Kabarda: From Historical Power to a Future Strategy in the Central Caucasus
In the previous articles of this series, we spoke at length about the Black Sea coast, the Kuban, the lands of the Shapsugs, and other Western Circassian communities. This is natural: it is with the Black Sea coast that the final decades of the Russo-Circassian War, the mass expulsion of Circassians, the loss of a vast portion of historical territory, and the geography of national memory that features so prominently in modern Circassian consciousness are connected. But looking at Circassia solely from the direction of the Black Sea risks overlooking nearly half of its history. The Circassian world had another major axis – the Central Caucasian one. Its core was Kabarda, which both pre-revolutionary sources and contemporary historiography frequently define as Eastern Circassia; this exact formula, “Kabarda (Eastern Circassia)”, is used, for instance, by the National Museum of the KBR.
Here, the routes of the steppe and the mountains converged, connecting the Western and Eastern Caucasus, the North Caucasus and Transcaucasia. Here lay Pyatigorye, the basins of the Malka, Baksan, Chegem, and Cherek rivers, the Terek-Sunzha corridor, and the northern approaches to the mountain passes across the Main Caucasian Ridge. Kabardian princes actively participated in the politics of Moscow, Crimea, the Ottoman Empire, Persia, the Nogai Horde, and the Georgian kingdoms, competing and forging alliances with neighboring Caucasian societies. Hence, historical Kabarda was not merely an area of compact settlement for one branch of the Adyghe people. Over several centuries, it stood as one of the prominent political systems of the North Caucasus.
Today, a very different administrative map remains of that geography. The main body of Kabarda Circassians resides in Kabardino-Balkaria, an Eastern Circassian population also lives in Karachay-Cherkessia, Pyatigorye forms part of the Stavropol Krai, Mozdok belongs to North Ossetia, and several regions once bound to the Kabardian political system have long acquired an entirely different ethnic and political trajectory. Yet the current administrative map must not completely supplant the historical one. For us, as Circassians, this matters not for the sake of drawing old borders as broadly as possible, but for understanding our own place in the Caucasus. If the western chapter of Circassian history explains much of the tragedy of the 19th century, Kabarda helps us comprehend something else: how Circassians were once embedded at the very heart of Central Caucasian politics – and why that standing was lost.
1. From Pyatigorye to the Terek: The Domain of Historical Kabarda
Historical Kabarda truly cannot be depicted like a modern republic delineated by border posts. Across different centuries, the area of actual Circassian settlement in Kabarda, the domains of individual princely houses, seasonal pasturelands, the territories of dependent communities, and a far wider zone of political influence did not coincide. Therefore, both the broadest and narrowest maps of Kabarda can simultaneously rest on authentic sources, simply capturing different dimensions of space. The most enduring core of Greater Kabarda consisted of the mountainous, foothill, and lowland terrains across the upper reaches of the Kuban, Kuma, Malka, Baksan, Chegem, and Cherek basins, along with adjacent rivers; Lesser Kabarda lay further to the east, across the Terek-Sunzha expanse. By the early 19th century, Johann Blaramberg delineated Greater Kabarda via the Podkumok, Malka, and Terek, while noting of Lesser Kabarda that “the Terek serves on the west,” with the Sunzha forming its eastern frontier.
Broadly speaking, from the south, the Kabardian plain-foothill domain bordered high-altitude societies and the Main Caucasian Ridge; to the north, it merged into the Ciscaucasian steppe, where borders shifted perpetually in response to relations with the Nogais, Crimea, and subsequently the Russian defensive line; to the east, the core of Lesser Kabarda reached the Terek and Sunzha, while political ties and tributary relationships extended further to societies across the Central and Northeastern Caucasus; to the west, Pyatigorye was of particular importance, while in earlier eras the zone of Kabardian settlement and influence reached much deeper toward the upper reaches of the Kuban, Laba, and Urup. Kabardian historiography even contains far wider reconstructions of the 16th and 17th centuries extending toward Caspian shores; however, here it is critically important not to confuse political influence with an enduring ethnic core, and even less so with a modern state boundary.
