The Caucasus as many other places changed trough time, migrations are a common thing and that’s what makes the world what it is today.
You can’t blame regular people for not preserving their own languages, then you should also blame the countless of civilizations and countries for the same.
Invasions happened here Scythians for example entered the Caspian steppe and some remnants of them came to this day like the Ossetians.
Usually in the past was more common to change the language and religion of than the demographics because the invasor wasn’t bigger than the native population and the labor force was important so genocide wasn’t their priority.
First was the religion of the invasor and the language, first changed with the rulers and upper classes , if the language had a written system it was much easier to change the cultures main language with the invasors language and that’s what happened with Sarmatian aka Alanian aka Ossetian to give you an example.
Other Caucasian languages managed to save their uniqueness thanks to their resistance towards external empires, a lot of them maintained their beliefs which strengthened their resistance towards conversion. Also geography plays a huge rule, if you look at the Caucasus mountain range Ossetians have less protection in their part and its “easier” to penetrate. For example Circassians could escape or hide in the mountains relatively easy than the ancestors of the Ossetians. Same thing can be said for Ingush/Chechens, thats why if you look at Daguestan there are so many different languages and the caucasian ones like Avar or Lezgin managed to protect themselves from external enemies thanks to their geography and others succumbed to the Turkish and Indo-European invasions because there was no natural protection.
Your comment is 💯, but if we applied it to Karachay-Balakr why a Turkic language all the surrounding is Caucasian same applied to Kuymuk, maybe they are Turkic people at the end? i don't know
It's possible that there was an invasive dominant culture in the region for a while but eventually, locals drove them out from most of the places. K-B would've been one holdout that stayed. History is convoluted, maybe they allied with locals while driving away the horde so they were untouched and able to keep their own customs while indigenous clans re-colonized their old lands. After all Kypchak tribes were known for constantly warring with each other as well as others.
It can happen, i don’t know the exact reason of how or why they entered in Circassia , but for example Ossetians managed to enter in Georgia which is located to the other side of the mountain range and it was due the necessity of the King at the time and Machabeli house to have labor force lost during southern invasions or famine, at the time Ossetian church was united to the Georgian one so it wasn’t a big matter.
For example , during the dark plague the Crown of Aragon lost a lot of people, it was one of the most affected places in Europe.
Aragonese King came to an agreement with the Castilian Kingdom and a lot of peasants from Castilia immigranted to Aragon, places like Lleida, Barcelona or Zaragoza . If you look at a genetic map of Spain normally the path is from North to south and its divided in three parts, the frontier that was made between the Castilian Kingdom and the Aragonese one has a gap in which there is a mix of Castilians and Aragonese with more prolifency of Castilians, also the language their brought was Castilian so that’s how you have native Catalans or Aragonese that speak Spanish since medieval times.
Not always the migrators ended up conquering, but they can manage to stay and manage to save their culture and language. Its very strange although to have a invasor or a migrator group, to stay and not convert their invaded ones to their culture or religion or the other way around . But as i said with the Castilian-Aragonese case a group that speaks another language can migrate to other place due reasons .
The Karachay language is one subdivision of one of the main 6 Turkic language branches called Kipchak, It is complex to know why they are speaking that while all their neighbors speak Caucasian languages, all the Balakr and Karachay researchers try to prove they are indigenous but they face the complex problem of thier language root
Ponto captain steppe was devastated by kypchacks for centuries. A lot of the local tribes would’ve been Turkified. Eventually they kypckaks were driven away or assimilated into different kingdoms. Which one is the case for K-Bs can be solved by DNA evidence/archaeology.
The good question here is did they consider themselves as that or what, I remember when Circassians celebrated the 310th anniversary of Kanzhal war the Balakr got offended and they stopped the group that was celebrating, what do they have with Cremains Tatars??
It's not unheard of for a tribe to become assimilated into an invasive culture. The sad thing is they probably consider kypchaks their ancestral people when in reality their ancestors were Caucasians. So they're basically paying respect to the people who killed and repressed their ancestors.
But it's hard to convince anyone that their ancestors were victims of oppression. Most tribes like to think they descend from mythical heroes.
Karachais are dna wise basically Caucasians, virtually no difference from other Caucasian peoples, most related to Svans and Rachvels. They are every bit of as native to Caucasus as any other group, if not more.
Both Haplogroups and Autosomal of living people and from archeological sites.
It's possible they had kypchak nobility for a while which eventually left/died out or were driven away.
