The Eurasian Steppe, sometimes called the Great Steppe, is a belt of temperate grassland, savanna and shrubland stretching roughly 8,000 kilometers from Manchuria through Mongolia, Xinjiang, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Romania and Hungary, making it the largest continuous grassland system in the world. Since the Paleolithic it has served as the principal overland corridor linking Eastern Europe, North Asia, Central Asia and East Asia, functioning as a predecessor of the Silk Road and, in the modern era, the Eurasian Land Bridge. Across its long history the steppe was home to a succession of nomadic empires and tribal confederations, among them the Xiongnu, the Scythians, the Huns, various Turkic peoples and the Mongol Empire, whose horse borne mobility shaped Eurasian geopolitics and trade for millennia. Ecologically the steppe is dominated by open grassland with little tree cover, grading into forest along its northern edge and into desert to the south, and its wildlife includes Przewalski's horse, the saiga antelope, the gray wolf and Pallas's cat.
Facts
Disputed
Area (sq km)Sourced to the subject's own accountEstimates for the Eurasian Steppe's total area vary widely by source, from roughly 4.9 million to 8.6 million square kilometers, depending on where the steppe's drier southern boundary against neighboring desert is drawn; this value is one commonly cited estimate, not a settled figure. Classification
Biogeographic Realm Connections
Demonstrates
Source Encyclopaedia Britannica
Hosts
Source World Wildlife Fund
Source World Wildlife Fund
In Biome
Source World Wildlife Fund
Open Questions
Source Eurasian Steppe (Wikipedia)
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Eurasian Steppe
WikipediaIntroductionQuote, Introduction
The Eurasian Steppe, also called the Great Steppe or The Steppe, is an area of grassland in Eurasia that is mostly located in the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome.
2. Eurasian Steppe: Geography, History, Ecology and Facts (Geography Worlds)
Geography WorldsGeography overview paragraphQuote, Geography overview paragraph
This immense corridor of treeless grassland, typically 500 to 800 kilometers wide, covers an estimated 8.6 million square kilometers.
Eurasian Steppe (Wikipedia)
WikipediaWikipedia summary, lead paragraphQuote, Wikipedia summary, lead paragraph
The Eurasian Steppe, also called the Great Steppe or The Steppe, is an area of grassland in Eurasia that is mostly located in the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome.
World Wildlife Fund
World Wildlife Fund- In Biome: Grassland
- Hosts: Przewalski's Horse
- Hosts: Saiga Antelope
View the Source Encyclopaedia Britannica
Open Questions (1 open question)
What is the total area of the Eurasian Steppe?
This atlas's own cited Wikipedia article describes the Eurasian Steppe by the countries it crosses and its west-east extent ("It stretches westward some 8000 kilometres (5000 miles) from Manchuria across Mongolia, Xinjiang, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Romania and Hungary") but states no total-area figure anywhere. Public reference sources checked separately describe the steppe's boundary differently, especially where it grades into desert to the south and forest to the north, and the area figures given across those sources diverge by several million square kilometers depending on the boundary used; none of those figures is stored here because none was confirmed against its own raw source text at a specific, citable locator.
What would resolve this A single authoritative biogeographic source that fixes the steppe's boundary (for example a named ecoregion or biome classification) and states the resulting total area for exactly that boundary.
Physical geography / biogeographyEurasian Steppe (Wikipedia)
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