Jeyrakh-Assin Reserve

Acting Director of the Jeirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve Sampiyev A.A. attended the presentation of the book by Gulnara Khazbiyeva “The Revival of the People of the Tsarist Sketo-Sarmatians by Alan Galgay”.

The book discusses the common origin of the Ingush people Galgai, Sketes, Sarmatians, Aso-Alan and Sumero-Akkadians. To prove this hypothesis, the author gives numerous linguistic, historical, socio-cultural correspondences.

The popular science publication is designed not only for specialists: historians, ethnographers, philologists, but also for everyone interested in the history of Ingushetia.

The event was attended by honorary guests, government representatives, scientists, researchers, heads of competent organizations, etc.

The presentation of the book caused a lively discussion among the audience, various points of view were voiced, including constructive criticism, but most importantly, the book did not leave anyone indifferent.

In turn, the management of the museum-reserve expresses great gratitude to the organizer of the event and the author for many years of fruitful work, for his contribution to the history of Ingushetia, and the gift of a book that will undoubtedly take an honorable place in the collection of books of the museum-reserve.

An employee of the Jeirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve Akhilgov M. acquainted the students of the Beininsky branch of the GBOU, SOSH Kindergarten of I.S.Lyanov Dzheyrakh village with the rules for visiting the tower complexes of mountain Ingushetia.

Keep clean and orderly in the monuments.

Do not start a fire near the tower complexes.

Do not leave garbage and garbage bags in places not intended for this purpose.

Do not paint or paint on the walls of towers.

Take care of our nature and it will reciprocate you.

Employees of the Dzhirakh-Assinsky State Museum-Reserve together with the specialists of ASM Group identified and recorded 103 objects of cultural heritage at the Khamkhi tower complex in mountain Ingushetia as part of the launched program to identify all objects of cultural heritage of the Republic of Ingushetia.

Unique stone buildings are mostly destroyed or in disrepair. Among the objects of the complex are 1 ruined mausoleum and 1 preserved sanctuary, 2 combat and 5 semi-combat towers, 40 residential towers, most of which are ruined, 16 above-ground and semi-underground crypts, as well as 11 stone steles. The remaining buildings are in ruined condition and their purpose will be determined after archaeological work.

The project partners are SAFMAR and Revival Charitable Foundations.

Specialists of the Jeirakh-Assin State Museum-Reserve together with the specialists of "ASM Group" within the framework of the program to identify all objects of cultural heritage of the Republic of Ingushetia have identified and recorded 84 objects of cultural heritage at the Upper Barkhone tower complex in mountain Ingushetia.

Unique stone buildings are in disrepair. Among the objects identified - 53 steles, 10 residential and 1 semi-combat tower, 18 crypts, 1 stone wall and 1 early cyclopean building.

The project partners are SAFMAR and Revival Charitable Foundations.

On February 27, the staff of the Dzheyrah-Assinsky Museum-Reserve, within the framework of the work plan, held with the students of the GBEU "SOSH S.P." “Golgetti” is a preventive conversation about the careful attitude to historical and cultural monuments, which are our main national treasure.

The event was held in order to promote the protection and preservation of the cultural heritage of the republic, the development of cognitive interest and moral education of the younger generation.

On the National TV channel "Magas" in the program "Government" there was a video about large-scale works to restore monuments of history and culture of mountain Ingushetia. The program was attended by the Head of the Committee for the State Protection of Cultural Heritage RI Kodzoev T.U., Acting Director of the Jeirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve Sampiev A.A., archaeologist Umalat Gadiev, coordinator of the Construction Industrialization Agency, member of the Committee of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Russian Federation in the field of construction, Ruslan Marzaganov, historian, local historian Ruslan Kurkiev, general director of ASM Group LLC, honorary architect-restor Mikhailov A.G.

The participants discussed the archaeological surveys preceding the restoration work in the ancient temple "Thaba-Yerda", when these works will begin, what other objects are subject to restoration, interaction between historians, researchers and restorers who are engaged in the restoration of monuments.

On the tower complexes "Hamhi", "Tori", "Upper and Lower Barhane" field work was carried out on the accounting of OKN.

