The Caucasus is divided into the North Caucasus and South Caucasus, although the Western Caucasus also exists as a distinct geographic space within the North Caucasus. The Greater Caucasus mountain range in the north is mostly shared by Russia and Georgia as well as the northernmost parts of Azerbaijan. The Lesser Caucasus mountain range in the south is occupied by several independent states, mostly by Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, but also extends to parts of northeastern Turkey, and northern Iran.
"Thus, toward the east, where it rises to a greater height, it is called the Caucasus, due to the whiteness of its snow, for in an eastern language, caucasus means “white,” that is, shining white with a very thick snow cover. For the same reason the Scythians, who live next to this mountain range, call it Croacasim, for among them whiteness or snow is called casim. 3. The Taurus range is likewise called the Caucasus by many."[14]
In the Tale of Past Years (1113 AD), it is stated that Old East Slavic Кавкасийскыѣ горы (Kavkasijskyě gory) came from Ancient Greek Καύκασος (Kaúkasos),[15] which, according to M. A. Yuyukin, is a compound word that can be interpreted as the 'mountain of the seagull(s)' (καύ-: καύαξ, καύηξ, -ηκος, κήξ, κηϋξ 'a kind of seagull' + the reconstructed *κάσος 'mountain' or 'rock' richly attested both in place and personal names).[16]
In Georgian tradition, the term Caucasus is derived from Caucas (Georgian: კავკასოსიḲavḳasosi), the son of the Biblical Togarmah and legendary forefather of the Nakh peoples.[17][18]
According to GermanphilologistsOtto Schrader and Alfons A. Nehring, the Ancient Greek word Καύκασος (Kaukasos) is connected to Gothichauhs 'high' as well as Lithuaniankaũkas 'hillock' and kaukarà 'hill, top', Russianкуча 'heap'.[15][19] British linguist Adrian Room claims that *kau- also means 'mountain' in Pelasgian,[20] though this is speculative given that Pelasgian is so poorly known.
The Transcaucasus region and Dagestan were the furthest points of Parthian and later Sasanian expansions, with areas to the north of the Greater Caucasus range practically impregnable. The mythological Mount Qaf, the world's highest mountain that ancient Iranian lore shrouded in mystery, was said to be situated in this region. The region is also one of the candidates for the location of Airyanem Vaejah, the apparent homeland of the Iranians of Zoroaster. In Middle Persian sources of the Sasanian era, the Caucasus range was referred to as Kaf Kof.[23] The term resurfaced in Iranian tradition later on in a variant form when Ferdowsi, in his Shahnameh, referred to the Caucasus mountains as Kōh-i Kāf.[23] "Most of the modern names of the Caucasus originate from the Greek Kaukasos (Lat., Caucasus) and the Middle Persian Kaf Kof".[23]
"The earliest etymon" of the name Caucasus comes from Kaz-kaz, the Hittite designation of the "inhabitants of the southern coast of the Black Sea".[23]
It was also noted that in Nakh Ков гас (Kov gas) means "gateway to steppe".[24]
Endonyms and exonyms
The modern endonym for the region is usually similar in many languages, and is generally between Kavkaz and Kaukaz.
The South Caucasus borders the Greater Caucasus range and Southern Russia to its north, the Black Sea and Turkey to its west, the Caspian Sea to its east, and Iran to its south. It contains the Lesser Caucasus mountain range and surrounding lowlands. All of Armenia, Azerbaijan (excluding the northernmost parts), and Georgia (excluding the northernmost parts) are in the South Caucasus.
The watershed along the Greater Caucasus range is considered by some sources to be the dividing line between Europe and Southwest Asia. According to that, the highest peak in the Caucasus, Mount Elbrus (5,642 meters) located in western Ciscaucasus, is considered the highest point in Europe. The Kuma-Manych Depression, the geologic depression that divides the Russian Plain from the North Caucasus foreland is often regarded by classical and non-British sources as the natural and historical boundary between Europe and Asia. Another opinion is that the rivers Kura and Rioni mark this border, or even that of the river Aras.
