Chechens


Chechens, historically also known as Kisti and Durdzuks, are a Northeast Caucasian ethnic group of the Nakh peoples originating in the North Caucasus region primarily in Eastern Europe, located between the Black and Caspian Seas. They refer to themselves as Nokhchiy. Chechen and Ingush peoples are collectively known as the Vainakh since the 1930s and were known as Nakhchi prior. The majority of Chechens today live in the Chechen Republic, a subdivision of the Russian Federation. Chechens are Muslims.
The isolated terrain of the Caucasus mountains and the strategic value outsiders have placed on the areas settled by Chechens has contributed much to the Chechen community ethos and helped shape its fiercely independent national character. Chechen society has traditionally been egalitarian and organized around many autonomous local clans, called teips.

Etymology

Chechen

According to popular tradition, the Russian term "Chechen" comes from Central Chechnya, which had several important villages and towns named after the word Chechen including, Chechan, Nana-Checha, and Yokkh Chechen. The name "Chechen" occurs in Russian sources in the late 16th century as "Chachana", which is mentioned as a land owned by the Chechen Prince Shikh Murza. The etymology is of Nakh origin and originates from the word "Che", added with the suffix "cha/chan", which can be translated to "inside territory". The villages and towns named Chechan were always situated in the "Chechan-Are" located in today's Central Chechnya.

Nakhchiy/Nokhchiy

While "Chechan" was a term used by Chechens to denote a certain geographic area it was not their self-name. The Nakh people historically always called themselves "Nakhchiy" or Nokhchiy. The oldest mention of Nakhchiy was in 1310 by the Georgian Patriach Euthymiu, who mentions the "People of Nakhche" among Tushetians, Avars and many other Northeast Caucasian nations. The term Nakhchiy has also been connected to the nation of Nakhchamatyan and Nakhchivan by many Soviet and modern historians, but these last two hypothesis tend to have a lot of criticism. However, Chechen manuscripts in Arabic from the early 1820s do mention a certain "Nakhchuvan" as the homeland of all Nakhchiy. The etymology of the term Nakhchiy is believed to have come from "Nakh" and "Chuo".

Geography and diaspora

The Chechens are mainly inhabitants of Chechnya. There are also significant Chechen populations in other subdivisions of Russia especially in Aukh, Ingushetia and Moscow.
Outside Russia, countries with significant diaspora populations are Kazakhstan, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Arab states : those in Iraq and Jordan are mainly descendants of families who had to leave Chechnya during the Caucasian War, which led to the annexation of Chechnya by the Russian Empire around 1850, while those in Kazakhstan originate from the ethnic cleansing of the entire population carried out by Joseph Stalin and Lavrentiy Beria in 1944. Tens of thousands of Chechen refugees settled in the European Union and elsewhere as the result of the recent Chechen Wars, especially in the wave of emigration to the West after 2002.

History

Origin

Chechens are a Nakh people, and discussion of their origins is intertwined with the discussion of the mysterious origins of Nakh peoples as a whole. The only three surviving Nakh peoples are Chechens, Ingush and Bats, but they are thought by some scholars to be the remnants of what was once a larger family of peoples.
The Nakh languages are a subgroup of Northeast Caucasian, and as such are related to Nakho-Dagestanian family, including the languages of the Avars, Dargins, Lezghins, Laks, etc.
However, this relationship is not a close one: the Nakho-Dagestani family is of comparable or greater time-depth than Indo-European, meaning Chechens are only as linguistically related to Avars or Dargins as the French are to the Russians or Iranians.
Nakh peoples such as Chechens are thought to either be descended from original settlers of the Caucasus or supposedly Nakh-speaking ethnic minorities in the north-eastern regions of the ancient state of Urartu. The two theories are not mutually incompatible, and there has been much evidence that seems to link both of the two together.

