The Chechen people have always had enough heroes.
What Chechens really lack is a restored system of national memory.
And perhaps this is why a people who have experienced so many tragedies still remain torn in their understanding of their own history.
The Chechen people have never had a shortage of heroes.
Chechen history is replete with examples of resistance, self-sacrifice, dignity, and a willingness to defend their land even when the odds were against them.
Heroism has never been a deficiency for the Chechen people. What has proved to be a deficiency is the ability to preserve, collect, and pass on the memory of their experiences to future generations. Because a people’s heroism lives not only in moments of resistance. It also lives when a people is able to preserve the memory of its heroes, tragedies, and its own history.
There were heroes during the ancient invasions.
There were heroes during the era of destructive campaigns in the Caucasus.
There were heroes in the Caucasian War.
There were heroes during the deportation of 1944.
There were heroes in the First and Second Chechen Wars.
Heroes were among those who fled to the mountains, losing homes, families and entire villages.
Heroes were among those who died but did not agree to live without dignity.
The Chechens’ problem has never been a lack of heroism.
The problem is different.
The Chechens still have not developed a fully-fledged system of national memory.
Not isolated memories.
Not individual dates.
Not emotional outbursts after tragedies.
Namely, the system:
– archives,
– preservation of evidence,
– people’s historical base,
— transmission of memory to future generations,
— preservation of family histories,
– the general historical line of the people,
— recognised symbols of memory and unity.
Today, the main symbol of tragedy for Chechens remains the deportation of 1944.
And that’s fair.
But the tragedy of the Chechen people did not begin in 1944.
The history of pressure on the Caucasus and Chechen lands has been going on for centuries.
Long before the Caucasian War, the following passed through the Caucasus:
– Tatar-Mongol invasions,
– Temirlane’s campaigns,
– destructive wars between states and empires,
– punitive campaigns,
— the struggle for control over the plains and mountain passes.
During the Mongol invasions, the Caucasus suffered enormous destruction. Later, Temirlane’s campaigns again brought destruction to settlements and mass casualties.
Then came new eras of wars:
— confrontations of the 16th–17th centuries,
— the advance of the Russian Empire into the Caucasus,
— Caucasian War,
— destruction of villages,
– displacement of the population into mountainous areas,
– Soviet repressions,
– deportation,
— wars of the late 20th century.
Many Chechen lowland settlements were completely destroyed. People fled to the mountains not for the good life, but for survival.
In fact, the history of the Chechens is the history of a people who for centuries were forced not just to live, but to survive.
But the special tragedy of the Chechen people is that along with the people, the very memory of them was destroyed.
Many nations have preserved their history in state archives, libraries, universities, museums, family collections and written chronicles.
The Chechens saw a significant part of their own history destroyed along with wars, villages, and generations of people.
In many ways, the history of the Chechens today is preserved in the archives of those states and empires that themselves waged wars in the Caucasus.
This is one of the most difficult historical paradoxes.
People are often forced to learn their own history from the documents of their opponents.
We remember 1944, when, after the deportation, everything that remained in Chechen houses and villages was destroyed and burned.
We remember how, at the beginning of the First Chechen War, Chechen museums were among the first to be destroyed.
We remember the 1930s, when ancient weapons, daggers made by ancient masters, family heirlooms, and items passed down through generations were confiscated en masse from Chechens.
We also remember earlier eras, when, along with the destruction of villages, family manuscripts, family traditions, old towers, traces of generations, and the memory of the origins of families and villages disappeared.
When a nation lives for centuries on the brink of survival, between life and the archive, a person almost always chooses life.
This is natural.
While saving children, families, and the nation itself, people were not always able to save documents, relics, manuscripts, old records, and memorabilia.
Therefore, the Chechen people found themselves in a tragic situation: they managed to preserve themselves, but did not manage to preserve a significant part of their own historical memory.
It was not only the memory in documents that was subject to destruction.
The material memory of the Chechen people itself was under attack.
The Chechen towers, one of the main symbols of the historical existence of the people of the Caucasus, have been destroyed for centuries by wars, punitive expeditions, and deportations.
Some of the towers were destroyed during the Caucasian War. Many were destroyed during the Tsarist colonial era. Further destruction occurred during the Soviet era, especially after the deportation of 1944.
Even at the beginning of the 20th century, there were special military units engaged in the destruction of mountain tower complexes and fortifications.
New losses also occurred during the recent Chechen wars.
Many historical sites were destroyed during the fighting. Some ancient architectural structures were dismantled and used as material for military fortifications, checkpoints, fences, and defensive positions.