Two territories in the region claim independence but are recognized as such by only a handful of entities: Abkhazia, and South Ossetia. Abkhazia and South Ossetia are largely recognized by the world community as part of Georgia.[26][27]
The region has many different languages and language families. There are more than 50 ethnic groups living in the region.[28] No fewer than three language families are unique to the area. In addition, Indo-European languages, such as East Slavic, Armenian and Ossetian, and Turkic languages, such as Azerbaijani, Kumyk language and Karachay–Balkar, are spoken in the area. Russian is used as a lingua franca most notably in the North Caucasus.
Located on the peripheries of Turkey, Iran, and Russia, the region has been an arena for political, military, religious, and cultural rivalries and expansionism for centuries. Throughout its history, the Caucasus was usually incorporated into the Iranian world.[29][30] At the beginning of the 19th century, the Russian Empireconquered the territory from Qajar Iran.[29]
The site yields the earliest unequivocal evidence for the presence of early humans outside the African continent;[32] and the Dmanisi skulls are the five oldest hominins ever found outside Africa.
Antiquity
Kura–Araxes culture from about 4000 BC until about 2000 BC enveloped a vast area of approximately 1,000 km by 500 km, and mostly encompassed, on modern-day territories, the Southern Caucasus (except western Georgia), northwestern Iran, the northeastern Caucasus, eastern Turkey, and as far as Syria.
Under Ashurbanipal (669–627 BC), the boundaries of the Assyrian Empire reached as far as the Caucasus Mountains. Later ancient kingdoms of the region included Armenia, Albania, Colchis and Iberia, among others. These kingdoms were later incorporated into various Iranian empires, including Media, the Achaemenid Empire, Parthia, and the Sassanid Empire, who would altogether rule the Caucasus for many hundreds of years. In 95–55 BC, under the reign of the Armenian king Tigranes the Great, the Kingdom of Armenia included Kingdom of Armenia, vassals Iberia, Albania, Parthia, Atropatene, Mesopotamia, Cappadocia, Cilicia, Syria, Nabataean kingdom, and Judea. By the time of the first century BC, Zoroastrianism had become the dominant religion of the region; however, the region would go through two other religious transformations. Owing to the strong rivalry between Persia and Rome, and later Byzantium. The Romans first arrived in the region in the 1st century BC with the annexation of the kingdom of Colchis, which was later turned into the province of Lazicum.[33] The next 600 years was marked by a conflict between Rome and Sassanid Empire for the control of the region. In western Georgia the eastern Roman rule lasted until the Middle Ages.[34]
Kingdom of Armenia at the peak of its might at the beginning of the 1st century B.C.
In the 12th century, the Georgian king David the Builder drove the Muslims out of the Caucasus and made the Kingdom of Georgia a strong regional power. In 1194–1204 Georgian Queen Tamar's armies crushed new Seljuk Turkish invasions from the southeast and south and launched several successful campaigns into Seljuk Turkish-controlled Southern Armenia. The Georgian Kingdom continued military campaigns in the Caucasus region. As a result of her military campaigns and the temporary fall of the Byzantine Empire in 1204, Georgia became the strongest Christian state in the whole Near East area, encompassing most of the Caucasus stretching from Northern Iran and Northeastern Turkey to the North Caucasus.
The Caucasus region was conquered by the Ottomans, Turco-Mongols, local kingdoms and khanates, as well as, once again, Iran.
In the second half of the 19th century, the Russian Empire also conquered the North Caucasus. In the aftermath of the Caucasian Wars, the Russian military perpetrated an ethnic cleansing of Circassians, expelling this indigenous population from its homeland.[41][42] Between the 1850s and World War I, about a million North Caucasian Muslims arrived in the Ottoman Empire as refugees.[43]
Having killed and deported most of the Armenians of Western Armenia during the Armenian genocide, the Turks intended to eliminate the Armenian population of Eastern Armenia.[44] During the 1920 Turkish–Armenian War, 60,000 to 98,000 Armenian civilians were estimated to have been killed by the Turkish army.[45]
In Greek mythology, the Caucasus was one of the pillars supporting the world.[47] After presenting man with the gift of fire, Prometheus (or Amirani in the Georgian version) was chained there by Zeus, to have his liver eaten daily by an eagle as punishment for defying Zeus's wish to keep the "secret of fire" from humans.
The Roman poet Ovid placed the Caucasus in Scythia and depicted it as a cold and stony mountain which was the abode of personified hunger. The Greek hero Jason sailed to the west coast of the Caucasus in pursuit of the Golden Fleece, and there met Medea, a daughter of King Aeëtes of Colchis.
