Caucasus Visuals

We’ve got a new name. Pan Caucasus is now Caucasus Visuals. Nothing is changing about the content you came here for. We’ll keep exploring the Caucasus through history, art, photography, architecture, and visual storytelling. Same page. Same focus. New identity. Thank you for following along.

Captured Shapsug boy and a Shapsug Circassian, 1850s. Artist: Theodor Horschelt (1829-1871) The Shapsugs are one of the Circassian tribes.

Bagin, a fighting dog breeder from the Avar village of Sogratl, Dagestan. shandi_ / IG

"Abkhazia Sings", a vinyl record cover of a song compilation by the State Merited Ensemble of Folk Song and Dance of Abkhazia. "Art of the Peoples of the USSR" series, 1972.

Balkar wedding, Kabardino-Balkaria. Photo: Rustam Nakhushev

On May 3, 1957, the mass return of the Karachay people to the Caucasus began after a 14-year deportation to Central Asia. Since 1997, May 3 has been celebrated as the Day of Rebirth of the Karachay People. This date is officially designated as a public holiday in Karachay-Cherkessia and is marked by commemorative events.

Georgian wrestlers. Mtskheta, Tiflis Governorate, 1887.

Residents of Baku welcoming the leader of the USSR, Leonid Brezhnev. Azerbaijani SSR, 1982. Photo: Behruz Huseynzade

Sunflower bloom, Stavropol Krai. artemmeletov / IG

Portrait of a young Agul girl, Dagestan. The Aguls are one of the Dagestani peoples, closely related to the Lezgins. They live in the central part of southeastern Dagestan.

Os-Bagatar I, a medieval ruler of Alania and a 9th-century military commander whose figure lies at the intersection of real history and Caucasian epic. He lived and ruled during the birth of a unified Alanian Christian state. Os-Bagatar I is considered the founding ancestor of numerous Ossetian families. The name "Os-Bagatar" (Ossetian: Ос-Бæгъатыр) translates as "Ossetian warrior/hero." The word "Bagatar" originates from the Turkic baghatur ("brave warrior", "hero"), which the Alans adopted from the Huns in the 4th century. According to the Arabic geographer Ahmad ibn Rustah, this term was used as a title for the kings of Alania, highlighting their origin from the military-aristocratic elite, and later became established as a personal name. According to historical chronicles, Os-Bagatar I died in 888 in the Battle of Aspindza (the territory of modern Georgia).

"Don't abuse cosmetics!" A Soviet poster in Georgian and Russian. Georgian SSR, 1978.

Abaza Muhajirs (settlers) in the village of Loukyt (now Osmaniye, Turkey). Ottoman Empire, 1890s. Photo: Hakob Khararyan

Armenia, USSR. Summer 1982.

A medieval crypt in the historical region of Malkhista. Chechnya, 1980s.

Portrait of the Ingush Aminat Tutaeva. Nasyr-Kort village, 1930s. Her father, Idris Tutaev, a former officer of the Russian Imperial Army, was executed during the Stalinist repressions in 1938. Her sister, Asiyat, a Major in the Medical Corps of the Red Army, died in German captivity in 1944.

A Karachay men's tombstone. Arkhyz village. Karachay Autonomy, 1935. Photo: Erna Siebert (1908-1981)

Khalisat Magomedova, a performer of Lak folk dances. Vachi village. Dagestan ASSR, 1968.

Circassians from Gelendzhik, 1845. Artist: Grigory Gagarin (1810-1893) / Scènes, paysages, moeurs et costumes du Caucase dessinés d'après nature par le prince G. Gagarine. Paris, 1845.

Portrait of the Ossetian Milena Dzboeva, Upper Zgid village, North Ossetia. Photo: Alan Tsagaraev