Pyatigorye is especially revealing in this regard. The Russian designation “Pyatigorsk Cherkasy”, widely applied to Eastern Adyghes throughout the 16th and 17th centuries, serves as a reminder of how distinct the map of today’s Caucasian Mineral Waters region looked several hundred years ago. The areas of the Podkumok, Kuma, and Mount Beshtau (Iuashkhitkhu) were linked to Kabardian communities through seasonal pastures, settlements, transit roads, and shared political interests. For a modern observer, Nalchik and Pyatigorsk are divided across different federal subjects; for a person of the early modern era, no such border existed. The history of Mozdok tells a similar story: what today seems like an innate part of North Ossetia was, in the 18th century, at the very vortex of a fierce dispute over Kabardian lands and Russian imperial advance.
A distinct matter is the Darial Gorge. Kabarda commanded substantial leverage over the northern access routes to Central Caucasian communications and over a portion of the societies through whose territories the roads into Georgia passed. Whoever held sway over the lowland approaches to the Terek, Pyatigorye, and the passes across the ridge inevitably became a key contender in the struggle for communications between the North Caucasus and Georgia. It was precisely this factor that later rendered the Central Caucasus of paramount strategic value to Russia.
2. Why the Caucasus Reckoned with Kabarda
The historical might of Kabarda is sometimes attributed almost entirely to the martial prowess of its Circassian warriors, yet this is far too narrow an explanation. Military culture held tremendous importance, but it functioned as part of a much larger system: fertile plains and foothills, vast pastures, renowned horse breeding, agriculture, trading thoroughfares, a population sizable by Caucasian standards of the era, a sophisticated aristocratic hierarchy, and the capacity of princely lineages to engage in relations with substantially larger states. Grigol Orbeliani, a Georgian prince and later a prominent statesman of the Russian Empire, observed a defining feature of this system during his journey through the Caucasus in 1831: “In Kabarda, power was attained by a prince who distinguished himself through bravery in war and hospitality at home.” Around such a prince gathered the uzdens, who formed his military and political backbone.
In Kabardian historical memory, the origin of this princely system is traced back to Inal, a 15th-century figure around whom an extensive body of genealogical and political lore coalesced over time. By the 16th to 18th centuries, we encounter a much more thoroughly documented world of princely houses and rival domains. In the 18th and early 19th centuries, sources document six major princely houses associated with the Atazhukin, Misostov, Bekmurzin, Kaytukin, Talustanov, and Djilakhstanov lineages. None of these houses constituted a monarchy in the European sense: princes relied on uork nobles, dependent strata, personal alliances, and their own prestige, with collective decisions often requiring delicate negotiations among several ruling factions.
One of the most notable figures of the 16th century was Temryuk Idarov. Under his rule, the alliance with the Tsardom of Moscow took on a systematic character: in 1557, a Kabardian embassy sought Moscow’s military support against Temryuk’s internal rivals and external pressures, and in 1561, this political bond was cemented by the marriage of his daughter Kucheney – baptized as Maria Temryukovna – to Ivan IV. It is vital to understand the true substance of this episode without the distortions of later myths about “eternal unification” or, conversely, about an inexplicable blunder by our ancestors. Temryuk utilized Moscow as an external ally within a complex multipolar arena, while Moscow harnessed its alliance with Temryuk to project its own interests into the Caucasus. It is also important to highlight that the military-political and ethno-cultural ties of Circassia (and Kabarda in particular) with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth represent one of the most vivid chapters of Caucasian-European interaction. For centuries, the aristocratic elites of these states found common ground based on a shared chivalric ethos, military culture, and collective resistance against expansionist empires.
Relations between Kabarda and Istanbul developed alongside the active participation of the Circassian nobility within the highest tiers of Ottoman military and administrative leadership. The illustrious commander Circassian Osman Pasha (Ozdemir-oglu) served as Grand Vizier and Kapudan Pasha, while the Kabardian prince Iskender Bey governed the Beylerbeylik of Caffa. This was realpolitik, and Kabardian princes pursued it with notable pragmatism for their time.
Kabarda was also capable of independently inflicting decisive defeats on major foreign powers. The most famous example is the Battle of Kanzhal in 1708, linked to Supreme Prince Kurgoko Atazhukin and the advisor, diplomat, and philosopher Zhabagi Kazanoko, when Kabardian Circassians routed an invading army of the Crimean Khanate. While figures regarding the forces involved vary across sources – warranting caution with the most sensational numbers – the reality of a major Crimean defeat and its profound geopolitical weight remain indisputable. Three decades later, Kabarda’s strategic weight in the Russo-Ottoman balance was so pivotal that the Treaty of Belgrade in 1739 explicitly stipulated that the Kabardian people “shall remain free and not be under the dominion of either empire.” Kabarda was designated to serve as an independent buffer between the two empires.