In the course of the work on fixation and accounting of objects of cultural heritage of mountain Ingushetia, the staff of the Jeirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve together with specialists of complex architectural and restoration projects of the ASM GROUP carried out work on the architectural complexes "Khamkhi", "Tori", "Upper Barkhan", "Lower Barkhan".

As a result of the work, 78 OKNs were recorded in Lower Barkhan, 84 OKNs in Upper Barkhan, these are funerary steles, residential and semi-combat towers, crypts, barrier walls, sanctuaries and a cyclopean building. In the tower complex "Tori" identified 30 OKN, in "Hamhi", according to preliminary data, 103 objects. Among the objects of the complex "Hamhi": a ruined mausoleum, a preserved sanctuary, combat, semi-combat and residential towers, above-ground, underground and semi-underground crypts, etc.

Technical condition of objects can be divided into the following groups:

- highly ruined;

- ruined buildings with the preservation of the base and the possibility of determining the dimensions and initial volumes;

Destroyed and extremely emergency buildings (subject to collapse by half of the total volume);

- partially destroyed buildings;

- buildings in satisfactory condition.

The partners of the project are SAFMAR and Revival charitable foundations.

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Specialists of the Jeirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve continue to work on fixing and recording historical and cultural monuments together with specialists of the ASM GROUP.

These days, work was carried out on the architectural complexes "Govzt", "Hyarp", "Morch" and "Niy".

In Morcha, 23 OKNs – a sanctuary, underground crypts, semi-underground towers, residential, combat, semi-combat towers, 34 OKNs in Goust, 115 objects in Hjarpa, including funerary steles, were taken into account and recorded.

In the picturesque complex "Niy" recorded 222 OKN, including 5 combat, 2 semi-combat and 34 residential towers, 37 crypts, 3 diverse sanctuaries and 135 funerary steles. One important find is the remains of an old ruined mill found on the southeastern side of the complex.

We remind you that last autumn, the first stage of restoration work at the Khyarp and Morch complexes was completed. Three residential towers have been restored in Hiarp, one combat tower, one semi-combat tower and one residential tower in Morecha. In Nyi completed the 2nd stage of restoration work, during which the restoration of 4 battle towers, 1 semi-combat and 7 residential towers.

The partners of the project are SAFMAR and Revival charitable foundations.

A preventive conversation about the formation of a careful attitude to the main national heritage of the republic - monuments of history and culture was conducted by an employee of the Dzhirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve Kharon Khamkhoev with students of the SBEU "SOSH Kindergarten S.p. Alkun".

The event was held in order to protect and preserve the cultural heritage of the republic and develop the cognitive interest of the younger generation.

On the TV channel Magas there was a news story about the field work on fixing and accounting of all objects of cultural heritage of mountain Ingushetia, conducted by employees of the Dzhirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve together with specialists of "ASM GROUP". The start of work fell on January 2024. The program is designed for a long time, as it is aimed at identifying all towers and crypts in Ingushetia.

Yesterday, the event of the official transfer of a treasure of 16 coins to the local history museum named after Tugan Malsagov took place. Valuable finds were discovered by specialists of "ASM Group" during field work in one of the towers of the architectural complex "Tumgi" of mountain Ingushetia.

The unique treasure consists of 5 copper and 11 silver coins of the Golden Horde, relating to the middle of the XIV century, to the reign of Uzbek Khan, Haji Khan and Toktamysh Khan.

The event was attended by heads of competent organizations, representatives of the SAFMAR Foundation, researchers, ethnographers, representatives of Teip Tumgoev and others.

In my opinion, this is a very valuable find from the point of view of the history and archaeology of Ingushetia, it is a storehouse of scientific material for everyone who is interested in our history. They will be stored in the local history museum of the republic and presented to a wide circle of the population, where everyone will have the opportunity to see them firsthand, said the head of the Committee for the State Protection of Cultural Heritage Sites of the Republic of Ingushetia Kodzoev T.U.

Earlier, a similar find, dirham - a coin of Sultan Murad III, grandson of the famous Suleiman the Magnificent, minted in 1574-1575 . was found by archaeologists during the clearing of materials of the collapsed above-ground crypt of Tsori.

Also, in the local history museum there are transferred fragments of bas-relief stones discovered at the beginning of the year on the adjacent territory of the tower complex "Pui", and of great scientific interest.

