Chud or Chude (, in Finnic languages: tšuudi, čuđit) is a term historically applied in the early East Slavic annals to several Finnic peoples in the area of what is now Estonia, Karelia and Northwestern Russia. Arguably, the earliest attested written use of the word "Chuds" to describe Finnic peoples (presumably early Estonians) was c. 1100, in the earliest East Slavic chronicles. According to the Primary Chronicle, the invading troops of Yaroslav I the Wise defeated "Chuds" in a battle in 1030 and then established the fort of "Yuryev" (in what is now Tartu, Estonia). According to Old East Slavic chronicles, the Chuds were among the founders of the Rus' state. Etymology There are a number of hypotheses as to the origin of the term. Chud could be derived from the Slavic word tjudjo ('foreign' or 'strange'), which in turn is derived from the Gothic word meaning 'folk' (compare Teutonic). Another hypothesis is that the term was derived from a transformation of the Finno-Ugric name for the wood grouse. Yet another hypothesis contends that it is derived from the Sami word tshudde or čuđđe, meaning an enemy or adversary (). This, however, would have required prominent Sami presence in trading centers around Lake Ladoga. Identity Chuds have traditionally been believed to belong to the group of Baltic-Finnic peoples, though there have been some debate as to which specific group. After the first encounter with the Chuds, Slavic people tended to call other Finnic-speaking peoples Chuds, and thus became a collective name for the Finnic neighbours in Russian cultural tradition. Many writers contend that the Chuds were Vepsians, Fasmer posits them in Karelia while Smirnov suggests the Setos are descendants of the Chuds. In recent research on toponymy of the Luga and Volkhov river catchment areas Finnish fennougrist Pauli Rahkonen has come to the conclusion, that the language spoken in the area has been Finnic only in the vicinity of the southern coasts of Lake Ladoga and the Gulf of Finland, but more upstream of the two rivers, the language, as based on the evidence of hydronyms in the area, has represented other Finno-Ugric languages than Finnic. However, the Zavoloshka Chuds in the White Sea catchment area seem to have spoken Finnic languages based on the evidence of substrate toponymy in northern Russia carried out recently by Finnish Finno-Ugrist Janne Saarikivi. Chuds in chronicles The East Slavic Primary Chronicle describes Chuds