Koibal

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The Koibal are one of the subdivisions of the Khakass people of Southern Siberia. Although they speak the Turkic Koybal language, the Koibal have mixed ancestry. They formed in the late 19th century from the merger of the Abugach, Baikot, Kandyk, Tarazhak, Kol and Arsh peoples. Most of these people are believed to have been of ancestry more closely related to Samoyedic peoples or Kettic peoples than to Turks.

Prior to the rise of Communism the Koibal were officially Russian Orthodox. However they had retained many Shamanist and Animist customs.

[edit] Sources

Wixman, Ronald. The Peoples of the USSR: An Ethnographic Handbook. (Armonk, New York: M. E. Sharpe, Inc., 1984) p. 109.