Kakhib is one of the oldest villages in Dagestan. Old Kakhib-Bakdab and its battle towers were built in the 8th-10th centuries. The areas of the village of Bakdab were inhabited back in the Stone and Bronze Ages.
Kakhib is the common name for three villages and many hamlets.
The word "Kakhib" is derived from the Georgian word "Kakhi", which means poor mountainous area. In I764, the “Kakhib Canton” was formed. By the 11th century, Kakhib was one of thirteen large villages, such as Khunzakh, Kumukh, Akhty, Urada, which were the main centers of trade and economic activity. In Kakhib, the production of edged weapons, jewelry, rugs, fur coats, shoes, wood and stone carving, and sheepskin production was developed. The development of the village was facilitated by the fact that it was located “On the Great Road of Nations” from Samur to Vedeno.
Old Kakhib was known throughout the Caucasus as an impregnable structure. History remembers only one breakthrough of invaders, and it was during the invasion of the Tatar-Mongols.
After this sad event, right above the abyss and above the village, the mountaineers erected watchtowers that date back to the 8th-10th centuries. Such protection was insurmountable for any conqueror. Only one bridge across the canyon of a mountain stream connected Old Kakhib with the world.
The houses in Old Kahib were built in the style of highland architecture, where the roof of one house served as a yard for another. The jamaat gathered here, and weddings were often celebrated. The streets and alleys in the village were very narrow, and the saklyas were adjacent to each other so closely that from the outside it seemed as if they were growing from the cliff itself.
Village Old Kakhib in Dagestan on the map:
Address: Russia, Dagestan, Shamilsky district
GPS: 42.42856, 46.596184
So, the second story from the Dagestan trip of the recently past year is about the monuments of the free villages of Avaria.
No matter how strong they were and no matter how high they sat on their steep plateau, the Khunzakh Nutsals and Khans, who in their best years could afford to besiege not only Derbent, but also ruin Georgia, they were never able to conquer the entire Avaria. The villages of free societies, who preferred to live by their adat, climbed the steepest slopes and menacingly bristled with battle towers: the enemy will not pass!
The Shamil region of Dagestan, which I started writing about in the last series, is the former lands of Gidatl, the most famous free union of Avaria, and the villages allied to it. And, perhaps, the most picturesque reserve of mountain tower architecture in Dagestan.
PAGAN SUNS OF KAHIBA
The village of Kakhib, our first goal, is nestled in the gorge of the Kakhibtlyar River, a tributary of the Avar Koisu, among layered, seemingly torn, weathered mountains. True, strictly speaking, “Kakhib” is the name of the entire surrounding area with settlements and farmsteads. The ancient tower village for which we came here was called Bakdab.
From the regional center of Hebda to Kakhib there is a short but rather steep road up the gorge. Kahib was once famous for its Islamic scholars and sheikhs. And now the first thing that the traveler will encounter here is a ziyarat (holy place) with a source dedicated to three local Tariqat sheikhs of the early 20th century - Hasan-Afandi, Habibullah-Haji and Muhammadzarif-Afandi. Passers-by will definitely stop here to get water for the journey...
Modern Kahib - narrow curved roads, gardens, a school and a neat mosque. The new village is only a few decades old: in the fifties, the inhabitants of ancient Bakdab, exhausted by constant collapses and landslides, moved to a calmer and more convenient bank of the river. Bakdab finally became empty in the seventies - some people refused to leave their native walls until the very end.
Once again I am surprised at my luck in getting to the right people at the right time: the car that picked us up from Hebd brought us straight to the house Iraiganat Magomedsaidova, local librarian, teacher and local historian. Of course, we were immediately invited to tea, and where there is tea in Dagestan, there is lodging for the night. We were given the village library, which doubles as a local history museum, at our disposal (in every self-respecting village in these parts you can find an impressive ethnographic collection).
Perhaps I can safely add the Kakhib library to my personal list of the most memorable places to spend the night.
A pregnant cat was also found in an ancient carved chest!