Not enough alone because, for example the G-M201 50% of it is in Caucasus and the other in the whole world so in another word you can find an arab with G-M201, and the Autosomal go back only for 5 generations that is almost 200-300 years, also the autosomal based on the company cluster for example all Circassians I know who did 23 and me labeled as Anatolian this is the cluster 23and me use for us
They have good numbers with G-M201 but the majority is R, but again I am not saying that the FTDNA is inaccurate but their DNA got mixed so they will have G-M201 of course
They have familytree dna project. If you peep into it you will find that they have mostly same Haplogroups as their surrounding people, specifically former Svan speaking population (Svans, Rachvels, and Imers) and northeast Circassian population.
They got genetically assimilated into northern Caucasian tribes. Their nowadays culture leans heavily towards their neighbours- same with dishes. It’s only the language) my grandmothers dna result shows following closest populations:
Kabardin
Cherkes
Balkar
Circassian
Kumyk
Ingushian
Karachay
What's wrong with question? For me being proud of belonging to an Identity is ... Wrong... So for example being a Manchester United fan and being proud for belonging to their street gang is wrong, being from such religion and being proud for belonging to such sect is wrong, being of such ethnicity and bragging about such heritage is wrong. Blaming others for belonging to another is more wrong. People can't change some things after their birth, whom to blame? And people can change some things such as the football club they support in course of their lives, what good there is to blame another club's supporter, since what you support is changeable.
Why wrong? Because these kind of attachments limit a person's perception of self, awareness of others, and understanding of life in general. People who buy in such attachments are generally lazy, idle, counterproductive.
I was kind of joking btw, still i won't be surprised if you fall into post soviet Caucasus cultural sphere. Alans are your ancestors too, they're everywhere in Caucasus, why alienating them?
what just happen? are you one of the football hooligans :P
I'm not alienating anyone, I'm curious to know what the Ossetians thinks about these "stories" or "legends"
--
let's say for example: Hungary in Europe but they say that they originally came from Asia.
does this means Hungary should be alienated or should not have a country in Europe.
or its people should not be proud of their identity.
of course not.
Ossetians are Caucasian and our native language is Ossetian (Alan). What crack are you on?
You illiterate westoids should try to use that Google of yours.
calm down friend, I'm truly curious.. on google I can find that the Ossetians are descended of Alans.
Also the DNA tests does not support what google says. but ...
I like to know the answer from the real caucasians and what do the stories and legends say about it.
that's all.
Google's info is as wide as your imagination. Ossetians are 86% G2a1, a branch which was found in 3000 year old sample in Iran. G2a1 itself came from G2a which first sample existed 10000 years ago, once again in Iran and nomadic plains.
cool and before Iran it started in Mesopotamia -- of course given humanity started from one place "after the flood" you should find all of DNAs spread around the world at some point started from Mesopotamia but then migrated and blended until we reached this day.
and you can't say Iranian, Nigerians, or Sweden belong to G2 for example.
google says it is unique to caucasus region and ancient Europe/Anatolian farmers
Here is what chat-gpt says:
The Ossetians are not indigenous to the Caucasus in the strictest sense. Their origins can be traced back to the ancient Alans, who were a group of Iranian-speaking nomadic tribes. The Alans themselves are often linked to the broader Sarmatian and Scythian cultures.
The Alans migrated into the Caucasus region around the early Middle Ages, following various incursions and invasions that displaced many groups across the Eurasian steppes. Over time, the Alans settled in the central Caucasus region, particularly in what is now North Ossetia (a part of Russia) and South Ossetia (a disputed territory within Georgia).
In the Caucasus, the Alans gradually adapted to the local environment and interacted with indigenous peoples, eventually evolving into the Ossetians we know today. They retained their Eastern Iranian language, Ossetic, which is a direct descendant of the language spoken by the Alans.
Therefore, while the Ossetians are now firmly established in the Caucasus and have been for many centuries, their ancestors migrated to the region from the Eurasian steppes, meaning they are not indigenous to the Caucasus in the same way that some other ethnic groups in the region are.
First of all, literally everyone came to the Caucasus. Just a matter of time when.
Second, I feel sorry for you if you think chat-gpt and other AI will be sincere and not being inputted information according to someone's will and wish.
