Tartary (Latin: Tartaria) or Great Tartary (Latin: Tartaria Magna) was a name used from the Middle Ages until the twentieth century to designate the great tract of northern and central Asia stretching from the Caspian Sea and the Ural Mountains to the Pacific Ocean, settled mostly by Turko-Mongol peoples after the Mongol invasion and the subsequent Turkic migrations.
The vast region incorporated much of the Pontic-Caspian steppe, Volga-Urals, Caucasus, Siberia, Turkestan, Mongolia, and Manchuria.
Tartary was often divided into sections with prefixes denoting the name of the ruling power or the geographical location. Thus, western Siberia was Muscovite or Russian Tartary, Xinjiang and Mongolia were Chinese or Cathay Tartary, western Turkestan (later Russian Turkestan) was known as Independent Tartary, and Manchuria was East Tartary.
As the Russian Empire expanded eastward and more of Tartary became known to Europeans, the term fell into disuse. European areas north of the Black Sea inhabited by Turkic peoples were known as Little Tartary.