Antiquity

In particular, the Chechens are descended from the Durdzuks, a group well known in the Georgian chronicles. Other groups linked Amjad Jaimoukha traces the name Durdzuk to an ancient city north of Lake Urmia, near Nakhichevan. Other groups attributed to being the ancestors of the Chechens and Ingush include the Kists, Gargareans and the Nakhchmateans.
The Chechens are one of the Nakh peoples, who have lived in the highlands of the North Caucasus region since prehistory. There is archeological evidence of historical continuity dating back since 3000 B.C. as well as evidence pointing to their ancestors’ migration from the Fertile Crescent c. 10,000–8,000 B.C.
The North Caucasus has been subject to innumerable invaders since time immemorial. In all of recorded history and inferable prehistory, the Chechens had never initiated battle except in self-defence, fighting fiercely to maintain its independence.

Medieval

In the Middle Ages, the lowland of Chechnya was dominated by the Khazars and then the Alans. Local culture was also subject to Georgian influence and some Chechens converted to Eastern Orthodox Christianity. With a presence dating back to the seventh century, Islam gradually spread among the Chechens although the Chechens' own pagan religion was still strong until the 19th century. Society was organised along feudal lines. Chechnya was devastated by the Mongol invasions of the 13th century and those of Tamerlane in the 14th. The Vainakh bear the distinction of being one of the few peoples to successfully resist the Mongols and defend themselves against their invasions; not once, but twice, though this came at great cost to them, as their state was utterly destroyed. These events were key in the shaping of the Chechen nationhood and their martial-oriented and clan-based society.

Early modern period

The Caucasus was a major competing area for two neighboring rival empires: the Ottoman and Persian Empires. Starting from 1555 and decisely from 1639 through the first half of the 19th century, the Caucasus was divided by these two powers, with the Ottomans prevailing in Western Georgia, while Persia kept the bulk of the Caucasus, namely Eastern Georgia, Dagestan, Azerbaijan, and Armenia. The Chechens, however, never really fell under the rule of either empire. As Russia expanded slowly southwards as early as the 16th century, clashes between Chechens and the Russians became more frequent, and it became three empires competing for the region. During these turbulent times the Chechens were organized into semi-independent clans that were loyal to the Mexk-Kela. The Mehk-Kela was in charge of appointing the Mehk-Da. Several of these appeared during the Late middle ages such as Aldaman Gheza, Tinavin-Visa, Zok-K'ant and others. The administration and military expeditions commanded by Aldaman Gheza during the 1650-1670s led to Chechnya being largely untouched by the major empires of the time. Alliances were concluded with local lords against Persian encroachment and battles were fought to stop Russian influence. As Russia set off to increase its political influence in the Caucasus and the Caspian Sea at the expense of Safavid Persia, Peter I launched the Russo-Persian War, in which Russia succeeded in taking much of the Caucasian territories for several years. Notable in Chechen history, this particular Russo-Persian War marked the first military encounter between Imperial Russia and the Vainakh. Sheikh Mansur led a major Chechen resistance movement in the late 18th century.
In the late 18th and 19th centuries, Russia embarked on full-scale conquest of the North Caucasus in the Caucasian War. Much of the campaign was led by General Yermolov who particularly disliked the Chechens, describing them as "a bold and dangerous people". Angered by Chechen raids, Yermolov resorted to a brutal policy of "scorched earth" and deportations; he also founded the fort of Grozny in 1818. Chechen resistance to Russian rule reached its peak under the leadership of the Dagestani leader Imam Shamil. The Chechens were finally defeated in 1861 after a bloody war that lasted for decades, during which they lost most of their entire population. In the aftermath, large numbers of refugees also emigrated or were forcibly deported to the Ottoman Empire.

