Talk:Chechen tower architecture

Page split from "Nakh peoples"

This article was created from two sections of the Nakh peoples article, since the details were getting off-topic for the latter. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 18:43, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Defensive Towers height

(This section was copied from Talk:Nakh peoples. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 18:43, 11 November 2009 (UTC))

I read that defensive towers were 30m high somewhere else to. But I'm not sure if that's true. Searching for evidences but I think they were maximum 20 or 25 meters high... Normally they had 5 or 6 floors+3 or 4meter height of first floor(in defensive reasons) level from terrain. it makes 6xFloor hight+4meters=30 that mean each floor was in best case 6 meters high.. thats impossible..(and not esthetic) So in my opinion someones wrote 30 in place 15 or 20 and other followed his/her mistake... By the way the towers I saw in real wer far lower than 10floors building --Nakh 09:54, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

25meters high were Combat towers. The dwelling towers were a little bit lower. "Presumably, it had three stories originally. Only two are extant, and the present-day height of the tower approaches 7 metres." Nakh 05:31, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

References

Nakh vs. Vainakh Architecture

At least, in my book, there's a difference between the two. The difference is whether the term refers to the Bats, and although the Bats are a tiny group that almost no one knows about, from a factual point of view, its a pretty big difference.

Vainakh refers to Chechens and Ingush (and Kists, who, ethnically, are semi-Georgianized Chechens) collectively. It is pretty much an equivalent to Czechoslovak- a word for two separate but very close people. It refers to the sense of kinship between Chechens and Ingush (it means, of course, "our people"). Vainakh thus includes Chechens, Ingush, and Kist (in an ethnic sense only though, as Kists do not identify as Chechens, despite speaking Chechen, they identify as Georgian Nakh). It does not include the Bats, who are culturally very different from Vainakh peoples (do not really have teips in the sense that Chechens and Ingush do; have always had Georgian/Tush laws rather than an adat; Christian; heavily Georgianized, etc.) and do not consider themselves Vainakh.

Nakh includes all peoples speaking Nakh languages- Chechens, Ingush, Kists and Bats. But there's only a couple thousand (at most) Bats and they are also obscure to the point that very few people know of their existence (indeed, they did not even have a separate census group once in all the history of Tsarist, Soviet and now Georgian censuses). Thus, people forget that the Bats exist. If you forget the Bats exist than Nakh seems to be almost equivalent to the Vainakh- both include the same set of people (Ingush, Chechens and Kists).

But we should refrain from using "Nakh" in such a way (in Wikipedia at least), because it is not correct. At least that's what I think. That's why I propose it should be renamed "Vainakh architecture"

But before I formalize this, I wanted to ask what the people actually editing the page (Nakh and others) thought of this. Any comments, suggestions, corrections, etc? Do you agree? --Yalens (talk) 18:05, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Well, after reading the article (somewhat), if there's influence from Urartian and Byzantine styles, I suppose one could say its an inherent Nakh thing. But still, I'm against overgeneralization. We could just put a note, at least if its too much to rename it, that Bats architecture is little known (and probably, I'm guessing, identical to Chagma-Tush architecture). Still, as a general rule, I oppose the use of Vainakh for the Bats (and this page clearly has little if anything to do with Bats/Tsova-Tush) because they lack Vainakh cultural traits (like the Vainakh clan system and the adat). --Yalens (talk) 18:32, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Check out this Tushetian village named Dartlo, I believe it's Nakh architecture

Dartlo

(I also found such a tower in the Tushetian village of Parsma) Machinarium (talk) 15:13, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Interestingly, I also found one in Khevsureti (search for Lebiskari). Machinarium (talk) 16:04, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Nakh Tower also found in Chontio, which was historically a Bats village. Machinarium (talk) 17:41, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Machinarium belated thanks for this! --Yalens (talk) 06:12, 9 July 2017 (UTC)

@Yalens Hello, colleague. The Russian and Chechen Wikipedias have long since corrected the error regarding the title of this article. The title is listed in accordance with the sources: 1, 2, and 3. Do you have any sources that mention a different title? If not, I suggest replacing the title with "Chechen Tower Architecture." Flandria12 (talk) 15:03, 11 September 2025 (UTC)

Good source I found, hope it helps

George Anchabadze's The Vainakhs... pages 25-27 have a lot on architecture.