How large was its population? Here, caution is essential. Reliable censuses for the 15th and 16th centuries simply do not exist. For the first half of the 17th century, Zh. V. Kagazhezhev proposed a demographic estimate of approximately 462,000 people, calculated from the number of recorded “kabaks” – settlements or estates – and an assumed average size for each; the methodology itself indicates why this figure should be regarded as a modeled estimate rather than an exact census. Evliya Celebi simultaneously spoke of tens of thousands of armed men across various parts of Kabarda, but his figures cannot be read as modern mobilization statistics. For the 18th century, discrepancies among historians remain vast: V. K. Gardanov estimated the population in the first half of the century at roughly 130,000–160,000, while E. D. Naloeva suggested 250,000–300,000; for the late 18th century, estimates range from 110,000–135,000 by Z. A. Kozhev to 300,000–350,000 by T. Kh. Kumykov. In other words, while precise figures elude us, the scale was completely incomparable to the diminished demographic footprint of Kabarda left in the wake of early 19th-century wars and epidemics.
Regarding military potential, the picture is clearer. Eighteenth-century records typically credit Greater Kabarda with fielding about 5,000 to 6,000 professional mounted warriors, and Lesser Kabarda with several thousand; when mobilizing infantry from the broader population, total muster strength could rise considerably. In 1732, Prince Magomet Atazhukin cited about 5,000 horsemen for Greater Kabarda, while a 1739 document recorded 6,000 cavalry from Greater Kabarda and approximately 3,000 from Lesser Kabarda. During the Russo-Turkish War of 1787–1791, Greater Kabarda’s field army under Supreme Prince (pshishkho) Misost Atazhukin was once again estimated at around 5,000 cavalry. For the Caucasus of that era, this was a formidable force, especially given the superior training and equestrian excellence of the cavalry, coupled with rapid mobilization capabilities. In the 17th and 18th centuries, Kabarda’s aristocratic cavalry was recognized as the undisputed benchmark of equestrian military art in the Caucasus. Unlike most neighboring societies, the Kabardian army was not an impromptu militia, but a professional corporation of feudal knights – princes (pshy) and nobles (uork) who formed the so-called noble army (uorkydze).
The subsequent demographic trajectory tells the tragic story of decline. By the 1830s, following relentless warfare, devastating plague outbreaks, and forced migrations, barely 30,000 Circassians remained on Kabardian soil. The 1897 imperial census recorded Kabardian as the mother tongue of 62.9 percent of the population in the Nalchik Okrug – though the okrug itself naturally did not coincide with historical Kabarda. During the Soviet period, a significant demographic recovery occurred: within Kabardino-Balkaria, researchers record approximately 122,400 Kabardians in 1926, 363,500 in 1989, and roughly 529,000 according to the 2020 census. Beneath these dry figures lies an immense historical arc: from one of the largest political communities of the Central Caucasus – through near-catastrophic depopulation – to a revived people now situated within an entirely reshuffled political geography.
3. From the Founding of Mozdok to Yermolov’s Campaigns: The Fall of Old Kabarda
The downfall of Kabarda cannot be reduced to a single defeat, a single plague, or an isolated blunder by its princes. It was a sequential onslaught spanning several decades. To preserve historical nuance, we must steer clear of the oversimplified notion that “Russia was always Kabarda’s enemy.” In the 16th century, Moscow was a useful ally for a faction of Kabardian princes; during the war of 1735–1739, Greater Kabarda fought on the Russian side; and Russian contingents periodically aided certain Kabardian factions against rivals. Within Kabarda itself, pro-Russian, pro-Crimean, and autonomous factions coexisted, with alliances shifting over time. The 1739 Treaty of Belgrade was still grounded in the premise of Kabarda’s unique, autonomous status between two empires.