Iraiganat Magomedsaidova and her brother Pakhrutdin, a military doctor who lives in the Murmansk region and visits his homeland on visits - one of the best memories from the mountain accident as a whole. We were received truly warmly and sincerely. Usually, given that hospitality in the Caucasus is a matter of ancient etiquette, you always ask yourself whether you are abusing it? They never had this feeling at home.
For tea - a little local delicacy, smoked fat tail. You won't eat much, but it's actually quite interesting. What else do you think Dagestan wrestlers use to gain muscle?
Having despaired and abandoned our backpacks, we set off with Pakhrutdin to the ruins of Bakdab.
The Kakhibtlyar River seems to divide the gorge into two halves, dead and alive. On one side is the present-day Kakhib with its sounds and smells, on the other is the formidable skeleton of a fortified village on a steep slope. But seriously - perhaps the most picturesque ruins I have seen in the Caucasus.
Guests from the living side often visit the dead side - to collect herbs, bow to the graves, and just take a walk. On the way to the other side we pass an ancient cemetery...
On the other side of Kakhibtlyar, right on the steep slope of the mountain, we see a number of monuments - as I understand it, cenotaphs of Kakhib people who died or died in a foreign land (correct me, knowledgeable people, if I’m wrong). Similar monuments began to appear here, they say, back in the 15th century, when Gidatl and the surrounding area were just converted to Islam and their inhabitants themselves began to bring the new faith to their neighbors with sabers and fire. Such steles were also placed for the soldiers who fought under the banners of Shamil against the Russians. I forgot to ask who these monuments are dedicated to.
In the ruins of the village, two battle towers were preserved (each was built by a separate tukhum - surname; in a jamaat - a rural society there could be several tukhums), and the impressive ruins of a mosque.
Bakdaba Mosque and the battle tower next to it. The mosque, I must say, looks more like a castle... 
It is based on a clearly earlier structure - part of the lower tier is made in a different, more ancient masonry.
It, in turn, contains stones with pagan petroglyphs...
And here, again, in the ruins of the mosque is the Kakhib petroglyph that most impressed me. Pagan deer carry the sun on their antlers.
You can walk around Bakdab for a long time in search of evidence of the long pagan-Christian past of Avaria - it is a very exciting activity!
There are, of course, many monuments of Arabic epigraphy in Bakdab-Old Kakhib...
The only intact tower, restored relatively recently, is the compositional center of the village:
You can walk around the ruins for a long time - but our plans are still to get to neighboring Goor before dark. Therefore, we turn around and return to New Kakhib...
GOOR: TOWERS OVER THE CHAPTER
From Kakhib to Goor it’s a forty-minute walk up the hill.
Goor greets us with dog barking and the close attention of the locals: the men at the godekan wanted to see our documents: “the time is such, who knows who can walk there?” My companion's Dutch passport caused a particular stir...
We were in Goora in the first half of July. And in August, in this area, security forces shot dead two young shepherds, having cheerfully reported on the destruction of terrorists (the dead were even “supplied” with uniforms and machine guns for this occasion). In all the surrounding villages, the connection between the dead guys and the “Wahhabists” is stubbornly denied. However, alas, there are many such stories throughout the Eastern Caucasus.
But let's return to our stones.
They say that the Goorians have been living in the current place since the arrival of Islam in Gidatl; their ancestors had to change their place of residence more than once due to constant threats of enemy attack, until they were forced to climb to the very crest of the mountain.
Once upon a time, several tukhums lived in Goor, each of which built a tower in case of a siege - there were seven of them in the village, only three have survived to this day, another one collapsed relatively recently.
The Goor towers immediately impressed me with the abundance of petroglyphs in the masonry - it’s even more interesting here than in Kakhib!
For example, who is the horseman on the left? Isn’t it Saint George, who migrated into the masonry of the tower from some medieval house or chapel?
The inevitable swastikas, a symbol of the sun moving in a circle...
On the outskirts there is a mosque with a ziyarat of the local holy sheikh and an ancient cemetery. In Goor, they write, steles of martyrs dating back to the 15th century have been preserved...