After the first war, when I travelled through the mountainous regions and photographed ancient tower complexes, many of the sites still bore traces of air and missile strikes.
My photographs captured the aftermath of the shelling:
– damaged towers,
– destroyed walls,
– craters around architectural complexes,
— traces of direct hits on ancient structures.
In many places, it was clear that the strikes were not only hitting the area around the tower complexes but also directly hitting the historical sites themselves.
Along with the towers, ancient symbols, stone signs, traces of old eras, elements of the people’s worldview and ancestral memory disappeared.
Some of these signs still survive. But a huge number were lost along with the destruction of the towers and villages.
In the summer of 1999, before the start of the second war, I had the chance to hike through the Chechen mountains and photograph ancient towers and old Chechen architecture. Back then, photography was still film, not digital.
The idea for this work came to me even before the war: to collect and preserve images of ancient Chechen architecture and, over time, publish a separate architectural album.
I shared this idea with Chechen historian Ruslan Arsanukaev.
He supported this work, and we agreed to prepare the future album jointly: I was engaged in photographing ancient architecture, and Ruslan was to prepare historical and scientific explanations for the photographs.
We went to the mountains together, examined tower complexes, and discussed the history and origin of various structures.
During this time, a huge amount of material was captured—dozens of films, which captured ancient towers, ruined complexes, old stone structures, petroglyphs, magical signs, and traces of ancient Chechen architecture.
I developed some of the photographs only to check the quality of the pictures.
It was these photographs that accidentally ended up outside of Chechnya – and therefore survived.
The main archive—about 40–50 rolls of film containing thousands of photographs—I left with relatives for safekeeping.
I then told them one phrase:
“These photographs contain more historical architecture than living people.”
I understood that war lay ahead. I understood that many towers and historical sites could be destroyed. Therefore, I asked that this archive be preserved at any cost.
But later, the purges began.
People lived in fear.
And the relatives, fearing searches and possible consequences, destroyed these films.
Thousands of photographs were simply flushed down the toilet.
Thus, another archive of Chechen memory disappeared.
From the entire archive, we managed to save just over a hundred photographs that accidentally ended up outside of Chechnya before the start of the second war.
It was especially acutely felt then: the Chechen towers are not just stone.
This is the memory of the people, transformed into architecture.
The image of the national cauldron, the Qoman Mukhar, associated with public gatherings and the symbolism of the unity of the Chechen people, has also been preserved in Chechen historical memory.
According to legend, this large cauldron was used during the Mekh-Khel meetings in the historical region of Nashkha, where representatives of the Chechen teips gathered to discuss common issues, reconcile conflicts, and make decisions that affected the entire nation.
The boiler itself was perceived as more than just a household item.
It symbolised:
– unity of types,
– the common destiny of the people,
– brotherhood,
– collective responsibility,
— the idea of a common Chechen home.
According to some historical information and surviving legends, the names of the Chechen tyips were engraved on the cauldron, and it was kept as a special national relic.
According to popular legend, the ancient cauldron was destroyed in the 19th century during the period of Imam Shamil.
How accurately all the details of these legends correspond to the full historical reconstruction is a question for further research.
But something else is important here.
The very fact that the memory of such a symbol is preserved shows that the Chechens had their own forms of popular unification, collective council, and shared responsibility long before modern political systems.
The tragedy also lies in the fact that, along with wars, evictions and the destruction of towers, not only people and architecture disappeared.
Symbols of national unity also disappeared.
Later, some of this work was still preserved.
In 2004, while the war was still ongoing, Ruslan Arsanukayev published a book in Paris about Chechen petroglyphs, ancient symbols, and the architectural heritage of Chechnya. The book was published in French and Russian.
As stated in the publication itself, the project was supported by the French Ministry of Culture, the Paris City Hall, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the organisation France Libertés.
This book uses dozens of rescued photographs, including my own photographs of ancient Chechen architecture, petroglyphs, and stone signs. I am separately acknowledged for these photographs in the publication.
In total, over a hundred photographs were rescued from the entire archive, having accidentally ended up outside of Chechnya before the start of the second war. These became part of the surviving visual memory of Chechnya’s ancient architecture and historical symbols.
On one of the pages of the book, there was a phrase left:
“And to all those who dare to draw under the bombs.”
This phrase very accurately conveys the atmosphere of that time.
While the war was still going on, when cities and villages were being destroyed, people still tried to take photographs, record, draw, collect materials and preserve the remnants of the people’s memory.
Because many people already understood back then: if memory disappears, the people will eventually begin to disappear along with it.
I understand well the cost of losing national memory, not only as a researcher or author.
I had to go through this myself.
