Ingush people
The territory of Ingushetia is located in the zone of their intersection and part of the early Bronze Age monuments found here has a characteristic syncretic appearance (for example, the Lugovoe settlement).
In the written Georgian sources describing the events of this period, the ancestors of the Ingush (tribes of the Koban culture) are known under the ethnonym "Caucasians" and "Dzurdzuks", in ancient ones – under the name "Makhli".
[33] The Dzurdzuks controlled the main Caucasian passage, the Darial Gorge, and had close political ties with the ancient Georgian state.
[34] According to Leonti Mroveli, the first king of Georgia, Pharnavaz, was married to a woman "from the tribe of Dzurdzuks, descendants of the Caucasus" and they had a son, Saurmag[35] (Ingush: Сармак, romanized: Sarmak, lit.
[38] At the beginning of the 2nd century BC as a result of the military invasion of the North Caucasus by the Seleucid king Antiochus III, the political union of the Koban tribes was defeated.
[40] The ethnonym "Gargareans" is associated with the tribes of the Koban culture, which is mentioned by the ancient Greek geographer Strabo in his work Geographica in 1st century AD as a North Caucasian people living next to the Amazons.
[53] Villages located in the mountainous zone were grouped mainly along local gorges, which contributed to their ethnopolitical consolidation into separate territorial groups/districts – communities (Ingush: шахьараш).
[56] Over time, the number and boundaries of societies changed, this happened as a result of migration processes of the Ingush-speaking population, including those associated with the return of the Ingush to the plane (plain).
At a very early stage, they were in the nature of individual military-political actions undertaken by the Ingush on the plain lands in order to counteract the consolidation of alien nomadic peoples on them.
[53] Separate episodes associated with this time are reflected in one of the Ingush legends, recorded in the 19th century by ethnographer Albast Tutaev, where representatives of the Galgaï Society of Mountainous Ingushetia appear.
[citation needed] Probably, these events were associated with the development of land in the upper reaches of the Sunzha and Kambileevka, where the oldest settlements of the Ingush Akhki-Yurt and Angusht arose.
On March 4–6, 1770, with a large gathering of people near the foothill village of Angusht in a clearing with the symbolic name "Barta-Bos" ("Slope of Agreement"), 24 Ingush elders swore an oath of allegiance to the Russian Empire.
[77] On November 12, 1836, Baron Rosen reported in letter to count Alexander Chernyshyov that in 1830, the highlanders of Dzherakh, Kist, and Galgai societies were briefly subdued by Russia.
American historian Norman Naimark writes: Troops assembled villagers and townspeople, loaded them onto trucks – many deportees remembered that they were Studebakers, fresh from Lend-Lease deliveries over the Iranian border – and delivered them at previously designated railheads.
[96] American professor Johanna Nichols, who specializes in Chechen and Ingush philology, provided the theory behind the deportation:[97] In 1944 the nationalities themselves were abolished and their lands resettled when the Chechen and Ingush, together with the Karachay-Balkar, Crimean Tatars, and other nationalities were deported en masse to Kazakhstan and Siberia, losing at least one-quarter and perhaps half of their population in transit.
[101] Since 1988, informal organizations have been created in Ingushetia, various movements have appeared ("Nijsxo", "Däqaste", "People's Council"), which set as their goal the creation of Ingush statehood within the Russian Federation with the return of all territories torn away during the deportation.
[126][127] In 1781, during his travels fromt the Mozdok fortress to the inner Caucasus, Leonti von Städer described the Ingush as “outwardly free, fierce and serious; ardent in speech, yet pacified rather quickly; their feelings are manifested sincerely and openly; they consider contempt for life a virtue and the slightest symptom of fear as the greatest of faults; therefore they are daringly courageous.”[128] The Ingush are considered very ancient inhabitants of the Caucasus; but their origin is lost in obscure and even contradictory traditions.
They have long been supposed to be identical with the Tchetchen – an error which has recently been disproved by anthropological inquiries, which have shown that they are a distinct ethnical group of men.
The short knotty pike which forms part of their armor, serves not only as a weapon of defense, but is likewise used for supporting the gun between its forked branched, by fixing the pointed end in the ground, which enabled the sharp-shooter to take a more accurate aim.The famous Georgian historian and linguist Ivane Javakhishvili proposed to use "Ghalghaï" (Georgian: Ghilghuri or Ghlighvi)[21] as a general name or classification for the Ingush, Chechen and Bats languages, instead of artificially invented terms, such as "Nakh" or "Vainakh": "Chachnuri" (Chechen) – i.e. "Nakhchouri" (Nakhchoy), "Ingushuri" (Ingush) – i.e. "Kisturi" (Kist) in the North Caucasus, and "Tsovuri" (Tsova) – i.e. "Batsburi" (Batsbi) in Georgia, in the Tushin community, constitute another separate group, which currently does not have its own common distinct name.
In ancient times, Greek and Roman geographers called the native inhabitants of the middle and eastern parts of the North Caucasus – "Geli" and "Legi".
It is noteworthy, that according to the genealogical table drawn up by Leonti Mroveli, the legendary forefather of the Vainakhs was "Kavkas", hence the name Kavkasians, one of the ethnicons met in the ancient Georgian written sources, signifying the ancestors of the Chechens and Ingush.
Nichols is quoted as stating that "The Nakh–Dagestanian languages are the closest thing we have to a direct continuation of the cultural and linguistic community that gave rise to Western civilization".
[141] Due to the complex code of conduct and folk customs, even the poorest, ragged Ingush, in relations to a stranger, and especially to a guest, behaves with such tact that would be called aristocratic, in comparison with the simple-minded, unceremonious treatment of the Russian peasant.
Krupnov in his book "Medieval Ingushetia" described the Ingush towers as «in the true sense the pinnacle of the architectural and constructional mastery of the ancient population of the region».
[144][145] Before the final consolidation of Islam, the Ingush from ancient times had their traditional pagan beliefs widespread, with their own unique pantheon, developed mythology and numerous religious architectural objects.
[148]Islam began to penetrate to the ancestors of the Ingush as early as the 8th century as a result of military campaigns of the Arabs against the Khazars and Alans, which ran through the Darial and Derbent gorges.
V. B. Vinogradov believed that the headquarters of Khan Uzbek was located in the area of the modern Ingush village of Plievo, the city of Karabulak and the mausoleum of Borga-Kash.
Раньше, на томъ мѣстѣ, гдѣ нынѣ расположенъ г. Владикавказъ, существовалъ ингушскій аулъ Зауръ, но въ 1784 г., по распоряженію князя Потемкина, на мѣстѣ, гдѣ существовалъ этотъ аулъ, для охраненія Военно-Грузинской дороги, служившей единственнымъ удобнымъ путемъ для соединенія съ Закавказьемъ, была устроена крѣпость Владикавказъ, а въ 1785 г. по указу Императрицы Екатерины II, отъ 9 мая, въ крѣпости была выстроена первая православная церковь.
Какъ только была устроена эта крѣпость, часть осетинской народности спустилась съ горъ и поселилась у стѣнъ этой крѣпости, подъ защитою мѣстныхъ войскъ.
Правый берег Терека принадлежал, какъ это мы видили ингушамъ и кистамъ; не могли осетины на чужой земле враждебных имъ племен иметь свой аулъ; наконец своим наименованіем Владикавказа Дзауджи-Кау, осетины подтверждаютъ это мненіе, т. к. Дзауагъ — есть имя собственное Зауръ, а Кау — значитъ селеніе; иначе — селеніе Заура.
