High up in the hills of the Georgian Caucasus mountains, is a mysterious tribe of highlanders who go by the name of the Khevsurs (also spelled Keveshur). These scattered 3200~ traditionalist Khevsureti inhabit a land dubbed Khevsuria (what else) that consists of a smattering of about two dozen small villages around Mount Borbalo that, by all accounts, have never owed allegiance to anyone.
Scholars visiting these highlanders in the 19th century found these christian-faith armored warriors clad in chain-mail and brandishing both broadswords and shields much as the old European crusaders did. This led to the conclusion that these were holdovers from lost crusades, forever stuck in time.
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The hillsides of the region are dotted with impossible to attack keeps in the old way of medieval fortifications that remain to this day. Some of these date back to the 8th Century.
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Shatili village, Khevsureti, Georgia photo wiki. The fortified village fortress consists superimposed flat-roofed dwellings and some 60 towers which cluster together to create a single chain of fortifications, impregnable from the ground in medieval times, and impassible from above.
The Turks never conquered them, nor did the Georgians, or anyone else for that matter until the 1950s.
When the Tsar’s Army swept through the region in the 1830s and 40s, the Khevsurs made a deal to remain independent, and agreed only to provide occasional volunteer warriors in time of conflict. Instead of having to pay taxes, the highlanders were given obsolete Russian army rifles from surplus stocks as a token from the far off “Tsar of the Mountain Princes”
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In 1877, the Khevsurs rode against the Turks. In 1914, when war broke out again, a platoon-sized unit assembled in Tblisi to pledge their allegiance to the Tsar for the length of the conflict– still armed with broadswords and shields in addition to their dusty breech-loaders.
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In 1917 the Tsar was swept away but the Khevsurs promptly renewed their deal with the young new Georgian government. When the Red Army came knocking in 1921, the Khevsureti assembled:
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Georgian Khevsureti arriving to fight against Soviet Army,1921.
Uncle Joe Stalin, himself a Georgian, and well known to genocide troublemaker ethnic groups in the new Soviet workers paradise, however, granted the Khevsureti a bit of space, and only moved to wipe them out in the 1950s with wholesale deportations to other parts of the country. However after the reforms of the 1960s, some 22 families returned.
So they still endure till this day in isolated hillsides accessible only five months out of the year. Currently nestled between Chechnya and Georgia, they have become something of an extreme attraction for enterprising tourists.
A lost piece of the Crusades? Maybe. A throwback to an older age of steel and iron? For sure.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
