Nakh peoples

Ethno-Linguistic groups in the Caucasus region.

The Nakh or Vainakh peoples are a group of peoples of the North Caucasus region, speaking Nakh languages, including the Chechen, Ingush, Bats and Kist peoples of the Caucasus region.

In some linguistic publications, the term vainakh ("our people") has been restricted to the Chechen and Ingush languages. Although Chechen and Ingush may be considered divergent dialects of the same language, the peoples are not close genetically, indicating an episode of language shift.

History

Prehistory

The early history of the Nakh peoples has been tentatively reconstruced from linguistic analysis and archaeological evidence.

10,000-8,000 BC

People speaking a language ancestral to the Northeast Caucasian languages migrated from the Fertile Crescent to the slopes of the Caucasus bringing domesticated animals, crops, and irrigation.

6000-4000 BC

Pottery was introduced to the region. Neolithic settlements near Ali-Yurt and Magas yielded clay dishes polished and drilled stones, and stone tools (such as axes and knives). Remains of settlements made out of clay bricks were found in the plains. Settlements with "cyclopean" stone walls and buildings were found in the mountains (at Doshkhakle, Kart, Tsecha-Akh, Orsoi, and other places), some of them dating to 8000 BC.

Vainakh architecture

Towers

File:Nakh Tower.JPG

Drawing of a Nakh military tower.

A characteristic feature of Vainakh architecture in the Middle Ages, rarely seen outside Chechnya and Ingushetia, was the Vainakh tower, a kind of multi-floor structure that was used for dwelling or defense (or both). Nakh tower architecture and construction techniques reached their peak in the 15th–17th centuries.

Residential towers had two or three floors, supported by a central pillar of stone blocks, and were topped with a flat shale roofing. These towers have been compared to the prehistoric mountain settlements dating back to 8000 BC.

Military ("combat") towers were 25 meter high or more, with four of five floors and a square base approximately six meters wide. Access to the second floor was through a ladder. The defenders fired at the enemy through loopholes and the top of the tower had mashikul – overhanging small balconies without a floor. These towers were usually crowned with pyramid-shaped roofing built in steps and topping with a sharpened capstone. This type of tower construction flourished in the period from 14th and to the 17th century.

Buildings combining the functions of residential and military towers were intermediate in size between the two types, and had loop-holes and mashikiuls.

Nakh towers used to be sparingly decorated with religious or good-wishing petrographs, such as solar signs or depictions of the author’s hands, animals, etc.. Military towers often bore a Golgopha cross.

Sanctuaries, temples and mosques

The Vainakh pagan pantheon included a supreme god Dela and a goddess of fertility Tusholi. There were also phallic cults.

A whole number of peculiar monuments, natural and artificial, served as shrines for ritual services. Vainakhs chose mountains (such as the Tsei-Lam Range), lakes (Galanchozh-Ami) and some species of plants, pear-trees in particular, for exercising rituals. These shrines were places for prayers and for the sacrifice of domestic animals.

The most primitive shrines (sielingi) were low rectangular pillar-shaped stone structures with a niche for candles. These shrines were raised on the village outskirts and at the graveyards to protect both the living and the dead. Better known are shrines in the form of small houses topped with ridged step roofing, like Myatsil Sanctuary on Mat-Lam Mountain near the town of Vladikavkaz. Such a large range of shrines belonging to

Beginning from the 11th – 12th century, Georgian Christian influence on the Nakh tribes are attested, for example, by the Tkhaba-Yerdy Church consecrated to St. Thomas in Assa Valley, and extant churches in Ingushetia.

Islamic influence intensified in 18th and 19th centuries. Examples of Islamic architecture from that period are the tower-shaped mosques in the villages of Makazhoi and Khimoi.

Necropoles

Burial vaults or crypts remained from the pagan period in the history of Vainakhs. They were built either a bit deepening into the ground or half underground and on the surface. The latter formed whole “towns of the dead” on the outskirts of the villages and reminded sanctuaries from the outside, with a dummy vaults constructed of overlapping stones. The deceased were placed on the special shelves in the crypts, in clothes and decorations and arms.

The general Islamic rituals established in burials with the further penetration of Islam inside the mountainous regions of Chechnya and Ingushetia. Stone steles, churts, inscribed with prayers and epitaphs, began to be erected at the graves and more prosperous mountaineers were honoured with mausoleums after death. The Borgha-Kash Mausoleum dating to the very beginning of 15th century and built for a Noghai prince is a good example of these.

Mythology

Cole Thomas Prometheus Bound 1846-47

From Vainakh mythology came to our times only some little fragments. These fragments are names of deities peronifying elements of animist ideas, Nart saga, cosmogonic tradition, remnants of stock-breeding and landtilling, totemic beliefs and folk calendar.

Legends

The greatest samples of Nakh myhtology are Legends of Pkharmat, Galanchoj Lake, Epic war of Pkhagalberi(hare riders) Dwarves against Narts, Kezanoi Ami, Myth about how Sun Moon and stars appeared.

Nakh myth of Legendary Pkharmat that was shackled on Mount Kazbek by God Sela because he has stolen heavenly fire from him, shows some paralels with Greek Myth of Prometheus and Georgian Amirami. Legendary war of Pkhalberi(hare riders) dwarves against Narts compared to Greek "Crane and Pygmies war" by Said-Magomed Khasiev Golden Fleece myth seems to be binded to Nakh 11 years calendar tradition. In that ram skin was placed in oak frame "Jaar" for 11 years and to produce golden fleece named "Dasho Ertal".

Legend of Galanchoj Lake A woman and her doughter decided to wash diapers in the holy lake Galanchoj. Supreme god Delas doughter Tusholi lived in the lake upset with their insult and immedietly turned them in stone. But holy didnt wished to stay in its tainted bank anymore it's transformed into a bull and invaded the settlements below. It crushed many things on its way until was tamed in Settlement Aukh of Akki Taip. Akkis immedietly found use for the tamed animal. With its help they plowed on the Bull. In spring grew up cereal from that were water poured. Endly water flooded the basin and it became new forbidden lake Galanchoj.

Cosmology

The names of stars and constellations were also connected to myths. So Chechens know Milky Way as Cha Takhina Tacha (the route of scattered straw) and Great Bear as Vorkh Veshin Vorkh Seda (the seven brothers’ seven stars)

Fairy tales

In Nakh faily tales can be found people with supernatural abilities, magic artefacts, mythic animals as dragons and winged horses and some journeys to another worlds and magic. Almost in all fairy tales good triumph over evil.

References

• Jaimoukha, A., The Chechens: A Handbook, London and New York: Routledge, 2005.

See also

• Peoples of the Caucasus
• Nakh languages