And in the mosque, they write, before collectivization a book was kept - a chronicle of the village, now irretrievably lost...
It's starting to get dark. Colleague Airmiles Davis on the tower and the world around us.
At some point, closer to sunset, in the middle of the ruins, a feeling of the enormity of the world and a desire to sit on the ridge and, without moving, absorb the air, landscapes and silence around, came over me. Meanwhile, the time for evening prayer had come - and from the minarets of the surrounding villages far below, adhans began to be heard one after another.
The noise of the engine brought me out of my stupor - a whole family in a Priora had come to rest near the towers; the father of the family, it must be admitted, turned out to be an ace in artistic parking...
Already at the very dark we return to Kakhib, where dinner and a pleasant conversation await us, so that the next morning we can move towards
Village Kakhib- a very interesting, mysterious place on territory of Dagestan. In terms of antiquity, the history of old Kakhib is comparable to the age of the city of Derbent. Historians date finds from these sites to the period from the 7th century BC, but do not directly compare them with the history of the village of Kakhib.
Kakhib is located in the Shamil region of Dagestan, 5 kilometers from today’s regional center Hebda. At the peak of the steep ridge on the left bank of the Kakhibtlyar River. Height above sea level 1775 meters.
After visiting Gamsutl, I decided to definitely get to this village, and then visit the ghost village of Goor. The trip took place about a year later, although I only had to go from Derbent, you understand things... The travel time from Derbent will take some, 4 hours. Therefore, stock up on everything: food, water, time and patience. Along the way, be sure to stop in passing villages: Sergokala, Lefties, Gergebil, Urib etc. Since the path is not close, I decided to go in the summer and still the path was not easy.
On the spectacular ridge of a rock mass, under reliable protection from attacks by possible enemies, this village once arose. , whose remains I visited today, date back to 8-10 centuries. What is very typical for Kakhib, it has preserved large battle towers, in which residents took refuge in case of danger. There were five combat towers in total. The largest that is still visible has a height 20m and width 4.6m, the thickness of the walls is one meter. Now there are three towers left. If we refer to some descriptions of the village of Kakhib, then some buildings had five floors. By the way, the architecture here is typical for Dagestan, i.e. the roof of one house is also the courtyard of the house located above. And yet, the village used to be called Bakdab.
Kahib is mentioned in many ancient sources, such as Arabic, Iranian, etc. at a time when Dagestan was part of their political and economic interests.
The population of Kakhib always took an active part in the events that took place on the territory of Dagestan. And during the invasion of Nadir Shah, and together with Imam Shamil, and during the revolutionary years, and during the Great Patriotic War, the Kakhib people showed their courage, bravery and loyalty.
Approximately at 1980 it reached the village electricity! At the same time, a normal road appeared. This is why the residents, apparently, left to live in other places to the benefits of civilization.
Residents of villages Mokoda, Upper And Lower Kolob, Horoda, Kiinich, Hamakal are natives of the village of Kakhib. Some went further to the big cities of Dagestan. And someone almost stayed. Near the old Kakhib, going down a steep slope onto a plateau near the river there is New Kakhib.
Every day, the residents of Kakhib, leaving their houses, look at. I don't know, it's probably hard. It’s one thing when it’s exotic and you come here for a few hours. There is little connecting you with these walls. And it’s completely different when everything, even every stone, is yours.
Don't sit at home, stay positive and travel!
Village Council Kakhibsky formed by the Decree of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee dated 20.01.192I as part of the Tilitl - Gidatlinsky section of the Gunibsky district, as the Kakhibsky village council. Since I926, the municipality has been called “Kakhibsky village council” since 2005.
Kakhib is one of the oldest villages in Dagestan. Old Kakhib-Bakdab and its battle towers were built in the 8th-10th centuries. The areas of the village of Bakdab were inhabited back in the Stone and Bronze Ages. Doctor of Historical Sciences O. M. Daudov, having studied archaeological finds found in the vicinity of the village of Bakdab, claims that they date back to the 7th-4th centuries BC. Scientist V. G. Kotovich tomb with. Upper Kolob dates back to the U-UN centuries AD.
