The Cantemir dynasty was descended from emir Edigey (1352-1419) who ruled the Golden Horde during over 20 years and comes from the Tatar tribe Nogai, writer and researcher Fedor Angeli says in his book “The Cantemir Epoch and New Approach to the Dynasty: the end of the 14th century – the first half of the 17th century”, which was published at “Stiinta” publishing house, Info-Prim Neo reports. Fiodor Angheli's findings, based on Turkish, Austrian and Nogai people's archives, refute previous theories that the Cantemir genealogy could had European roots, as well as beliefs that Tamerlane (1336-1405), who destroyed the Golden Horde, was one of the famed ancestors. Fiodor Angheli reached the conclusion that the Cantemir dynasty originated on the banks of the Volga River, not in Central Asia, where Tamerlane ruled. Dr. Angeli – a former MP and ambassador to Turkey – says he was able to reconstitute the parental line of the Cantemirs until the early 15th century, up to the times of the Golden Horde, or more exactly the downhill of it. The earliest ancestor found on the line was the emir Edigey (also known as Idegay or Edigu), who himself founded a confederation of nomad peoples, called the Nogai Hoard, on the remains of the disintegrating, more famous Golden Horde. Edigey's mother was reportedly Chinese. The Cantemirs' genealogical tree derives from the Mansur tribe of the Great Nogai Horde. The researcher says “Mansur” is a name that in the Arabian language means “a man who will conquer somebody or something with the help of Allah”. In 1419-1427, Mansur was a khan of the Golden Horde. The Nogai Horde was founded by Edigey in the 1420 – 1430, after the dismemberment of the Gold Horde. In the 1550s, the Nogai Horde included 18 tribes. One of them was the tribe Mansuetudine, from where the Cantemirs come. The author says all the ancestors of the Cantemirs were Muslims. The Mongolian and Turkic origins of the family explain the name Cantemir, derived from the words “khan” and “demir”, which in combination mean “khan of steel”, or “powerful ruler”. There is a theory that the forefathers of the Moldavian princely family came to Moldavia, or more exactly to its southern part (which was later given the Turkic toponym Budjak), with Sultan Bayazid the Second's invasion of Akkerman and Kilia in 1484. But Dr. Angely says it is more likely that they settled here after Suleiman the Magnificent's campaign against Tighina (renamed Bender) in 1538. After this victory, the Porte placed thousands of Nogai Tatars at the mouths of the rivers Dniester and Dnieper. In the 16th century a group separated from the Nogai masses and formed the Budjak Horde, among which the name Cantemir would surface from later. According to archives, the Cantemir dynasty has the following genealogical line: Edigey – Mansur – Divey – Araslan Divey – Araslanoglu Cantemir (alias Cantemir Divey, Dimitrie Cantemir's grandfather) – Constantin Cantemir. In 1622-1637, Cantemir Araslanoglu (Dimitrie's grandfather) was the governor of the vast province of Silistria. He earned the governor's seat along with the title of vizier in Osman the Second's campaign against the Poles in 1621. A hardcore anti-Polish statesman, Araslanoglu had to disappear when the Ottoman Empire needed a truce with the Poles before engaging in a war against Iran. Additionally, the fierce rivalry between the governor or Silistria and the khan of Crimea had been a permanent headache for the Sultan, who found a formal excuse to execute Cantemir Araslanoglu. It was quite common for Ottoman statesmen to have Christian women among their wives and concubines, and Cantemir Araslanoglu wasn't an exception. Constantine, the father of Dimitrie and the first member of the Cantemir family to ascend Moldavia's throne, was presumably the son of one of Araslanoglu's Christian wives. The Cantemir dynasty, which existed for 117 years, became extinct in 1820, with the death of Dimitrie's grandson Dmitri Constantinovich in 1820.