Yakuts (Yakut: Саха Sakha), are Turkic people who mainly inhabit the Sakha Republic (Yakutia).

The Yakut language belongs to the Siberian branch of the Turkic languages. Yakuts mainly live in the Republic of Sakha in the Russian Federation, with some extending to the Amur, Magadan, Sakhalin regions, and the Taymyr and Evenki Autonomous Districts.

The Yakuts are divided into two basic groups based on geography and economics. Yakuts in the north are historically semi-nomadic hunters, fishermen, reindeer breeders, while southern Yakuts engage in animal husbandry focusing on horses and cattle.

Origin and history

The ancestors of Yakuts were Kurykans who migrated from Yenisey river to Baikal Lake. around VII c. AD. The Yakuts originally lived around Olkhon and the region of Lake Baikal. Beginning in the 13th century they migrated to the basins of the Middle Lena, the Aldan and Vilyuy rivers as khans of the rising Mongols.

The northern Yakuts were largely hunters, fishermen and reindeer herders, while the southern Yakuts raised cattle and horses.