The four-volume “History of Dagestan” reports that “the entire territory of the region was developed back in the 2nd millennium BC.” The author of the book “Ancient and New Kakhib,” Candidate of Sciences G. G. Aripov, claims that the village of Bakdab was included in the scientific works of not only Dagestan scientists, but also many foreign authors.
The village is built on the ridge of a rocky massif, inaccessible to enemy raids. There were five battle towers. The large tower has a height of 20 m, a width of 4.6 m, and a wall thickness of 1 meter. A large mosque was built next to the tower; it was located on the fifth floor of a large building.
Kakhib is the common name for three villages and many hamlets.
The word "Kakhib" is derived from the Georgian word "Kakhi", which means poor mountainous area. In I764, the “Kakhib Canton” was formed. By the 11th century, Kakhib was one of thirteen large villages, such as Khunzakh, Kumukh, Akhty, Urada, which were the main centers of trade and economic activity. In Kakhib, the production of edged weapons, jewelry, rugs, fur coats, shoes, wood and stone carving, and sheepskin production was developed. The development of the village was facilitated by the fact that it was located “On the Great Road of Nations” from Samur to Vedeno. In August I886, there were 370 households in Kakhib, I6I0 inhabitants, 778 men, 832 women.
Kakhib is called the village of Alimov. Shuaib-afandi in his nazmu glorifies and names two Kakhibs: Umaydi and Salman. Turkish archival sources report about Alim Tiduri ibn Ilbuzar (Kakhib). I886, Arabists named the names of I3 Kakhibs, including Hasan Hilmi and Habibula Hadji. The inhabitants of Kakhib adopted Islam in I460, when Udurat Haji Machadinsky returned from Arabia to Gidatl. Kakhib is the birthplace of three sheikhs: Hassan Hilmi Afandi, Habibul Haji, Muhammadarifa-Afandi. A memorial was opened in Kakhib - a ziyarat of the three named sheikhs. The traditions of the Kakhib Ustaz are continued by Muhammadamin-Haji.
Residents of Kakhib always took an active part in major events that took place in Dagestan and during the invasion of Nadir Shah, then during the struggle of the four imams against tsarism. In the village of Gimry, along with Imam Gazimagomed, according to Gaidarbek Ginichutlinsky, there was also an alim from Kakhib. The second imam Gamzat-bek sent Akhberdilov Magomed from Khunzakh to Kakhib when a quarrel arose over land. Many Kakhibs served in the troops of Gamzat-bek. 45-50 residents of the village of Kakhib constantly served in the troops of Imam Shamil, of whom was a well-aimed shooter with a flint weapon - Pahuta. He earned the imam's award for his accurate shooting. Shamil's leader was also a resident of the village. Kahib Kasa Ramadan. In I9I8, many Kakhibs, at the call of Nazhmudin Gotsinsky, gathered for a campaign against Temir Khan Shura. But Hasan Afandi and Habibula Haji, on the advice of Saifullah-Qadi, their teacher, persuaded them to return home. Hasan Afandi and Habibula Haji opposed the civil war in Dagestan. Kakhib was awarded a diploma from the All-Russian Central Executive Committee.
In I923, on November 20, a congress of Alimov of Dagestan opened in Kakhib. Sheikh Habibula Haji was elected chairman. 76 delegates took part in the congress. The delegates condemned the war started by Nazhmudin Gotsinski.
On November 22, I928, the Kakhib region was formed. It included 47 settlements with 17952 inhabitants. The collective farm was formed in I93I. The number of livestock reached eight thousand.
During the Great Patriotic War, 345 Kakhib residents defended their homeland. Of these, 164 died. A beautiful monument was built in Kakhib to those who died at the front. Hundreds of Kakhibs took part in events in Afghanistan, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Cuba.