Nineteenth and twentieth centuries

Since then, there have been various Chechen rebellions against Russian/Soviet power in 1865-66, 1877, during the Russian Civil War and World War II, as well as nonviolent resistance to Russification and the Soviet Union's collectivization and anti-religion campaigns. In 1944, all Chechens, together with several other peoples of the Caucasus, were ordered by the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin to be ruthlessly deported en masse to the Kazakh and Kirghiz SSRs; and their republic and nation were abolished. At least one-quarter—and perhaps half—of the entire Chechen population perished in the process, and a severe blow was made to their culture and historical records. Though "rehabilitated" in 1956 and allowed to return the next year, the survivors lost economic resources and civil rights and, under both Soviet and post-Soviet governments, they have been the objects of both official and unofficial discrimination and discriminatory public discourse. Chechen attempts to regain independence in the 1990s after the fall of the Soviet Union have led to the first and the second war with the new Russian state, starting in 1994.

Language

The main language of the Chechen people is Chechen. Chechen belongs to the family of Nakh languages. Literary Chechen is based on the central lowland dialect. Other related languages include Ingush, which has speakers in the neighbouring Ingushetia, and Batsbi, which is the language of the people in the adjoining part of Georgia. At various times in their history, Chechens used Georgian, Arabic and Latin alphabets; as of 2008, the official script is Russian Cyrillic.
Most Chechens living in their homeland can understand Ingush with ease. The two languages are not truly mutually intelligible, but it is easy for Chechens to learn how to understand the Ingush language and vice-versa over time after hearing it for a while.
In 1989, 73.4% spoke Russian, though this figure has declined due to the wars for a large number of reasons. Chechens in the diaspora often speak the language of the country they live in.

Genetics

Genetic tests on Chechens, have shown roots mostly in the Caucasus as well as slight connections to and influences from the Middle East as well as Europe. As is the case with many other Caucasian peoples, Chechens are broadly connected with European populations on the Y-DNA from all European regions, but narrowly closer to Western Europeans in terms of mitochondrial DNA.
A 2004 study of the mtDNA showed Chechens to be diverse in the mitochondrial genome, with 18 different haplogroups out of only 23 samples. This correlates with all other North Caucasian peoples such as the Ingush, Avars and Circassians where the mitochondrial DNA is very diverse. They clustered closer to European populations than Middle Eastern populations this time, but were closer to Western European populations than to Eastern European populations, despite living in the East. They actually clustered about as close to Basques as they did to Ingush, but the Chechens were the closer to the Ingush than any other population, the imbalance probably largely being due to the uniqueness of the Ingush on the mitochondrial DNA among those tested. However the FTDNA groups show that Mitochondrial DNA is very diverse in the North Caucasus in general with Chechens having 12 mtDNA haplogroups out of 108 samples and Ingush 9 out of 15 samples.
The most recent study on Chechens, by Balanovsky et al. in 2011 sampled a total of 330 Chechens from three sample locations and found the following frequencies: A weak majority of Chechens belong to Haplogroup J2, which is associated with Mediterranean, Caucasian and Fertile Crescent populations, with its peaks at 87.4% in Ingushetia and 72% in Georgia's Kazbegi Municipality. In the North Caucasus, the largest frequencies are those of Nakh peoples and Ingush ). Other notable values were found among North Caucasian Turkic peoples and Balkars ). It is notable that J2 suddenly collapses as one enters the territory of non-Nakh Northeast Caucasian peoples, dropping to very low values among Dagestani peoples. The overwhelming bulk of Chechen J2 is of the subclade J2a4b*, of which the highest frequencies by far are found among Nakh peoples: Chechens were 55.2% according to the Balanovsky study, while Ingush were 87.4%. Other notable haplogroups that appeared consistently appeared at high frequencies included J1, L, G2, R1a, Q-M242 and R1b-M269. Overall, tests have shown consistently that Chechens are most closely related to Ingush, Circassians and other North Caucasians, occasionally showing a kinship to other peoples in some tests. Balanovsky's study showed the Ingush to be the Chechens' closest relatives by far.
Chechens are black-, brown-, red- or fair-haired and eyes can be brown, blue or green, while skin is usually light. George Anchabadze notes that the physical traits of Chechens, which includes being taller than average, are typical of the "Caucasian type" which many other peoples of the Caucasus exhibit.

