Tofalar, Tofas (in translation - "man"), or Karagas (in translation - "black goose")- the indigenous people of Southern Siberia, numbering about 750 people, historically lived in the valley of the Uda River and on the northeastern slopes of the Eastern Sayans. They speak the Tofalar language, which belongs to the taiga area of the Sayan subgroup of the Siberian (East Turkic) group of the Turkic branch of the Altai language family. The formation of the Tofalars into a separate ethnos with a common Turkic language was finally completed by the XIX century. By origin, language and many elements of culture, the Tofalars are close to the Tuvinians-Todzhins.