Recently, an employee of the Dzhirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve, during a planned tour, a bas-relief stone was found on the territory of the architectural complex "Keli", which, according to experts, is most likely a fragment of a stele. Such relief images specialists often found on stone steles and on clothing. Steles were used to perpetuate someone's memory or an event. As you know, our ancestors paid great attention to the spiritual life, evidence of this is a large number of preserved religious buildings.

After the study, the historical relic will be transferred to the Museum of Local History of the Republic of Ingushetia.

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Coordinator of the Agency for Industrialization of Construction, member of the Committee of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Russian Federation in the field of construction, well-known in Europe and Russia solution specialist Ruslan Marzaganov conducts research on samples of ancient mortar at cultural heritage sites of mountain Ingushetia.

Last autumn, together with colleagues of the Dzhirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve, about 28 samples were taken on initiative at four sites – Thab-Yerda, Albi-Yerda, Hamkhi and Qest. And at the moment, there will be studies of these samples. According to preliminary data, we can say that we have found an active mineral additive that gives strength to this solution, that is, in one way or another it is involved in different solutions. We are now trying to determine when this additive was introduced into the solution. Either it was introduced during the firing of lime, or it was introduced during the preparation of the mixture.

There are already some interesting observations, and if everything goes well, then we will start full-scale tests in the spring, in the late spring of this year, and will interact with the staff of the museum-reserve. We're going to start picking out objects that we're going to mint and make test stitches and we're going to watch them. This work is very thorough. I hope that I will be able to publish my works, similar to those I did in Germany, before this summer. There will be shown methods already tested in their work. I'm not giving a quick result because we have to study it carefully. It takes us about a year to get the first serious related findings. This work will continue because it is not only an Ingush work, but at least an all-Caucasian one. I have interaction with Georgian specialists, we will try to solve this issue in this interregional order, there are also specialists abroad who are interested in this work, but we must understand that everything that was built in the world up to the XIX century, was based on lime solutions, Marzaganov said.

On March 19, within the framework of the work plan on visual inspection of the technical condition of cultural heritage objects, acting director of the Dzhirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve A. A. Sampiev made an inspection trip to the Lyazhgi tower complex. The state of the monuments was examined, visual changes in the design were photographed.

Lyazhgi is a large castle-type tower village northwest of Olgeti and Khyamishka, east of Mellare Castle on the site between Olgeti and Eban, southeast of the district center of Jairakh, on the banks of the Armkhi River. According to folk etymology, the name Lyazhgi originated from the word "lying" - the so-called leather bag intended for storing grain. This name was given to the village because its land gave good harvests - a small piece of land collected a whole "lie" of grain.

The complex has preserved monuments of the late medieval era. At one time, five powerful castle complexes towered here, each of which had a battle tower. To date, three ensembles have been preserved in the village: Khutievs, Kharsievs and Kurskievs. The Kharsiev Tower is the first restored battle tower in modern Ingushetia. The battle tower of the Khutievs, located in the upper part of the village, has been preserved in its original form, it is the tallest and slender of all the towers, with a slate step-pyramidal coating. Its feature is also the presence of a four-sided stone false vault not only on the 2nd and 6th floors, but additionally on the 3rd. This strengthened the structure of the tower and increased its defense capability.

Speaking of the other towers, they were 5-storey, with a flat roof and a parapet. Now it is not so often you can see a tower with a surviving spire.

On the south side of the village was adjacent to a high stone barrier wall of the late Middle Ages. It had wide locking gates. Near them, day and night, local guards were on duty, controlling a section of the most important trade, transport and military highway that ran here. Currently, only a few parts of the wall remain.

The complex also has residential towers and crypts of varying degrees of preservation. The water mill, located on the territory of the Lyazhginsky waterfall, was the last identified by the OKN of the complex.

Based on the results of the trip, acts of technical status will be drawn up at the OKS and sent to higher organizations.

On the left bank of Assa, opposite the Targim complex, there is a dilapidated large pagan temple of Albi-Yerda. According to radiocarbon research, the monument was built between 668 and 974, making it one of the oldest temples in the North Caucasus. The temple has the structure of a three-church basilica common in Georgian Christian architecture. An oblong quadrangular room (14x8 m) surrounds the gallery with side aisles on three sides.