During the First Chechen War, I ran an underground television station. After the war and at the beginning of the Second Chechen War, I continued to film footage, documenting events, people’s faces, and the atmosphere of the time.
Part of the archive had to be hidden in the occupied territory, burying the materials in the ground to prevent them from falling into the hands of Russian security forces.
Later, a difficult question arose.
The archive was located underground in occupied territory.
Over time, it became clear: there are only two options.
Either try to dig up the archive, understanding that this could attract attention and, if discovered, the materials could fall into the hands of federal agencies.
Or leave the archive in the ground, realising that over time, the magnetic films will demagnetise and the materials will become unusable.
It was a choice between possible danger to people and the gradual destruction of the archive itself.
And I chose to leave it in the ground.
In fact, I consciously understood that the archive would eventually perish. But at the time, I thought that was a lesser price to pay than the potential consequences for people who might suffer because of these materials.
These videos showed Chechen fighters, random people, residents, and the faces of those who could be identified years later.
And I understood that if the archive fell into the hands of Russian punitive structures, not only the participants in the war could suffer, but also innocent people who happened to be in the frame.
Then I had to make a difficult choice.
Between the archive and human lives.
And I chose human lives.
Later, I saw another tragic example of how an attempt to preserve such archives could end.
During the war, a close friend of mine spent many years filming videos and photographs dedicated to the tragedy, the resistance, and the heroes of Chechen independence.
It was a huge archive:
– footage of the war,
– destruction,
— human destinies,
– heroes of the Chechen resistance,
— evidence of an entire era.
The archive was kept by people close to him.
But later, during the cleanup operations, the materials were discovered by federal agencies.
After this, the people in whose house the archive was located were detained.
They didn’t return later.
This story became further confirmation for me that the decision to leave my archive in the ground was the right one.
Because under the conditions of war and occupation, the archive ceased to be simply a memory.
He became a threat to living people.
And this is perhaps one of the most difficult aspects of the Chechen tragedy.
The people were losing not only their history.
People were again and again faced with a choice: to preserve memory or to save human lives.
And too often the price of preserving memory has been human life.
In the same way, my newspaper archives, articles, books, collected materials, and many documents from those years disappeared.
In fact, there is almost nothing left.
And this, too, is one of the tragedies of Chechen history.
The Chechens lost not only people.
The Chechens lost their memory of themselves again and again.
But here a major paradox arises.
The people managed to preserve themselves as a people.
Preserved the language.
Preserved traditions.
Maintained a sense of dignity.
Preserved the memory of freedom.
But he did not have time to fully create a unified system for preserving his own history.
Memory was torn into eras.
Some remember the Caucasian War.
Others – deportation.
The third are the wars of the 1990s and 2000s.
But there is no single historical line that would connect all of this into the common destiny of the people.
This is precisely why difficult paradoxes arise today.
Even after two Chechen wars, there are Chechens who no longer perceive the tragedies of their own people as personal history.
This is not just a political issue.
This is a consequence of the destruction of national memory.
Empires have always understood one thing: a people without memory is easier to divide.
Therefore, archives, manuscripts, national education, historical continuity, and the people’s own view of their history are being destroyed.
When memory weakens, people begin to look at themselves through the eyes of a foreign system.
And then people appear who serve not the memory of their people, but the interests of the empire.
This has been the case at all times.
And Chechens are no exception.
But the task today is not endless mutual accusations.
The task is to restore the basis of national memory.
Such a basis, where:
— all the tragedies of the people are recognised,
– documents and evidence are preserved,
— stories of old people are recorded,
— the history of each village and each family is recorded,
— a unified national archive is being created,
— a national historical culture appears.
This exists among many nations.
There are memorial museums, national archives, institutes for the study of tragedies, educational programmes, unified days of remembrance, and state and public foundations for the preservation of history.
Among the Chechens, much of this was either destroyed or never restored after the wars and deportations.
This is why books, archives, documentaries, eyewitness accounts, folk memories, and the preservation of the history of teips, villages, and families are especially important today.
Our work on the book “Memory of the People” is not just a book about the past.
This is an attempt to collect the fragmented parts of the historical memory of the Chechen people into a single historical line.
Because people live not only by territory.
People live by memory.
When memory disappears, people gradually begin to lose their understanding of themselves.
A people disappear not only when its people are destroyed.
A people begins to disappear when the memory of itself disappears.
The main thing that Chechens lack right now is not heroism.
There were heroes.
What is missing is a restored system of national memory capable of uniting centuries of tragedy, resistance, and the survival of the people into a single historical memory.
Ruslan Takhaev
The book “Memory of the People”
