[30] Circassia has been repeatedly invaded since ancient times; its isolated terrain coupled with the strategic value external societies have placed on the region have greatly shaped the Circassian national identity as a whole.

The stars represent the 12 Circassian tribes: the Abzakh, the Besleney, the Bzhedugh, the Hatuqway, the Kabardians, the Mamkhegh, the Natukhaj, the Shapsugh, the Chemirgoy, the Ubykh, the Yegeruqway and the Zhaney.

[38] The largest Circassian clan in the country also contributed to Egyptian and Arabic cultural literary, intellectual, and political life starting with the reign of Muhammad Ali Pasha in Egypt and continuing to the modern day: the Abaza family.

[81][82] During that period, Circassians (known at the time as Kassogs)[83] began to accept Christianity as a national religion, but did not abandon all elements of their indigenous religious beliefs.

[86] Prince Inal, who owned land in the Taman peninsula during the 1400s,[87] established an army and declared that his goal was to unite the Circassians[88] under a single state.

The Crimean Khan Kaplan-Giray barely managed to save his life,[100][95] and was humiliated, all the way to his shoes taken, leaving his brother, son, field tools, tents and personal belongings.

Russian troops retaliated by destroying villages where resistance fighters were thought to hide, as well as employing assassinations, kidnappings, and the execution of whole families.

[109] Because the resistance was relying on sympathetic villages for food, the Russian military also systematically destroyed crops and livestock and killed Circassian civilians.

Columns of the displaced were marched either to the Kuban [River] plains or toward the coast for transport to the Ottoman Empire... One after another, entire Circassian tribal groups were dispersed, resettled, or killed en masse.

Ivan Drozdov, a Russian officer who witnessed the scene at Qbaada in May 1864 as the other Russians were celebrating their victory remarked:On the road, our eyes were met with a staggering image: corpses of women, children, elderly persons, torn to pieces and half-eaten by dogs; deportees emaciated by hunger and disease, almost too weak to move their legs, collapsing from exhaustion and becoming prey to dogs while still alive.The Ottoman Empire regarded the Adyghe warriors as courageous and well-experienced.

[citation needed] As early as 1859, the Russian government had sought potential avenues for expelling the native Circassian population, and found a solution in the Ottoman Empire.

[129] What was intended to be an orderly, gradual expulsion quickly eroded over the following months, as the Ottomans overcrowded boats and neglected previously enforced safety regulations.

Numerous boats sank, unable to safely accommodate these larger loads, while the overcrowded conditions helped disease spread even further among both the Circassian migrants and the Ottoman crews.

The actions of the Russian military in acquiring Circassian land through expulsion and massacres[135] have given rise to a movement among descendants of the expelled ethnicities for international recognition of the perpetration of genocide.

In the decades before Russian rule, two tribes overthrew their traditional rulers and set up democratic processes, but this social experiment was cut short by the end of Adyghe independence.

Circassians also speak Russian, Turkish, English, Arabic, and Hebrew in large numbers, having been exiled by Russia to lands of the Ottoman Empire, where the majority of them live today, and some to neighboring Persia, to which they came primarily through mass deportations by the Safavids and Qajars or, to a lesser extent, as muhajirs in the 19th century.

[150] Among Christians, Catholicism, originally introduced along the coasts by Venetian and Genoese traders, today constitutes just under 1% of Kabardins,[151] notably including those in Mozdok[152] and some of those Kursky district.

The traditional female clothing (Adyghe: Бзылъфыгъэ Шъуашэр, Bzıłfıǵe Ȿuaşer [bzəɬfəʁa ʂʷaːʃar]) was very diverse and highly decorated and mainly depends on the region, class of family, occasions, and tribes.

The traditional colors of women's clothing rarely includes blue, green or bright-colored tones, instead mostly white, red, black and brown shades are worn.

The traditional male costume (Adyghe: Адыгэ хъулъфыгъэ шъуашэр, Adığe X́uıłfıǵe Ȿuaşer [aːdəɣa χʷəɬfəʁa ʂʷaːʃar]) includes a coat with wide sleeves, shirt, pants, a dagger, sword, and a variety of hats and shoes.

On the breast of the costume are long ornamental tubes or sticks, once filled with a single charge of gunpowder (called gaziri cartridges) and used to reload muskets.

The twelve tribes are the Abdzakh, Besleney, Bzhedug, Hatuqwai, Kabardian, Mamkhegh, Natukhai, Shapsug, Temirgoy, Ubykh, Yegeruqwai, and Zhaney.

[163] Adyghe tribes with remnants still in Circassia are: Kabarda (the largest), the Temirgoy and Bzhedug in Adygea, and the Shapsug near Tuapse and to the north of Tuapsiysiy Rayon of Krasnodarskiy Kray.

In the 1860s and the 1870s, the Ottoman government settled Circassians in territories of modern-day Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Israel, Iraq, Georgia, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Kosovo, Greece, Cyprus, and North Macedonia.

In the period after the First World War, Circassians came to the fore in Anatolia as a group of advanced armament and organizational abilities as a result of the struggle they fought with the Russian troops until they came to the Ottoman lands.

The Turkish government removed 14 Circassian villages from Gönen and Manyas regions in December 1922, May and June 1923, without separating women and children, and drove them to different places in Anatolia from Konya to Sivas and Bitlis.

The majority of the leaders of the Burji Mamluk dynasty in Egypt (1382–1517) had Circassian origins,[187] while also including Abkhaz, Abaza, and Georgian peoples whom the Arab sultans had recruited to serve their kingdoms as a military force.

Circassians have played major roles in different periods throughout Iraq's history, and made great contributions to political and military institutions in the country, to the Iraqi Army in particular.

[194][195][196] The Safavid (1501–1736) and Qajar (1789–1925) dynasties saw the importing and deporting of large numbers of Circassians to Persia, where many enjoyed prestige in the harems and in the élite armies (the so-called ghulams), while many others settled and deployed as craftsmen, labourers, farmers and regular soldiers.

According to Iyad Youghar, who headed the lobby group International Circassian Council: "We want the athletes to know that if they compete here they will be skiing on the bones of our relatives.