The turning point arrived in the second half of the 18th century, when Russian policy increasingly ceased to need Kabarda as an ally and instead sought its territory as a strategic springboard. In 1763, the fortress of Mozdok was founded on the Terek. For St. Petersburg, it was a pivotal bridgehead for southward expansion and logistical control; for a substantial portion of the Kabardian elite, it represented the construction of an alien fortress on their rightful land, around which new settlements mushroomed and subjects slipped from princely jurisdiction. Kabardians initially responded with diplomacy. In 1764, an embassy was dispatched to Catherine II demanding an end to Mozdok’s fortification; in correspondence, the princes insisted that until the issue was resolved, “no settlement must be permitted and no town erected.” St. Petersburg refused.
The next stage was even more severe. In the 1770s, the chain of isolated outposts transformed into a fortified cordon. Following the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774, Russia gained far greater operational latitude in the North Caucasus, and between 1777 and 1778 it began rapidly consolidating the Azov-Mozdok Defensive Line – Georgiyevsk, Aleksandrovsk, Stavropol, and other fortified posts were interlinked with garrisons, roads, and Cossack settlements. For the Circassians of Kabarda, the crisis went beyond the physical presence of soldiers. The new cordon radically altered the economic geography: it severed access to arable fields and steppe pastures across the Stavropol Plain – the primary economic foundation of Kabarda (Kurey gubghue, Setey) –, curtailed mobility, and established fixed garrisons where authority had formerly been mediated through diplomacy and local balance of power. The empire was methodically turning geography into military infrastructure.
The response was the Seven Months’ War of 1778–1779. Kabardian princes and nobility mounted a heroic attempt to assault the fortifications and halt the further expansion of the cordon, but Russian forces held overwhelming advantages in regular infantry, artillery, logistical supply, and endless troop reinforcements. The final phase of the war in the autumn of 1779 concluded with a crushing defeat for the Kabardian army on the Malka River; historical records highlight catastrophic casualties among the warrior nobility. The war was followed by indemnities, imposed oaths of allegiance, and a drastic curtailment of autonomy. It was a watershed moment: while Kabarda could still resist, the former balance of power was permanently shattered.
Yet resistance did not cease, nor did it follow a simple trajectory. In 1785, factions in both Greater and Lesser Kabarda backed the movement of Sheikh Mansur, who sought to forge a broader anti-Russian coalition across the North Caucasian peoples. The fundamental problem was that strategic space was rapidly vanishing: the Crimean Khanate was extinguished as an independent entity, the Ottoman Empire was in retreat, and Russia was already operating directly within the Central Caucasian theater.
Another major uprising erupted in 1804. The armed insurrection of the Kabardians was brutally quelled by the forces of General Grigory Glasenapp after bitter combat along the Chegem and neighboring sectors. What followed was a disaster against which no cavalry could prevail: a devastating plague epidemic, particularly lethal during the first decade of the 19th century. Warfare had already dismantled agricultural production, migration routes, and village networks; the epidemic struck a starved, exhausted population. Contemporaries were stunned by the scale of devastation. Grigol Orbeliani would later describe Kabarda as a once “mighty and populous nation” brought low by chronic war and the scourge of pestilence.
In 1810 came another crushing military blow – the expedition of General Sergey Bulgakov. Published records reveal that Russian forces razed an immense number of Kabardian settlements; P. A. Kuzminov, citing archival sources, records the destruction of more than two hundred villages in Greater Kabarda alone. While the full human toll of such punitive expeditions will never be fully quantified, the structural consequence is what matters most: it was not merely armed detachments that were eradicated. Homes, grain stores, livestock, and the very mechanisms of social reproduction were methodically obliterated. Concurrently, a segment of Kabarda’s population withdrew beyond the Kuban or among neighboring highlanders, forming what came to be known as Hajret, or Fugitive, Kabarda, which continued armed resistance for decades from within Western Circassian lands.
The final major chapter unfolded between 1818 and 1822, indelibly tied to General Alexey Yermolov. Russian strategy no longer confined itself to punitive raids, aiming instead for the permanent restructuring of space: erecting new fortresses, advancing defensive cordons, suppressing mobility, imposing imperial courts and administrative organs, and exerting brutal pressure on unyielding princes. In May 1822, Yermolov arrived in person to oversee the troops in Kabarda; military operations were immediately accompanied by the establishment of the Kabardian Provisional Court and the rollout of an imperial administrative-legal regime. By the early 1820s, old Kabarda as an autonomous regional political power was thoroughly dismantled, even as armed resistance by individual Kabardian units persisted across the Kuban and later merged into broader Caucasian struggles.
