Mongols

The Mongols are an East Asian ethnic group with roots in Mongolia, Inner Mongolia in China, and the Buryatia Republic of the Russian Federation. They are the largest ethnic group in Mongolia. As the most powerful member of the vast Mongolic peoples' family, they are known as the Mongols. Both the Oirats of Western Mongolia and the Buryats and Kalmyks of Russia are classed as independent ethno-linguistic groupings or as subgroups of the Mongols, depending on how they are categorised.

Because they have a shared ancestry and ethnic identity, the Mongols are a cohesive group. Mongolian language is a term used to refer to a collection of indigenous languages spoken by the Mongolian people. Proto-Mongols are the progenitors of the modern-day Mongols, and they are the people who lived before them.

Mongolic peoples have been equated with many peoples throughout history, including the Scythians, the Magog, and the Tungusic peoples. According to Chinese historical records, the Mongolic peoples' ancestors may be traced back to the Donghu, a nomadic confederation that occupied eastern Mongolia and Manchuria during the Bronze Age. There was a time when the Donghu lived near the Xiongnu, whose origins are still contested today. Despite the fact that some researchers believe they were proto-Mongols, it is more probable that they were a multi-ethnic community of Mongolic and Turkic tribes. It has been proposed that the Huns spoke a language that was connected to the Xiongnu language.

The Donghu, on the other hand, can more easily be classified as proto-Mongols because Chinese histories trace only Mongolic tribes and kingdoms (such as the Xianbei and Wuhuan peoples) back to them, despite the fact that some historical texts claim a mixed Xiongnu-Donghu ancestry for some tribes (such as the Xiongnu) (e.g. the Khitan).