Albi-Yerdy was first examined by V. F. Miller, his brief description and plan are preserved. “It is a small rectangle structure with a length not exceeding 13 steps and a width of 8 steps. The roof collapsed long ago and covered the inside of the building. On the east side inside there are traces of the altar absid and a window with a semicircular vault, in the south wall there are 2 windows and between them a low and wide door; on the west side there is a window high, the north wall is deaf.

Albi-Yerdy was examined by L. P. Semenov and I. P. Shcheblykin, V. I. Markovin, M. B. Musukhoev. In 1990, M. B. Muzhukhoev during excavations it was discovered that Albi-Yerdy, like Thab-Yerdy, had aisles from the south and north. The southern aisle had its own altar, with the floor level raised by one step and the bench for sitting on both sides. The chapel was connected to the central part of the opening and had a separate entrance from the west. The northern chapel also had its own altar and was connected by an opening to the central volume. There was no separate entrance.

The walls are composed of regular rows of tiles, reddish color. The roof collapsed throughout, part of the vault above the altar was preserved. From the inside, all the walls are covered with a thick, even layer of white plaster; under the last layer, in places, two more layers of older plaster of yellow and reddish colors can be observed. From the west to the building adjoined an open courtyard, also folded on a mortar and a simultaneous temple. The cladding is best preserved on the altar wall, from the outside it can be seen only in certain areas of masonry.

The walls of the building are now of varying degrees of preservation, of which the highest height from the level of the ancient floor reach transverse. The temple obviously had a gable roof. This is indicated by the remains of the cornice, traced along the longitudinal southern wall and located at a height of 3.20 m from the base. The material of the roof coating, most likely, were flattened stone slabs, which were discovered by M. B. Muzhukhoev in large numbers when clearing the blockage in the room. The fully preserved light opening in the altar (height 1.05 m) has a semicircular arched completion formed by a solid slab of well-treated gray sandstone.

The entrance to the temple is from the south side, shifted to the western wall. It has an arc-shaped top inside, laid out in the technique of a false vault of nine hewn sandstone slabs. Outside, the entrance is blocked horizontally by one large stone, which is embedded in the wall in such a way that covers the upper rounded part of the doorway. The width of the entrance is 1.03 m, the internal height is 2.10 m.

It is located within the boundaries of the Jeirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve. Subject to state protection.

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These days, the staff of the Dzheyrakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve, as part of the work plan for a visual inspection of the technical condition of the OKN, made an inspection trip to the architectural complex "Kashtym", located in the Tumgoy Gorge, near Galushpa.

Kashtym is a small dilapidated castle-type tower village, within the boundaries of which 12 towers, 4 crypt burial grounds and several ruined outbuildings are fixed. Residential towers in terms of rectangular, they have preserved separate different types of door and window openings, economic and defensive niches, loopholes, niches, caches, central support pillars of inter-storey floors and other structural details.

Included in the list of identified objects of cultural heritage of the Republic of Ingushetia. Subject to state protection.

Based on the results of the work, acts of the technical condition of the OKS will be drawn up and sent to higher organizations.

On March 28, acting directors of the Jeirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve Sampiev A.A., together with employees, under the work plan, made an inspection trip to the Old Evli tower complex.

Staryi Evli (Evloi, Tisha Iovle) is a castle-type tower village on the spur of the Tsorei-Loam mountain, on the high left bank of the Niihi River, northeast of Khairakh (right bank of the Assa River). According to the list of identified objects of cultural heritage of the republic, 15 residential towers, 10 crypts and a complex of early Muslim funerary steles are recorded in the complex. Residential towers in terms of rectangular or trapezoidal, 2-4-storey, with a flat roof and a high parapet, they have preserved diverse door and window openings.

Separately, I would like to note, a relatively well-preserved, elevated crypt with a rectangular climb and with a stepped-pyramidal roof, with a large cone-shaped stone crowning.

On all objects of cultural heritage of the complex will be drawn up acts of technical condition and sent to higher organizations.

Employees of the Dzhnirakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve held a Saturday on the territory of the complexes Lower Ozdik and Hamkhi - along the bed of the Assa River.

In Nizhny Ozdika, in the yard of the office space, whitewashing of seedlings and trees was made, drywood was collected. And along the bed of the river Assa was collected, attention !!️, about 20 bags of garbage! Unfortunately, we have to say that vacationers leave behind a lot of garbage. This is not what nature and our mountainous region deserve.