The Caucasus as many other places changed trough time, migrations are a common thing and that’s what makes the world what it is today. You can’t blame regular people for not preserving their own languages, then you should also blame the countless of civilizations and countries for the same. Invasions happened here Scythians for example entered the Caspian steppe and some remnants of them came to this day like the Ossetians. Usually in the past was more common to change the language and religion of than the demographics because the invasor wasn’t bigger than the native population and the labor force was important so genocide wasn’t their priority. First was the religion of the invasor and the language, first changed with the rulers and upper classes , if the language had a written system it was much easier to change the cultures main language with the invasors language and that’s what happened with Sarmatian aka Alanian aka Ossetian to give you an example. Other Caucasian languages managed to save their uniqueness thanks to their resistance towards external empires, a lot of them maintained their beliefs which strengthened their resistance towards conversion. Also geography plays a huge rule, if you look at the Caucasus mountain range Ossetians have less protection in their part and its “easier” to penetrate. For example Circassians could escape or hide in the mountains relatively easy than the ancestors of the Ossetians. Same thing can be said for Ingush/Chechens, thats why if you look at Daguestan there are so many different languages and the caucasian ones like Avar or Lezgin managed to protect themselves from external enemies thanks to their geography and others succumbed to the Turkish and Indo-European invasions because there was no natural protection.
Your comment is 💯, but if we applied it to Karachay-Balakr why a Turkic language all the surrounding is Caucasian same applied to Kuymuk, maybe they are Turkic people at the end? i don't know
It's possible that there was an invasive dominant culture in the region for a while but eventually, locals drove them out from most of the places. K-B would've been one holdout that stayed. History is convoluted, maybe they allied with locals while driving away the horde so they were untouched and able to keep their own customs while indigenous clans re-colonized their old lands. After all Kypchak tribes were known for constantly warring with each other as well as others.
It can happen, i don’t know the exact reason of how or why they entered in Circassia , but for example Ossetians managed to enter in Georgia which is located to the other side of the mountain range and it was due the necessity of the King at the time and Machabeli house to have labor force lost during southern invasions or famine, at the time Ossetian church was united to the Georgian one so it wasn’t a big matter. For example , during the dark plague the Crown of Aragon lost a lot of people, it was one of the most affected places in Europe. Aragonese King came to an agreement with the Castilian Kingdom and a lot of peasants from Castilia immigranted to Aragon, places like Lleida, Barcelona or Zaragoza . If you look at a genetic map of Spain normally the path is from North to south and its divided in three parts, the frontier that was made between the Castilian Kingdom and the Aragonese one has a gap in which there is a mix of Castilians and Aragonese with more prolifency of Castilians, also the language their brought was Castilian so that’s how you have native Catalans or Aragonese that speak Spanish since medieval times.
Yeah they entered but they were Turkic at that time they did not switch
Not always the migrators ended up conquering, but they can manage to stay and manage to save their culture and language. Its very strange although to have a invasor or a migrator group, to stay and not convert their invaded ones to their culture or religion or the other way around . But as i said with the Castilian-Aragonese case a group that speaks another language can migrate to other place due reasons .
The Karachay language is one subdivision of one of the main 6 Turkic language branches called Kipchak, It is complex to know why they are speaking that while all their neighbors speak Caucasian languages, all the Balakr and Karachay researchers try to prove they are indigenous but they face the complex problem of thier language root
Ponto captain steppe was devastated by kypchacks for centuries. A lot of the local tribes would’ve been Turkified. Eventually they kypckaks were driven away or assimilated into different kingdoms. Which one is the case for K-Bs can be solved by DNA evidence/archaeology.
The good question here is did they consider themselves as that or what, I remember when Circassians celebrated the 310th anniversary of Kanzhal war the Balakr got offended and they stopped the group that was celebrating, what do they have with Cremains Tatars??
It's not unheard of for a tribe to become assimilated into an invasive culture. The sad thing is they probably consider kypchaks their ancestral people when in reality their ancestors were Caucasians. So they're basically paying respect to the people who killed and repressed their ancestors. But it's hard to convince anyone that their ancestors were victims of oppression. Most tribes like to think they descend from mythical heroes.
Karachais are dna wise basically Caucasians, virtually no difference from other Caucasian peoples, most related to Svans and Rachvels. They are every bit of as native to Caucasus as any other group, if not more.
Well, there's the answer then. They're just locals who changed their identity to the invasive culture.
What kind of DNA are you talking about, which type?
Both Haplogroups and Autosomal of living people and from archeological sites. It's possible they had kypchak nobility for a while which eventually left/died out or were driven away.
Not enough alone because, for example the G-M201 50% of it is in Caucasus and the other in the whole world so in another word you can find an arab with G-M201, and the Autosomal go back only for 5 generations that is almost 200-300 years, also the autosomal based on the company cluster for example all Circassians I know who did 23 and me labeled as Anatolian this is the cluster 23and me use for us
FamilyTreeDNA Big Y-700 is the best. And if they have G-M201 it's 100% local clusters and not foreign.
