The name
Cumania originated as the
Latin exonym for the
Cuman-Kipchak confederation, which was a
Turkic confederation in the western part of the
Eurasian Steppe, between the 10th and 13th centuries. The
confederation was dominated by two
Turkic nomadic tribes: the
Cumans (also known as the Polovtsians or
Folban) and the
Kipchaks. Cumania was known in
Islamic sources as
Desht-i Qipchaq, which means "Steppe of the Kipchaks"; or "foreign land sheltering the Kipchaks", in the
Turkic languages. Some Russian sources have referred to Cumania as the "Polovtsian
Steppe" (
Poloveckaja Step), or the "Polovcian
Plain" (
Pole Poloveckoe).