Khwarshi people
The Khwarshi people are a Caucasian people living in Dagestan, in several small settlements. The Khwarshi are originally from the southeastern part of Tsumadinsky District, where seven Khwarshi settlements are located: Upper- and Lower Inkhokwari village, Kwantlada village, Santlada village, Khwarshi village, Khonokh and Khwayni village. They do not have an ethnonym for themselves as a united people, but instead they refer to themselves according to the settlement they are from. Thus they call themselves the Inkhokwari people, the Kwantlada people, the Santlada people, the Khwarshi people, the Khonokh people and the Khwayni people.
During August 1944, the Khwarshi were deported to Vedeno and Rityalb, but by 1957 30% of them had returned to the traditional settlements again, while the rest had emigrated to the Kizilyurtovsky- and Khasavyurtovsky districts, meaning that today there is also Khwarshis to be found in Komsomolskoe and Kizilyurt in Kizilyurtovsky, and in Oktyabrskoe, Pervomayskoe and Mutsalaul in Khasavyurtovsky. In fact, today the majority of Khwarshis, some 7,000, live outside the traditional settlements, while the remaining 1,500 live in the settlements.
They speak the Tsezic language Khwarshi and they are traditionally Sunni Muslims, living off agriculture.