People, observe order, clean up your garbage, take it to specially equipped garbage sites, which are available in recreation areas.

Follow these basic rules of purity, and nature will reciprocate us.

Acting Director of the Museum-Reserve Sampiev A.A., together with the staff, within the framework of the work plan, made an inspection trip to the tower settlements “Tsori” and “Oasegh”.

Medieval complex "Tsori" - one of the largest tower complexes - is located in the eastern part of the Dzheyrakh district of the Republic of Ingushetia, on the border with Chechnya and Georgia, on a high mountain ledge. Its more accurate location is the Guloikhi Gorge. There is a tower complex at an altitude of 1,170 m.

At the moment, there are three battle towers, more than three dozen residential, 12 crypt burial grounds, early Muslim land burials, an ancient mausoleum, and traces of two river mills were found. If you look closely, on the walls of the towers you can see interesting ornaments created from stones of different colors. There is a lot of evidence that artisans and architects who lived in the fortress were famous for their art throughout Ingushetia.

The battle towers of the castle ensemble are quite high, although not completely preserved. You can still see window openings, loopholes, arched ceilings and nothing like salt symbols, telling about the traditions of ancient Ingush. In general, despite the huge age of the buildings, many ornaments and decorative fragments have been preserved on the buildings.

The roof of the battle tower is flat with teeth at the corners, topped with conical stones. In Tsori, the towers and sakli of almost all the villages adjoin each other, piling up with tiers and forming one solid, strongly fortified castle.

Crypts are scattered near the village in several places. They are made of uncooked stones, on lime, have a yellow lining and in each tier of lazes - often rectangular, less often with a semicircular vault. More than half of them remained at full height. And the crypt that collapsed in 2022 was restored last autumn.

The tower complex "Oasegh" is located 500 meters north of Zori, right by the road. In the past, the complex had 6 residential towers up to three floors high, with a variety of annexes, which together with a stone defensive wall formed a single castle complex of the late medieval period. Nearby stood two tower-like terrestrial collective crypt tombs. Only one residential tower has survived. According to the preliminary results of the All-Union census of 1926, 2 peasant farms and 11 people of both sexes were recorded in the village.

Field material was collected by officers on the spot, the preservation of monuments was examined, and photofixation was carried out.

On all objects of cultural heritage of the complex will be drawn up acts of technical condition and sent to higher organizations.

Recently, mountain Ingushetia was visited by a film crew of the federal TV channel “Culture”. The next issue of the program “Unknown Routes of Russia” will be devoted to culture, architecture, life, craft of Ingush in the Middle Ages.

For the filming of the program, the guests visited the “Towers of Two Rivals”, the castle complex located on the spur of the Rocky Ridge, between the gorges of Ozdi-chozh and Ah-chozh, north of Vovnushki, the ancient temple “Thaba-Yerda” and the architectural complex “Niy”. The group was accompanied by the head of the department for the preservation of monuments of the museum-reserve Ziaudin Gurazev.

Recall that in 2023, according to the magazine “Around the World”, the Dzhyrakh-Assinsky Museum-Reserve entered the top 10 of the most striking and unusual museums in Russia, receiving 9.6 points out of 10 possible.

Recently, on the territory of the temple "Thaba-Erdy" an employee of the museum-reserve discovered interesting bas-relief stones, in the amount of 5 pieces. For a professional opinion about the value of the find, we turned to the famous archaeologist of our republic, Umalat Gadiev, who noted that “fragments of the revealed stones are obviously part of the once decorative decoration of the temple of Taba-Yerda”.

“They are mostly made from pieces of soft limestone rocks “wide”, which are well processed. These are fragments of cornice blocks, and apparently parts of the frame of window and doorways. Others require further interpretation. The findings are interesting and should be thoroughly investigated and transferred to the state part of the museum fund, the scientist concluded.

All found historical relics are transferred to the local history museum of the republic, where in the future they will be used in the restoration of cultural heritage objects.

In order to study the history of our people, you do not need to go far, history is under our feet, at every step. In the mountains of Ingushetia, we often find echoes of our past – the memory of our ancestors, our history. Recent findings suggest that pages of history can be opened every day, hourly and minutely.