The first school in Kahiba was opened in I924. It was attended by 29 students. In I940, a seven-year school was opened, then it was transformed into a secondary school. From I948 to I995. 1778 students graduated from the school. Magomedov Arip, Rasulova Zagrat, Zainulabidov Gazimagomed, Hasanbegov Gitinomagomed, Aripov Gadzhi, Dibirov Magomed, Rasulova Patimat - Doctor of Sciences became candidates of various sciences. The writers were Aripov Gadzhi and Rasulov Arip. Ramazanov Khalil and Asadulaev Saipudin became colonels. The title “Honored Teacher of the Republic of Dagestan” was given to Omarova Khadizhat, Gitikhmadibirov Khaibula, Sheikhmagomedova Saidat, Sharipov Abdurazak, Abdulaev Nabi. The title “Honored Doctor of the Republic of Dagestan” was given to Magomedov Gadzhi and Magomedov Arip. The title “Honored Worker of the Municipal Service of the Republic of Dagestan” was received by Khadizhat N. Magomedaminova.
Ancient Bakdab villages and farmsteads have been abandoned. All residents moved to New Kakhib, Leninkent, Makhachkala, Kaspiysk, Buinaksk. The resettlement affected about 1700 people. Wherever the Kakhibs live, they always remember their father’s village.
Residents of the villages of Verkhniy, Nizhny Kolob, Mokoda, Khoroda, Hamakal and Kiinikh come from the village of Kakhib. To make life easier, given that the place where these villages are located is more favorable for raising livestock, farming, etc., people began to move and occupy the territory, creating farmsteads. Tukhum Andalal at one time were the largest in Kakhib, but the men of this tukhum were very selfish and cruel towards the people of other villages and the tukhums of their own village. They appropriated large and small livestock for themselves, and collected taxes from pastures not only in Kakhib, but also in nearby villages. One day the Golotli people from the Khunzakh Khanate decided to take revenge on this tukhum. They all gathered and set up an ambush. When they came to collect the tax, the Glotlinians destroyed almost the entire detachment at Andalal, and the remaining men remaining in the village of Kakhib were destroyed in the village itself. Old people, women and children were moved from Kakhib to another place. From them the village of Nizhny Kolob was formed. This was the fate of one of the tukhums of the village of Kakhib.
Thus, the above mentioned villages were formed. The administration is located in the village. Kakhib, the language is the same, the collective farm is the same, family ties are preserved. When collectivization was going on in the country in the 30s, a collective farm named after was also created in our village. Red Army, which took 1st place in the region.
The people are hardworking, they also worked well on the sheltered farm in the Babayurt zone, which brought great profit to the collective farm.
During the Great Patriotic War, 68 people from the village fought on the fronts, many of them remained on the battlefield, and none of those who returned survived. Like the whole country, Kolobtsy also stood up to defend the Great Motherland. A monument was built in the village to the war participants.
HIasankhIilmi-apandi and MukhIamadgIarif-apandi (k.s.) lived all. Horoda, in the same place (k.s.) KhIusenil mukhIamad-afandi from Urib handed over an izhaza from KhIasan KhIilmi (k.s.) to guide people along the line of Tariqat.
In I96I, most of the population of V/Kolobtsy (the general name of the village of V/Kolob) was resettled to the plane. They were allocated territory in the village of Leninkent. Having established more than 500 farms in this village, where Kolobtsev now lives, they live in modern living conditions. There are more than 130 farms in the mountains. The largest village is Khoroda, 60 households, and previously the largest village was a village. N/Kolob with more than 70 farms. Professor M. Zainulabidov, associate professor G. Zainulabidov, N. Magomedov, M. Dibirov, and KGB Colonel Asadulaev Saipudin left the village. Alimas AskhIabgIali, MukhIumasanil MukhIamad. One secondary school with a boarding school, 2 primary schools, a medical outpatient clinic, 2 rural and school libraries, a madrasah named after. Askhabali-dibira from the villages. N/Kolob.
In the 80s, a power line was installed in the village and a highway was built. People have conditions for better living.
Magomedov Magomednabi Magomedovich, head of the municipal organization "s/s Kakhibsky", education - secondary special
