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Lyubov SOLOVYEVA
Ph.D. (Hist.), Senior Research Fellow at the Department of the Caucasus, The Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology, Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow, the Russian Federation).
THE ABKHAZIAN-GEORGIAN CONFLICT: THE PAST AND PRESENT OF ETHNOCULTURAL TIES
Abstract
The author takes Samurzakano, a his torical district (today the Gali Region), as an example of close ethnocultural contacts between the Georgians and Abkhazians. She relies on archival and literary sources to analyze migration and the specifics of the ethnocultural and ethnolinguis-tic processes that went on for many centuries in the Abkhazian-Georgian border area
where Abkhazians and Georgians/Megrels lived side by side and where their cultures intertwined. The author concludes that the Abkhazian-Georgian conflict is not a product of the different mentalities of these peoples with a long history of peaceful coexistence behind them, but of the pernicious and short-sighted policy of the people in power.
Introduction
The reverberations of the Abkhazian-Georgian armed conflict, which have made it the worst in the post-Soviet expanse, are keeping the academic community riveted to Abkhazia. Anyone wishing to sort out the causes of the 1992-1993 war and its reasons must look into the common past of the two peoples to find the answer. Indeed, how were the Abkhazians and Georgians/Megrels ever able to live side by side for decades or even centuries? How did their cultures interact? What ethnic processes took place under the impact of cultural interaction?
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There is any number of sources confirming that the historical interaction between the two peoples goes back into the past.1 These contacts were not limited to the ethnic border area but were obvious, to different degrees, across the rest of Abkhazia. According to historical sources, in the 18th-19th centuries, Georgian (mainly Megrelian) migration to the region was a common feature: some people moved on their own, others were brought as prisoners of war. (It should be said that Abkhazians also moved to Megrelia for various reasons, albeit on a smaller scale.2) The contacts between the Abkhazian and Georgian elites were fairly close. "Traditionally close ties were obvious at different levels—dynastic marriages, atalychestvo (fosterage), kunachestvo, pobratimstvo (sworn brotherhood), wet-nursing, and political alliances based on blood kinship;" this explains why, in the absence of political unity, "the elites were closely intertwined and mutually integrated at another, less conspicuous level of kinship."3 In his Georgy Sharvashidze, Simon Janashia offered a wealth of information about the dynastic contacts between the top social groups of Abkhazia and Megrelia.4
The relations between the two peoples worsened to the extent that today some historians refuse to admit that Georgians lived in Abkhazia before the late 19th century. Here is a typical statement: "To establish the fact that 'Georgians' were absent from Abkhazia there is no need to go too far back into history—they (the Georgians.—L.S.) did not appear there until the late 19th century."5
This is hardly substantiated because historians, including Abkhazian historians, who studied the history of the multinational Abkhazian population write that in the latter half of the 19th century Abkhazia "was actively settled" by different peoples—Georgians/Megrels, Armenians, Greeks, Estonians, Bulgarians, and Germans.6 Georgians comprised the largest group—they were mainly Meg-rels, as well as smaller groups of Imeritins, Svans, and Rachins. By the late 19th century, half of the Abkhazian population belonged to different nationalities.7
Georgian historians, in turn, write about the "purely Georgian" population of southeast Abkhazia (the historical district of Samurzakano, now the Gali Region of Abkhazia). Some authors go as far as lumping Abkhazians with the other ethnic minorities living in Georgia (Armenians, Azeris, Russians, etc.) as "guests on Georgian soil."8
In this article, I examine the specifics of the relations between the Abkhazians and Georgians/ Megrels in the 19th-early 20th centuries in the border area of Samurzakano. In fact, the Gali Region and the fate of its population (today Georgians/Megrels comprise the majority) is one of the pivotal problems that remained pending after the conflict. Abkhazian authors are convinced that the importance of the ethno-cultural history of the region and its people cannot be overestimated. Teymuraz Achugba, for example, has written the following: "When disclosed ... the processes and reasons of artificial and natural assimilation of the Abkhazians will create a favorable context conducive to the
1 See: G.V. Tsulaya, Abkhazia i abkhazy v kontekste istorii Gruzii. Domongolskiy period: Kratkie ocherki, Moscow, 1995.
2 For more detail, see: S.N. Janashia, "K genealogii roda Baratashvili," Etnograficheskoe obozrenie, No. 1, 1999, pp. 125-136.
