To discuss the Eurasian Steppe, we need to first define what a steppe is. Most people are completely unaware of the fact that a steppe is a geological ecoregion. Or, more basically speaking, it's an area that is generally characterized by grassland plains devoid of trees and far away from rivers or lakes. Imagine a desert, but with grass. The largest of these is known as the Eurasian steppe belt, which stretches from Moldova to Manchuria. The belt is a set of steppes that connect across the continent, as you can see below. The Eurasian Steppe has served to connect the regions of Europe, Southern Asia, Central Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Asia for many centuries - millennia, even. For example, if we think back to the Migration Theory, we can now see a direct path across the continent to envision the path they took. But that is not all the steppe belt has done. In addition, it has connected these areas economically, culturally, politically, and magically once civilizations started to rise.
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The Eurasian steppe belt can be divided into three distinct regions (or belts), all of which are then further divided into steppes based primarily on their geographical location. To begin, we'll discuss the first of the three divisions, the Western Steppe. This particular steppe begins near the mouth of the Danube river and reaches north of Kazan and south of the Ural Mountains. Within the Western Steppe, there is the Black Sea-Caspian Steppe, which as you can tell by its name, moves from between the Black and Caspian Seas to the Caucasus Mountains. The Western Steppe contains an interesting geographical feature, what many historians call the Great Hungarian Plain, which is an island steppe. What do I mean by an island steppe? I thought a steppe was a series of grasslands? The definition given previously is still correct, as an island steppe just refers to being separated from the original steppe, in this case by mountains. There is one more important interior steppe that I would like to point out: the Crimean Peninsula, which is on the south coast, and was and is a major connection for the wizarding and Muggle communities who lived farther down near the Mediterranean basin! Without the inclusion of the Crimean Peninsula in the Eurasian Steppes, we may never have known about our fellow magical ancestors from there, as more isolated wizarding cultures were located in this area.
Next, there is the Central Steppe, also known as the Kazakh Steppe, which lies at the southern end of the Ural Mountains and is typically referred to as the invisible, dividing line between Europe and Asia. However, this division is not only geographically important but also politically important. To the north of this ecoregion is the Kazakh forest, which eventually transitions into the Siberian forest, but to the south lies the Kazakh desert. I'm sure you can guess how these two extreme geographies can affect the political associations, yes?
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