Later folklore
The Caucasus has a rich folklore tradition.[48] This tradition has been preserved orally—necessitated by the fact that for most of the languages involved, there was no alphabet until the early twentieth century—and only began to be written down in the late nineteenth century.[49] One important tradition is that of the Nart sagas, which tell stories of a race of ancient heroes called the Narts. These sagas include such figures as Satanaya, the mother of the Narts, Sosruquo a shape changer and trickster, Tlepsh a blacksmith god, and Batradz, a mighty hero.[48] The folklore of the Caucasus shows ancient IranianZoroastrian influence, involve battles with ancient Goths, Huns and Khazars, and contain many connections with ancient Indian, Norse Scandinavian, and Greek cultures.[50]
Links between Greek mythology and subsequent folklore
Caucasian folklore contains many links with the myths of the ancient Greeks. There are resemblances between the mother goddess Satanaya and the Greek goddess of love Aphrodite.[51] The story of how the trickster Nart Sosruquo, became invulnerable parallels that of the Greek hero Achilles.[52] The ancient Greek Amazons may be connected to a Caucasian "warrior Forest-Mother, Amaz-an".[53]
Caucasian legends include stories involving giants similar to Homer's Polyphemus story.[54] In these stories, the giant is almost always a shepherd,[55] and he is variously a one-eyed rock-throwing cannibal, who lives in a cave (the exit of which is often blocked by a stone), kills the hero's companions, is blinded by a hot stake, and whose flock of animals is stolen by the hero and his men, all motifs which (along with still others) are also found in the Polyphemus story.[56] In one example from Georgia, two brothers, who are being held prisoner by a giant one-eyed shepherd called "One-eye", take a spit, heat it up, stab it into the giant's eye, and escape.[57]
There are also links with the ancient Greek myth of Prometheus.[58] Many legends, widespread in the Caucasus, contain motifs shared with the Prometheus story.[59] These motifs include a giant hero, his conflict with God or gods, the stealing of fire and giving it to men, being chained, and being tormented by a bird who pecks at his liver (or heart).[60] The Adyge/Circassian Nart Nasran,[61] the GeorgianAmirani,[62] the ChechenPkharmat,[63] and the AbkhazianAbrskil,[64] are examples of such Prometheus-like figures.
Ecology
Caucasus vegetation land cover, 1940View of the Caucasus Mountains in Dagestan, Russia
The region has a high level of endemism and several relict animals and plants, the fact reflecting the presence of refugial forests, which survived the Ice Age in the Caucasus Mountains. The Caucasus forest refugium is the largest throughout the Western Asian (near Eastern) region.[70][71] The area has multiple representatives of disjunct relict groups of plants with the closest relatives in Eastern Asia, southern Europe, and even North America.[72][73][74] Over 70 species of forest snails of the region are endemic.[75] Some relict species of vertebrates are Caucasian parsley frog, Caucasian salamander, Robert's snow vole, and Caucasian grouse, and there are almost entirely endemic groups of animals such as lizards of genus Darevskia. In general, the species composition of this refugium is quite distinct and differs from that of the other Western Eurasian refugia.[71]
The 2017 Azerbaijan Grand Prix (motor racing) was the first in the history of Formula One to be held in Azerbaijan. The 2017 World Rugby Under 20 Championship was held in Georgia. In 2017 the U-19 Europe Championship (Football) was held in Georgia. In 2019 the UEFA European Under-19 Championship was held in Armenia.
^Shamil Shetekauri et al., Mountain Flowers and Trees of Caucasia; Pelagic Publishing Limited, 2018, ISBN178427173X.
^John L. Esposito, Abdulaziz Sachedina (2004). "Caucasus". The Islamic World: Past and Present. Volume 1. Oxford University Press USA. ISBN0195165209. p. 86(registration required). Accessed 30 June 2021.
^"Caucasus - region and mountains, Eurasia". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 26 November 2018. West of the Kura-Aras Lowland rises the Lesser Caucasus range, which is extended southward by the Dzhavakhet Range and the Armenian Highland, the latter extending southwestward into Turkey.