Circassian World has it available online for now here as a pdf: http://www.circassianworld.com/pdf/The_Vainakhs_George_Anchabadze.pdf

The book is also a generally good resource for all things Vainakh, especially considering that sadly, Jaimoukha is no longer available to read online... :{. Hope you can find a good use for the info~. (I might add some myself) --Yalens (talk) 19:50, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Locking this article

Hello Drmies since you banned "Chechenthief" could you also lock this article for a couple of weeks? because lately this channel has been attacked by people who claim they are Ingush, their edits and even profile pages are anti-Chechen, especially this last one posted some ridiculous Mein Kampf-tier fan-fiction about Chechens. I do not believe these are actually Ingush since Chechens and Ingush have always had good relations. It is most likely some neo-Nazi group that is trying to sow disunity among us. So it would be wise to lock this article for a while imo. Also check the pageviews, last couple of days they have hundreds of views compared to the earlier dates. Someone is trying to attack this article. --Goddard2000 (talk) 21:16, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

Name

The article should be renamed, in the Russian, Turkish, Chechen and other Wikipedias the article is called Chechen. Takhirgeran Umar (talk) 21:22, 3 July 2023 (UTC)

Hi - I agree that this article should be renamed, but it should be merged with Ingush Towers. 60% of the content is the same. Easy to make it clear in the lead that most of the towers are in Chechen and Ingush territory.

I came here to suggest a merge, and then read your comment. What do you think? Billyshiverstick (talk) 04:54, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

@Takhirgeran Umar I absolutely agree with you, since the sources mention the Chechen tower architecture 1, 2, 3. As for the Ingush tower architecture, there is a separate article on this topic.

@Srnec Please take part in the discussion. Flandria12 (talk) 15:14, 11 September 2025 (UTC)

Yes, given that we have a separate article on Ingush towers, we could turn this into a Chechen towers article. But that is not how it is written now. And we could just as easily merge the Ingush article here and retain the name. What we should not do is try to cover all the towers in an article with a strictly Chechen title. Srnec (talk) 20:15, 11 September 2025 (UTC)

@Srnec You can add content from the article about Ingush towers here, deleting the article. But then the connection with other languages ​​in Wikidata will be lost. Therefore, I suggest changing the name to Chechen tower architecture, and removing information about Ingush towers from the article (adding them to the corresponding article). Flandria12 (talk) 10:10, 13 September 2025 (UTC)

I have reviewed your discussion and the articles concerning the Ingush tower. Given that, since 2023, the Ingush have decided to create their own separate page, I consider the continued existence of this article under the title Vainakh to be unjustified. It would be logical to rename this page, remove the information pertaining to the Ingush, and further revise and expand the remaining content. I am willing to take an active part in this process. Nakh 21:45, 9 January 2026 (UTC)

@Srnec At this stage, the page has been fully brought into compliance with the criteria you requested. I therefore ask that the page be renamed Traditional Chechen architecture. I plan to expand the article by adding material on other architectural elements, including bridges, watermills, irrigation and water-supply systems, as well as cultic and religious structures. For this reason, I believe that Traditional Chechen architecture is a more appropriate title than Chechen tower architecture, since a substantial portion of the content will not be related to towers. In addition, the phrase “tower architecture” sounds somewhat awkward in English. Nakh 22:44, 12 January 2026 (UTC)

@Nakh: I moved it to 'Chechen tower architecture' for now. As far as I can tell, the article is currently limited to towers. I do not necessarily endorse the Chechen/Ingush division of the topic. Srnec (talk) 23:04, 12 January 2026 (UTC)

@Srnec I fully agree with you. In the scholarly literature, these structures are consistently treated together under the broader framework of Nakh architecture and Nakh tower-building traditions.

However, given that the topic was administratively divided in 2023, and taking into account the risk of prolonged and unproductive move disputes, I considered it prudent for the time being to proceed within the existing framework. My intention was to stabilise the article first and bring it into full compliance with content and sourcing standards before proposing broader structural changes.

Unfortunately, articles related to Chechen history and culture—both on the English and Russian Wikipedias—have recently been subject to repeated challenges and reversions, which makes long-term structural discussions more difficult. At this stage, I am not certain what the most effective way to address this situation is, but I am trying to proceed cautiously and constructively.

I am fully open to any suggestions you may have and am willing to work in whatever direction you consider most appropriate.

With best regards, Nakh 08:15, 13 January 2026 (UTC)

Article Merge Request

Hi, could we please call this article "Nakh/Vainakh Architecture" or "Nakh/Vainakh Towers", explain who the Bats are in the lead, and then roll the Ingush Towers article into it as a section, with Chechen towers as another section. "Nakh Architecture redirects here" etc. The tower architecture is so close, and these areas are side by side. The different "balkanized" articles repeat each other over and over. (pun intended) All of these cultures made very similar towers at very similar times. I don't have the editing chops to propose this properly. Billyshiverstick (talk) 05:03, 27 February 2024 (UTC) #User:Drmies

• Billyshiverstick, I don't know why you pinged me--this is hardly my area, though I am tentatively planning a five-year trek to the Caucasus and Central Asia, with my Uncle Sandro of Chegem. Drmies (talk) 16:06, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Mistakes

Hi,
I would like to point out the following notes:
Notes 107 and 109 (Osmaev 2002)
Notes 4, 11, 13, and 18 (Jaimoukha 2005, p. 179)
Also, note 103 refers to note 101, but it's not well written. Sorry for not doing this, but I'm not very familiar with en.wiki templates. Thanks :) Cipintina (talk) 14:36, 18 March 2026 (UTC)