It is crucial to correctly position Kabarda on the timeline of the Russo-Caucasian War. Mention of the war often evokes images of Imam Shamil, the Caucasian Imamate of the 1830s–1850s, or the final stands in Western Circassia during the 1860s. For Kabarda, the core crucible of struggle began far earlier. Mozdok was founded in 1763, the catastrophic turning point of 1779 occurred before Shamil was even born, and by the peak of the North Caucasian Imamate, Kabarda had already absorbed the heaviest military and demographic blows. For this reason, in the Circassian historiographical tradition, 1763 is frequently marked as the inception of the Russo-Circassian confrontation, even though broader Russian historiography applies differing periodizations to the Russo-Caucasian War. In either case, the historical lesson is unmistakable: Kabarda was an early battleground in a multi-decade onslaught that eventually swept across the entire North Caucasus.
Could Kabarda have avoided defeat? Completely – hardly. The disparity in resources between Kabarda and a massive, centralized empire grew far too insurmountable over time.
4. The Crucial Loss – Not Land, but Connectivity
Territorial dispossession is often understood in purely literal terms: a people lived on certain land, and subsequently lost part of that land. For Kabarda, this framework falls short. What was destroyed or radically disfigured was the very mechanism that bound different facets of space together: transit corridors, seasonal pastures, political allegiances, princely alliances, trade routes, and the freedom to move unhindered between the lowlands, the foothills, and neighboring highland communities. Orbeliani, who witnessed Kabarda after its subjugation, remarked: “Formerly they were rich in horse herds” – by his era, decades of conflict had thoroughly undermined that economic foundation as well.
By connectivity, we refer not simply to adjacent geographic lines on a map, but to robust human, economic, cultural, informational, and civic ties. When people travel freely, exchange knowledge, build commerce, sustain familial and professional networks, know the heritage of adjoining areas, and perceive them as parts of a shared home, a nation grows resilient and strong. When these sinews are severed, even neighboring communities gradually turn into isolated enclaves.
Subsequently, fragmentation became institutionalized. Pyatigorye embarked on its own trajectory, Mozdok on another, Lesser Kabarda was absorbed into disparate administrative boundaries, and during the Soviet era, the national-territorial system finalized an entirely reshaped map of the Central Caucasus. Several generations later, administrative borders transformed into psychological barriers. Nalchik came to be seen as separate from Cherkessk, Cherkessk from Pyatigorye, Pyatigorye from Kabarda, and Mozdok solely as a piece of Ossetian and Russian heritage. Thus arose not only territorial, but profound cognitive fragmentation.
This is precisely why we do not frame the question of Kabarda’s legacy as “which territories must be reclaimed.” A far more pressing question is: how do we restore connectivity? A historical map must not become a cadastral blueprint for territorial demands, yet today’s administrative boundaries have no right to dictate what we are allowed to remember. Pyatigorye can simultaneously be a modern Russian multiethnic district and a living component of Kabarda’s historical memory. Mozdok can belong to the history of North Ossetia while remaining a foundational epicenter of the 18th-century Russo-Kabardian confrontation. One reality does not negate the other. Reclaiming this historical knowledge is entirely feasible today, without waiting for political shifts or redrawn borders.
5. Nalchik and Cherkessk: Two Halves of a Single Whole
On the contemporary map, the primary demographic and institutional stronghold of Eastern Circassians is Kabardino-Balkaria. Yet the Circassians of the KBR and the Circassians of the KChR are not separated by any ethnic gulf: they are integral branches of the Eastern Adyghe continuum, sharing a unified Circassian language that holds official state status in both republics. The artificiality of rigid divisions is particularly well demonstrated by the history of the Besleney. Julius Klaproth observed in the early 19th century: “The Besleneys and Circassians belong to the very same tribe,” emphasizing the kinship between their princely houses and those of Kabarda.
