “ Mordva and Rus” [5, 451 ] . Typically, researchers consider the term  “Purgasova Rus” in the ethnic context  and refer it to the Russian population . The result of this analysis leads to the assumption that the chronicle Purgasova Rus could be the druzhina (warriors) of the Scandinavians. It is known that in the area of ​​modern Yaroslavl (site of the ancient town of Temirevo) there was a Varangian settlement for a long time . Perhaps, the inhabitants of that settlement were  the  «Rus», later they settled in the Mordovians'  lands and left their mark in the gene pool the Teryukhans?

2. Abramov V.K. K voprosu ob antropologicheskom tipe mordvy-teryukhan // Materialy X Mezhdunarodnogo kongressa finno-ugrovedov: arkheologiya, antropologiya i istoriya. Ch. VI. – Yoshkar-Ola, 2008. – S. 20-27.

3. Mark K.Yu. Etnicheskaya antropologiya mordvy // Voprosy etnicheskoy istorii mordovskogo naroda. – M., 1960. – S. 154-165.

4. Proiskhozhdeniye i etnicheskaya istoriya russkogo naroda. – M.,1965. – 415 s.

5. Polnoye sobraniye russkikh letopisey (PSRL). T.1. – Vyp. 2. – S. 451.