^Kretschmer, Paul (1928). "Weiteres zur Urgeschichte der Inder" [More about the Pre-History of the Indians]. Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung auf dem Gebiete der indogermanischen Sprachen [Journal of Comparative Linguistic Research into Indo-European Philology] (in German). 55: 75–103.
^Kretschmer, Paul (1930), Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung auf dem Gebiete der indogermanischen Sprachen [Journal of Comparative Linguistic Research into Indo-European Philology], vol. 57, pp. 251–255
^Barney, Lewis, Beach, Berghof, Stephen A., W. J., J. A., Oliver (2006). The Etymologies of Isidore of Seville. New York, United States: Cambridge University Press. pp. 297–298. ISBN978-0-521-83749-1.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^ abVasmer, Max Julius Friedrich (1953–1958). "Russisches etymologisches Wörterbuch" [Russian Etymological Dictionary]. Indogermanische Bibliothek herausgegeben von Hans Krahe. Reihe 2: Wörterbüche [Indo-European Library Edited by Hans Krahe. Series 2: Dictionaries] (in German). Vol. 1. Heidelberg: Carl Winter.
^Yuyukin, M. A. (18–20 June 2012). "О происхождении названия Кавказ" [On the Origin of the Name of the Caucasus]. Индоевропейское языкознание и классическая филология – XVI (материалы чтений, посвященных памяти профессора И. М. Тронского) (in Russian). Saint Petersburg. pp. 893–899 and 919. ISBN978-5-02-038298-5. Retrieved 19 March 2017.
^Qoranashvili, G. Questions of Ethnic Identity According to Leonti Mroveli's Historical Chronicles, Studies, Vol. 1. Tbilisi.
^"Caucasus - region and mountains, Eurasia". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 26 November 2018. Caucasia includes not only the mountain ranges of the Caucasus proper but also the country immediately north and south of them. The land north of the Greater Caucasus is called Ciscaucasia (Predkavkazye, or "Hither Caucasia") and south of it is Transcaucasia (Zakavkazye, or "Farther Caucasia").
^Mikaberidze, Alexander (6 February 2015). Historical Dictionary of Georgia. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN978-1-4422-4146-6.
^ abMultiple Authors. "Caucasus and Iran". Encyclopædia Iranica. Retrieved 3 September 2012.
^Rapp, Stephen H. (2020). "Georgia, Georgians, until 1300". In Fleet, Kate; Krämer, Gudrun; Matringe, Denis; Nawas, John; Rowson, Everett (eds.). Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE. Brill Online. ISSN1873-9830. While Hodgson astutely perceived Caucasia's cross-cultural condition, subsequent research has exposed the region's long-term participation in the Iranian and wider Persianate world. This multifaceted association began in the Iron Age, survived the intensive Christianization of Caucasia, and continued until the annexation of Caucasian lands by the Russian Empire in the nineteenth century. (...) Above all, pre-modern Caucasia is characterized by its integration into the Iranian and Persianate socio-cultural world, the Iranian commonwealth, which extended from Central Asia to Anatolia and south to the Arabian Peninsula. Caucasia's active membership in this commonwealth began under the first "world empire" of the Achaemenids and survived both Christianization and the demise of the Sāsānian empire.
^Vekua, A., Lordkipanidze, D., Rightmire, G. P., Agusti, J., Ferring, R., Maisuradze, G., et al. (2002). A new skull of early Homo from Dmanisi, Georgia. Science, 297:85–9.
^Theodor Mommsen, William Purdie Dickson, Francis Haverfield. The provinces of the Roman Empire: from Caesar to Diocletian. p. 68.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^Allen, W.E.D (1932). A history of the Georgian people. p. 123.
^Hunter, Shireen; et al. (2004). Islam in Russia: The Politics of Identity and Security. M.E. Sharpe. p. 3. (..) It is difficult to establish exactly when Islam first appeared in Russia because the lands that Islam penetrated early in its expansion were not part of Russia at the time, but were later incorporated into the expanding Russian Empire. Islam reached the Caucasus region in the middle of the seventh century as part of the Arab conquest of the Iranian Sassanian Empire.