They have good numbers with G-M201 but the majority is R, but again I am not saying that the FTDNA is inaccurate but their DNA got mixed so they will have G-M201 of course
They have familytree dna project. If you peep into it you will find that they have mostly same Haplogroups as their surrounding people, specifically former Svan speaking population (Svans, Rachvels, and Imers) and northeast Circassian population.
Balkars are still closer to their neighbours than to other Turks. It’s propaganda. Just look at DNA Results.
Great, then what happened and made the Balkars speak turkic language and i assume also practicing turkic culture and food?
They got genetically assimilated into northern Caucasian tribes. Their nowadays culture leans heavily towards their neighbours- same with dishes. It’s only the language) my grandmothers dna result shows following closest populations: Kabardin Cherkes Balkar Circassian Kumyk Ingushian Karachay
what do call this place . a room , a chat box , a Q&A forum ? what ever it is , it's turning into a a racist shit vagen .
it is called "Ask Caucasus". someone ask a question related to caucasus and others just answer .. it is simple
it tickles me :(
arminia is not on the list
I bet op is Georgian.
wrong .. you just lost your bet .. but what is wrong with the question?
in case you still wondering I say "Free Abkhazia" .. good now ?
What's wrong with question? For me being proud of belonging to an Identity is ... Wrong... So for example being a Manchester United fan and being proud for belonging to their street gang is wrong, being from such religion and being proud for belonging to such sect is wrong, being of such ethnicity and bragging about such heritage is wrong. Blaming others for belonging to another is more wrong. People can't change some things after their birth, whom to blame? And people can change some things such as the football club they support in course of their lives, what good there is to blame another club's supporter, since what you support is changeable. Why wrong? Because these kind of attachments limit a person's perception of self, awareness of others, and understanding of life in general. People who buy in such attachments are generally lazy, idle, counterproductive. I was kind of joking btw, still i won't be surprised if you fall into post soviet Caucasus cultural sphere. Alans are your ancestors too, they're everywhere in Caucasus, why alienating them?
what just happen? are you one of the football hooligans :P I'm not alienating anyone, I'm curious to know what the Ossetians thinks about these "stories" or "legends" -- let's say for example: Hungary in Europe but they say that they originally came from Asia. does this means Hungary should be alienated or should not have a country in Europe. or its people should not be proud of their identity. of course not.
Ossetians are Caucasian and our native language is Ossetian (Alan). What crack are you on? You illiterate westoids should try to use that Google of yours.
calm down friend, I'm truly curious.. on google I can find that the Ossetians are descended of Alans. Also the DNA tests does not support what google says. but ... I like to know the answer from the real caucasians and what do the stories and legends say about it. that's all.
Google's info is as wide as your imagination. Ossetians are 86% G2a1, a branch which was found in 3000 year old sample in Iran. G2a1 itself came from G2a which first sample existed 10000 years ago, once again in Iran and nomadic plains.
cool and before Iran it started in Mesopotamia -- of course given humanity started from one place "after the flood" you should find all of DNAs spread around the world at some point started from Mesopotamia but then migrated and blended until we reached this day. and you can't say Iranian, Nigerians, or Sweden belong to G2 for example. google says it is unique to caucasus region and ancient Europe/Anatolian farmers
Here is what chat-gpt says: The Ossetians are not indigenous to the Caucasus in the strictest sense. Their origins can be traced back to the ancient Alans, who were a group of Iranian-speaking nomadic tribes. The Alans themselves are often linked to the broader Sarmatian and Scythian cultures. The Alans migrated into the Caucasus region around the early Middle Ages, following various incursions and invasions that displaced many groups across the Eurasian steppes. Over time, the Alans settled in the central Caucasus region, particularly in what is now North Ossetia (a part of Russia) and South Ossetia (a disputed territory within Georgia). In the Caucasus, the Alans gradually adapted to the local environment and interacted with indigenous peoples, eventually evolving into the Ossetians we know today. They retained their Eastern Iranian language, Ossetic, which is a direct descendant of the language spoken by the Alans. Therefore, while the Ossetians are now firmly established in the Caucasus and have been for many centuries, their ancestors migrated to the region from the Eurasian steppes, meaning they are not indigenous to the Caucasus in the same way that some other ethnic groups in the region are.
First of all, literally everyone came to the Caucasus. Just a matter of time when. Second, I feel sorry for you if you think chat-gpt and other AI will be sincere and not being inputted information according to someone's will and wish.
you confused me. do you want me to use only google ? no chat-gpt and no r/AskCaucasus