However, the political balance within the two republics differs profoundly. In the KBR, Circassians form the majority of the population; in the KChR, Circassians are a minority, where the largest ethnic group is the Karachays, alongside sizable Russian, Abazin, and Nogai communities. According to the 2020 census, Karachays accounted for roughly 44 percent of the KChR’s population, whereas Circassians made up about one-eighth. Consequently, duplicating the political paradigm of the KBR in Karachay-Cherkessia is impossible. There, any viable Circassian initiative requires not only grassroots mobilization, but coalitional acumen, negotiation, and the ability to demonstrate persuasively to neighboring peoples that strengthening Circassian culture and civic life does not come at their expense.
The KChR must therefore never be viewed as a mere satellite to the “primary” Circassian republic. It represents the second vital pillar of Eastern Adyghe presence in the Central Caucasus – demographically smaller, but strategically indispensable. If the Circassians of the KChR remain isolated from the larger Circassian cultural milieu of the KBR, administrative boundaries will inevitably solidify into civilizational divides. If, conversely, a vibrant intellectual, cultural, educational, and economic exchange bridges Nalchik, Cherkessk, and the Circassian villages, the two republics may remain politically distinct while ceasing to be separate worlds. In our view, this constitutes the most natural first step toward revitalizing Central Caucasian Circassian connectivity.
6. Unification Begins Beyond the Map
From shared ancestry, it is easy to leap to the notion of an administrative merger between the KBR and the KChR. Such an idea possesses an intuitive appeal: a broader territory, two urban centers, an expanded economic base, and the restoration of Eastern Adyghe ties. Yet between historical nostalgia and modern political viability lies an enormous gulf.
The KChR does not exist solely for Circassians. For the Karachay people, it serves as the cornerstone of their own national subjectivity; the Abazins, Nogais, and Russians harbor their own legitimate interests and historical apprehensions. While Circassians may view unification as an obvious historical blessing, our neighbors could easily interpret the very same initiative as a destabilization of the demographic and political balance at their expense. Simply telling them they have “nothing to fear” is futile. The concerns of other peoples are as tangible a political reality as our own.
Hence, it is far more constructive to reframe the debate. The question is not “when will we merge the KBR and the KChR?”, but rather: can we first cultivate an environment where the administrative border ceases to disrupt Circassian civic life? The history of Kabarda itself provides precedents where rival princely coalitions pledged “not to undertake any action without the other.” We need not mimic 18th-century feudal mechanisms, but the underlying principle remains clear: horizontal ties generate political resilience long before institutional changes become possible.
At present, a formal administrative merger between the two republics is not a realistic endeavor, but this by no means implies that fostering a closer Eastern Adyghe space should be relegated to an indefinite future. On the contrary, should the political architecture of the North Caucasus shift substantially, the decisive factor will not be antiquated maps drawn by enthusiasts, but the living relationships sustained among citizens, civic institutions, cities, and leaders. Historical windows of opportunity open abruptly. They are seized by those who enter times of change already connected, organized, and capable of dialogue.
7. Circassian Strategy and the Interests of Neighboring Peoples
The history of the Central Caucasus leaves no room for any serious strategy that ignores neighboring peoples with their own memories, rights, and political agency. The Circassians of the KBR, Balkars, Karachays, Circassians of the KChR, Abazins, Nogais, Ossetians, Ingush, and Russians have coexisted for centuries in constant interaction: alliances gave way to disputes, tributary ties to liberation, and eras of ascendancy of one community to the resurgence of another. Orbeliani, reflecting the perspectives of his day regarding old Kabarda, noted the tributary ties of certain Ossetian, Ingush, Abazin, and Besleney communities to Kabardian princes. Such historical testimonies must be acknowledged, but converting 18th-century hierarchies into 21st-century political demands would be just as disastrous as scrubbing them from history entirely.
Therefore, our relationship with the Karachay and Balkar peoples is a paramount indicator of the maturity of modern Circassian politics. We can fully honor the historical scale of Kabarda while unreservedly recognizing the rights, heritage, and aspirations of Balkars and Karachays. Similarly, acknowledging contemporary Karachay or Balkar agency does not obligate Circassians to renounce Kabarda, Pyatigorye, or the Circassian heritage of territories across present-day KChR.
In our view, the cornerstone must be mutual recognition of historical realities and the pursuit of mutual interests where the advancement of one nation does not undermine another. For the Central Caucasus, where all communities are bound by geography, shared markets, and common political realities, this approach is not a sign of weakness, but an absolute prerequisite for enduring stability.