^Allen F. Chew. "An Atlas of Russian History: Eleven Centuries of Changing Borders", Yale University Press, 1970, p. 74
^Yemelianova, Galina, Islam nationalism and state in the Muslim Caucasus. Caucasus Survey, April 2014. p. 3
^Memoirs of Miliutin, "the plan of action decided upon for 1860 was to cleanse [ochistit'] the mountain zone of its indigenous population", per Richmond, W. The Northwest Caucasus: Past, Present, and Future. Routledge. 2008.
^Vahakn Dadrian. (2003). The History of the Armenian Genocide: Ethnic Conflict from the Balkans to Anatolia to the Caucasus. New York: Berghahn Books, pp. 360–61. ISBN1-57181-666-6.
^Rashidvash, pp. 33–34; for connections found in the Nart sagas, see Colarusso, pp. 5–7.
^Rashidvash, p. 33; Colarusso, pp. 6, 44, 53, 399.
^When Sosruquo was born burning in flames, the blacksmith god Tlepsh, grabbed Sosruquo and plunged him into water, making him invulnerable except where he was held by tongs, see Rashidvash, pp. 33–34; Colarusso, pp. 52–54 (Circassian Saga 8: Lady Setenaya and the Shepherd: The Birth of Sawseruquo), 185–186 (Abaza Saga 47: How Sosruquo Was Born), 387–394 (Ubykh Saga 86: The Birth of Soseruquo), cf. pp. 323–328 (Abkhaz Saga 75: The Mother of Heroes).
^Hunt, pp. 9, 13, 201, 210–229; Bachvarova, p. 106; Mayor, pp. xxi; Rashidvash, p. 34; Colarusso. pp. 6–7, 170 (Circassian Saga 37: A Cyclops Bound atop Was'hamakhwa), 200–202 (Abaza Saga 52: How Sosruquo Brought Fire to His Troops).
^Colarusso, pp. 158–168 (Circassian Saga 34: How Pataraz Freed Bearded Nasran, Who Was Chained to the High Mountain), 168–169 (Circassian Saga 35: Bound Nasran); Hunt, pp. 355–356; Rashidvash, p. 34.
^Zazanashvili N, Sanadiradze G, Bukhnikashvili A, Kandaurov A, Tarkhnishvili D. 2004. Caucasus. In: Mittermaier RA, Gil PG, Hoffmann M, Pilgrim J, Brooks T, Mittermaier CG, Lamoreux J, da Fonseca GAB, eds. Hotspots revisited, Earth's biologically richest and most endangered terrestrial ecoregions. Sierra Madre: CEMEX/Agrupacion Sierra Madre, 148–153
^Milne RI. 2004. "Phylogeny and biogeography of Rhododendron subsection Pontica, a group with a Tertiary relict distribution". Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 33: 389–401.
^Kikvidze Z, Ohsawa M. 1999. "Adjara, East Mediterranean refuge of Tertiary vegetation". In: Ohsawa M, Wildpret W, Arco MD, eds. Anaga Cloud Forest, a comparative study on evergreen broad-leaved forests and trees of the Canary Islands and Japan. Chiba: Chiba University Publications, 297–315.
^Denk T, Frotzler N, Davitashvili N. 2001. "Vegetational patterns and distribution of relict taxa in humid temperate forests and wetlands of Georgia Transcaucasia". Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 72: 287–332.
^Pokryszko B, Cameron R, Mumladze L, Tarkhnishvili D. 2011. "Forest snail faunas from Georgian Transcaucasia: patterns of diversity in a Pleistocene refugium". Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 102: 239–250
Bachvarova, Mary R., From Hittite to Homer: The Anatolian Background of Ancient Greek Epic, Cambridge University Press, 2016. ISBN978-0521509794.
Coene, Frederick (2009). The Caucasus: An Introduction. Routledge. ISBN978-0-415-48660-6.
Colarusso, John, Nart Sagas from the Caucasus: Myths and Legends from the Circassians, Abazas, Abkhaz, and Ubykhs, Princeton University Press, 2002, 2014. ISBN9781400865284.
Cornell, Susan E., Small Nations and Great Powers: A Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict in the Caucasus.
Hunt, David, Legends of the Caucasus, Saqi Books, London, 2012. ISBN978-0863568237.
Mayor, Adrienne (2016), "Introduction to the Paperback Edition" in Nart Sagas: Ancient Myths and Legends of the Circassians and Abkhazians, by John Colarusso, Princeton University Press, 2016. ISBN978-0691-16914-9.
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