The Tatars is an umbrella term for different Turkic ethnic groups bearing the name "Tatar." Although the Tatars originally spoke a Turkic language, after many of them entered the armies of Genghis Khan "a fusion of Mongol and Turkic elements took place," and the 13th-century Mongol invaders became known as Tatars to Europeans. The original Tatars descended from the Rourans, of Proto-Mongolic Donghu origin, though several scholars suggested that Turkic elements also greatly contributed to the Tatars' ethnogenesis.