8. Constitutional Amendments in the KBR: Why Weakened Subjectivity Affects Both Circassians and Balkars
Against this backdrop, the recent debate surrounding the Constitution of Kabardino-Balkaria acquires particular urgency. In June 2026, the republican parliament reviewed a prosecutor’s protest regarding several constitutional provisions and established a working group to draft revisions. Among the contested clauses were provisions concerning territorial integrity, the statehood of the republic, and the official status of its head. Notably, the text currently accessible on the official legal portal still affirms: “The integrity and inviolability of the territory of the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic are guaranteed.”
One might perceive this development strictly as a technical harmonization of regional legislation with federal statutes. Legally, that is how the matter is formally framed. Yet political institutions do not consist solely of enforceable legal competencies; they enshrine a society’s self-conception. An ethnic republic is not a standard municipal district that arbitrarily received a constitution. The KBR was established as an institutional embodiment of the national statehood of both the Circassian and Balkar peoples within a larger federation.
We previously addressed this issue in a dedicated analysis by the Center for Strategic Studies of the civic organization “Khabze”, examining the consequences of revising these constitutional clauses and expressing grave concern over the continuing erosion of republican subjectivity. For us, this is no abstract legal technicality, but a question of the resilience of the institutional frameworks that sustain both Circassian and Balkar national agency.
Here lies a critical convergence of interests. Diminishing republican subjectivity undermines the institutional standing of more than just Circassians. Balkar political agency operates within the exact same institutional framework. Therefore, we believe it is far wiser to approach the defense of the KBR’s powers and unique status not as an effort where “Circassians defend Kabarda against all others,” but as a collective imperative uniting both titular nations and all residents of the republic. It is precisely the ability to articulate problems in this inclusive manner that distinguishes genuine statecraft from knee-jerk ethnic agitation.
9. What Kabarda’s Past Teaches About Our Future
Historical Kabarda has left us no ready-made political blueprint. Any attempt to superimpose an 18th-century feudal hierarchy onto modern society would be sheer absurdity. Instead, it has bequeathed something far more valuable – fundamental questions that compel us to view our current position with fresh clarity.
The first question concerns geography. We too easily restrict our thinking to the borders of the KBR, as if the story of Kabardian Circassians unfolded solely within the contour of the modern republic. Yet Kabarda itself is a testament that the Central Caucasus is an integrated system of interconnected zones. Nalchik cannot be fully comprehended without Pyatigorye and the northward corridors; Pyatigorye makes no sense without the history of Kabarda; Mozdok cannot be separated from the battle for the Terek; the KBR cannot be decoupled from the KChR; and the Central Caucasus cannot be viewed apart from the trans-Caucasian mountain passes.
The second question is connectivity. The strength of historical Kabarda lay not merely in its vast landmass. It unified disparate domains: the steppe with the mountains, the west with the east, and local societies with foreign empires. Here lies a very contemporary lesson. In the 21st century, influence does not hinge strictly on administrative borders. A region may lie outside your republic while remaining an integral part of your historical consciousness, scholarly inquiry, economic networks, and cultural presence. We do not need to alter the borders of Stavropol Krai to erase the blank spots Pyatigorye occupies in Circassian consciousness.
The third question is scale. The future of Circassians cannot be reduced solely to the KBR, nor does it make sense to approach every practical challenge on a global diaspora scale. There is also the Central Caucasus – the shared space where Circassians live alongside neighboring peoples, encompassing the KBR, the KChR, Pyatigorye (Stavropol Krai), and adjacent lands, where the bulk of our day-to-day and strategic interests are decided. We will return in depth to the overarching strategic posture of Circassians in the Caucasus – the advantages and vulnerabilities of our geography, ties with neighboring peoples, our position between the western and central zones, and potential roles for the Circassian factor – in the next article of this series. For now, it suffices to emphasize: historical Kabarda brings this regional dimension into sharp focus.
10. What Reclaiming Connectivity Means in Practice
Setting aside generic appeals concerning language, youth, enterprise, the diaspora, and folklore – themes thoroughly discussed in previous articles of this series –, several tangible objectives emerge directly from the Circassian and Central Caucasian reality.