Culture

Prior to the adoption of Islam, the Chechens practiced a unique blend of religious traditions and beliefs. They partook in numerous rites and rituals, many of them pertaining to farming; these included rain rites, a celebration that occurred on the first day of plowing, as well as the Day of the Thunderer Sela and the Day of the Goddess Tusholi. In addition to sparse written record from the Middle Ages, Chechens traditionally remember history through the illesh, a collection of epic poems and stories.
Chechens are accustomed to democratic ways, their social structure being firmly based on equality, pluralism and deference to individuality. Chechen society is structured around tukkhum and about 130 teip, or clans. The teips are based more on land and one-side lineage than on blood, and are bonded together to form the Chechen nation. Teips are further subdivided into gar, and gars into nekye. The Chechen social code is called nokhchallah and may be loosely translated as "Chechen character". The Chechen code of honor implies moral and ethical behaviour, generosity and the will to safeguard the honor of women. The traditional Chechen saying goes that the members of Chechen society, like its teips, are "free and equal like wolves".
Chechens today have a strong sense of nation, which is enforced by the old clan network and nokhchalla – the obligation to clan, tukhum, etc. This is often combined with old values transmuted into a modern sense. They are mythically descended from the epic hero, Turpalo-Nokhchuo. There is a strong theme of representing the nation with its national animal, the wolf. Due to their strong dependence on the land, its farms and its forests, Chechens have a strong sense of affection for nature. According to Chechen philosopher Apty Bisultanov, ruining an ant-hill or hunting Caucasian goats during their mating season was considered extremely sinful. It is notable that the glasnost era Chechen independence movement, Bart in fact originated as a simple environmentalist organization in the republic's capital of Grozny.
, a traditional Chechen musical instrument
Chechen culture puts a strong value on the concept of freedom. This asserts itself in a number of ways. A large majority of the nation's national heroes fought for independence. A common greeting in the Chechen language, marsha oylla, is literally translated as "enter in freedom". The word for freedom also encompasses notions of peace and prosperity.
Chechens are sometimes referred to as the "French of the Caucasus", for a number of reasons. This comparison may refer to either political/historical traits, or to personality characteristics. Like the French, who overthrew their age-old monarchy in the French Revolution, the Chechens had a similar revolution a century or two earlier, and like the French, they bore the distinction of being the only egalitarian society in an area full of monarchic states. Like the French, the Chechens preferred swift, revolutionary methods to realize the change they wished to see – unlike the Circassians who preferred more gradualist methods. Chechens were also called "French" by early Russian military officers and the French anthropologist Ernest Chantre who noted their "happy and witty" nature.

Religion

Chechnya is predominantly Muslim. Chechens are overwhelmingly adherents to the Shafi'i Madhhab of Sunni Islam, the republic having converted to Islam between the 16th and the 19th centuries. Most of the population follows either the Shafi'i or the Hanafi, schools of jurisprudence, fiqh. The Shafi'i school of jurisprudence has a long tradition among the Chechens, and thus it remains the most practiced. Some adhere to the mystical Sufi tradition of muridism, while about half of Chechens belong to Sufi brotherhoods, or tariqah. The two Sufi tariqas that spread in the North Caucasus were the Naqshbandiya and the Qadiriya.
A stereotype of an average Chechen being a fundamentalist Muslim is incorrect and misleading. By the late 2000s, however, two new trends have emerged in Chechnya. A radicalized remnant of the armed Chechen separatist movement has become dominated by Salafis, mostly abandoning nationalism in favor of Pan-Islamism and merging with several other regional Islamic insurgencies to form the Caucasus Emirate. At the same time, Chechnya under Moscow-backed authoritarian rule of Ramzan Kadyrov has undergone its own controversial counter-campaign of Islamization of the republic, with the local government actively promoting and enforcing their own version of a so-called "traditional Islam", including introducing elements of Sharia that replaced Russian official laws.