Zaur (village)

Zaur, Zaurovo[lower-alpha 1] — an old Ingush village, which was located on the right bank of the Terek and in the Tarskoy Valley. On its territory the fortress Vladikavkaz was founded in 1784.[1][2]

Etymology

Zovr-kov translates from the Ingush as "frontier outpost". Russian historian Pyotr Butkov described the Ingush village as a settlement that occupied a terrain from which the surroundings to distant space were visible. The village laid on the path leading across the Caucasus from north to south, and according to Butkov, was called by the Armenians Zura, by the Byzantines Tzur, and by Arab writers Suariag and Saul.[3]

History
The Ingush village Zaurovo and the fortress Vladikavkaz on Johann Vogt's map (1784).
Kisty-Ingoschofski (Ingush) on Jacob von Staehlin's map in 1771, over a decade prior to the establishment of the fortress Vladikavkaz on the right bank of the Terek river.
Деревни Унгушевскïе (Ingush villages) on Trescot's map in 1783, the year before Vladikavkaz was founded.
Burnashev's map (1784) illustrates the Ingush village Zaur (Заур) just below the newly built fortress Vladikavkaz.
On the 24th of December we continued our route along the right bank of the Terek. We left Vladikavkaz with a far smaller escort than had attended us thither, being accompanied by no more than 30 Cossacks and 12 Jägers. After proceeding four versts we had the Ingush village of Saukqua, now called by the Russians Saurowa, on our left. It is seated on the steep bank of the Terek, about two versts from the first range of the Caucasus. No part of this village is to be seen from the valley, except a lofty conical tower built of very white calcareous stone. I rode up the hill to it, in order to examine it more closely. It had no door at the bottom, but a large oblong aperture at the height of about 12 feet, to which it was impossible to ascend without a ladder.
  • Semyon Bronevsky (1823):[5]
By the names of their principal villages, Russians call them Zaurovtsy and Dzheïrakhi, and in general Kistins, separately from the name Ingushi; but by the same Ingush mountain people, they are all called Galgaï.
  • Dmitry Rakovich (1911):[6]
The well-known writer of the 19th century P. Butkov, says that before the arrival of the Russians, on the site where the fortress Vladikavkaz was founded — was the Ingush village Zaur. Some printed sources claim that the Vladikavkaz fortress was built on the site of the Ossetian village of Kap-Koy. This is incorrect. The land on right bank of the Terek belonged to the Ingush people from time immemorial. The Ossetians could not have had a village on foreign land of hostile tribes. Ultimately, with their name for Vladikavkaz — Dzaudzhi-Kau, Ossetians confirm Butkov's statement, since the name Dzaug in actuality refers to Zaur, and Kau means village; thus, the village of Zaur. Ossetians would settle near Vladikavkaz only after the establishment of the fortress, by the appeal of Knyaz Potëmkin.
...the Ingush, with the bulk of their population and resources in the piedmont and lowlands, suffered tremendous civilian losses in the Russian conquest. The Ingush piedmont town of Zaur was turned into the Russian fort of Vladikavkaz; the highland Ingush were deported to the lowlands to clear the area of the Darial Pass of possible sympathizers with the allies of Shamil; lowlanders were forced off their land and replaced with Russian settlers; massacres of indigenous civilians by Russian troops were numerous; at the end of the war much of the surviving Ingush and Chechen population was deported to the Ottoman Empire.

Notes
    • Ingush: Зовр, Зовр-ков, romanized: Zovr, Zovr-kov

    References
    1. Бутков 1869, p. 602.
    2. Терский календарь 1895, p. 14.
    3. Бутков 1837, p. 8.
    4. Klaproth 1812, pp. 656–657.
    5. Броневский 1823, p. 160.
    6. Ракович 1911, pp. 3–4.
    7. Nichols 2004, p. 2.

    Bibliography
    • Бутков, П.Г. (1869). Материалы для новой истории Кавказа, с 1722 по 1803 год. Часть вторая / Императорская академия наук. Непременный секретарь академик К. Веселовский (in Russian). Санкт-Петербург: Типография Императорской академии наук. pp. 1–602.
    • Бутков, П.Г. (1837). Мнение о книге: Славянския древності // Три древние договора руссов с норвежцами и шведами (in Russian). Санкт-Петербург: Типография Министерства внутренних дел. pp. 1–398.
    • Ракович, Д.В. (1911). Прошлое Владикавказа. Краткая историческая справка ко дню пятидесятилетнего юбилея города. 1861 г. Изд. 2-е (in Russian). Владикавказ.
    • Вертепов Г.А. Терский областной статистический комитет. (1895). Терский календарь. Вып. 5 (in Russian). Владикавказ: Типография Терского областного правления. pp. 1–409.
    • Броневский, С.М. (1823). Новейшие географические и исторические известия о Кавказе. Часть II (in Russian). Москва.
    • Klaproth, Julius (1812). Travels in the Caucasus and Georgia: Performed in the years 1806 and 1808. Berlin.
    • Nichols, Johanna (2004). Ingush-English and English-Ingush Dictionary: Ghalghaai-Ingalsii, Ingalsii-Ghalghaai Lughat. Psychology Press. ISBN 9780415315951.
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