First – reconstruct our historical geography as an analytical database rather than a nostalgic poster. As early as 1744, Russian geodesist Stepan Chichagov compiled the “Register of Villages and Notable Places in Greater and Lesser Kabarda.” Today, technology enables vastly more: a digital historical atlas featuring layered cartography spanning the 15th through 19th centuries, documenting settlements, princely domains, toponyms, pasturelands, roadways, fortresses, battlegrounds, migration trajectories, and shifting demographics. Crucially, every contested sector should be clearly annotated: what is verified fact, what is academic reconstruction, and where competing interpretations exist. Such a resource would command respect because it could withstand rigorous scrutiny by professional historians.
Second – analyze the Nalchik – Cherkessk corridor as an integrated regional system. Rather than organizing another superficial festival of unity, we need an empirical audit of existing ties: which institutions collaborate; where universities and intellectual circles intersect; where bureaucratic hurdles persist; which families, entrepreneurs, and civic networks already span both territories; where institutional redundancies exist; and where Circassians in the KChR lack adequate access to the broader cultural and educational infrastructure of Kabarda. In short, we must assess real connectivity before strengthening vulnerable links.
Third – reframe Pyatigorye, Stavropol Krai, and Mozdok as landscapes of multilayered memory. We must ensure that the Circassian imprint can never be excised from their history. Scholarly monographs, heritage trails, documentary films, archival initiatives, the reintroduction of historical toponyms into academic discourse, village mapping projects, and studies of the Mozdok Line – all of these restore our people’s presence in regional memory without antagonism toward current inhabitants. This is an objective that can be actively pursued right now.
Fourth – and especially urgent today: transform the question of the KBR’s republican subjectivity into a shared Kabardino-Balkar priority. If any defense of republican status is framed exclusively by Circassian activists, its political foundation will remain fragile. If, however, we demonstrate that maintaining robust republican institutions safeguards the vital interests of both titular peoples, an infinitely stronger coalition emerges. This is precisely where Kabarda’s history serves not as an inventory of grievances, but as a masterclass in coalitional diplomacy.
11. The Ultimate Lesson of Kabarda
Historical Kabarda matters to us not out of an urge to resurrect the 18th century. Nor because drawing broader perimeters on historical maps will somehow empower the Circassian nation today. Its significance runs far deeper. Kabarda proves that Circassians were once no passive Caucasian fringe caught between rival imperial giants, but a primary actor in regional geopolitics: empires courted their alliance, adversaries mobilized massive armies against them, their stance was weighed in Moscow, Warsaw, Tehran, Bakhchysarai, and Istanbul, and neighboring societies shaped their strategies around Kabardian power. There is no need to exaggerate this legacy; we need only refuse to forget it.
Yet Kabarda’s history also bears a sober warning. A martial reputation could not shield it from a systemic, industrial adversary. Valor could not offset crushing demographic losses. Fractured princely houses failed to forge a unified state. The strategy of maneuvering among great powers worked only as long as multiple powers balanced one another and none held unchecked dominance over the Central Caucasus. Once Russia acquired the capacity to systematically transform outposts into fortified lines, lines into roads, roads into settlements, and settlements into civil administrations, Kabarda’s feudal mechanisms were inevitably overwhelmed by imperial infrastructure. Then came war, plague, deportation, and administrative fragmentation.
And yet, Kabarda did not vanish. Following the demographic catastrophe of the 19th century, Kabarda’s Circassians rebuilt their numbers; having lost their feudal nobility, they preserved their tongue, their memory, and their name; after multiple border redistributions, Kabarda reemerged in the 20th century as an autonomous territory and subsequently as a republic. For our nation, that endurance is a profound achievement in itself.
The question today is therefore not: “How do we reclaim lost Kabarda?”
It is fundamentally different: how do we restore the connectivity of our people and our land without attempting to turn back the clock of history?
Historical Kabarda derived its strength from sitting at the crossroads of Caucasian communications and leveraging geography into political consequence. In this insight lies the most enduring lesson for us. The memory of Kabarda must not remain an echo of past glory and defeat. It can serve as the foundation for a broader perspective on our situation – an ability to see the Central Caucasus once again as an integrated space, and to recognize where our real opportunities lie.
The future of the Central Caucasian Circassians will depend not on how many ancient borders we can recite, but on how many severed ties we can heal – and how many new bridges we can build.
Adyghe lhepqyr pseusch!
Center for Strategic Studies of the Circassian Socio-Political Organization “Khabze”.