3 A.L. Rybakov, "Mestnye elity i ikh rol v Rossiyskoy sisteme kosvennogo upravleniia v Zapadnoy Gruzii (pervaia polovina XIX v.)," in: Kavkaz vRossiyskoy politike: istoria i sovremennost. Materialy mezhdunarodnoy nauchnoy konfer-entsii. Moskva, MGIMO (U) MID Rossii, 16-17 maia 2006 goda, Moscow, 2007, p. 64.
4 See: S.N. Janashia, "Georgy Sharvashidze. Kulturno-istoricheskiy ocherk," Emigrant. Obshchestvenno-prosveti-telskiy, literaturno-kulturny almanakh (Moscow), No. 1, 2000, pp. 125-136.
5 T.M. Shamba, A.Yu. Neproshin, Abkhazia: Pravovye osnovy gosudarstvennogo suvereniteta, Moscow, 2005,
p. 9.
6 See: L.I. Tsvizhba, Etnodemograficheskie protsessy v Abkhazii v XIX veke, Sukhum, 2001, p. 104.
7 See: Ibidem.
8 A.B. Krylov, "Problemy etnogeneza i gruzino-abkhazskiy konflikt," in: Kavkaz: istoria, kultura, traditsii, yazyki. Po materialam Mezhdunarodnoy nauchnoy konferentsii, posvyashchennoy 75-letiyu Abkhazskogo instituta gumanitar-nykh issledovaniy im. D.I. Gulia ANA 28-31 maya 2001 goda, Sukhum, 2003, p. 31.
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natural revival of the original national self-awareness of the Samurzakano population and help them identify their correct political orientation."9
The Ethnic Borderland
We all know that the ethnic borderland is the best place for ethnic contacts and ethnic processes to develop unhampered and where the very possibility of close and consistent ethnic communication determines the intensity and dynamism of these processes. The ethnic structure of the borderland zones is inevitably very complicated because ethnic interaction and ethnic processes might create transitional ethnic groups with no clear ethnic self-awareness and ethnic identity. In some cases, the blending of ethnic features and bilingualism create a situation in which the ethnic affiliation of any given population group becomes hardly identifiable.10
According to historical sources, in the 18th century, the population of Samurzakano was of mixed Abkhazian-Georgian (Abkhazian-Megrel) ethnic affiliation. According to numerous literary and archival sources, in the 19th century, the traditional everyday culture of the Samurzakano people was largely a product of the ethnocultural contacts between the two aforementioned peoples rooted in history. The considerable similarity of many aspects of the traditional everyday culture of the Abkhazians and Georgians/Megrels should be taken into account.11 Yu. Argun and L. Levidze pointed out that "Abkhazians and Megrels, who lived side by side for many centuries in largely similar natural geographic conditions, share many agricultural methods and have similar traditional dishes... They use similar methods of cooking and making drinks; they use similar names for certain foodstuffs and pots and pans." They had similar marriage, burial, and funeral rites. Researchers, however, concluded that "the Abkhazians and Megrels had no common material and spiritual culture. Each of the peoples had specific features of its own."12
Migration: Causes and Results
Mass migration from the neighboring West Georgian areas (mainly from Megrelia) to Samurzakano can be described as one of the specific features of the ethnic history of this region. People moved for various, mainly socioeconomic, reasons: class struggle and social contradictions, land shortage, trade in serfs, blood feud, natural disasters, and epidemics of plague and other diseases. Not infrequently Abkhazian feudal lords brought back Megrelian prisoners of war.
A social institution known across Abkhazia as asasstvo (from the Abkhazian word asas, which means guest), "the right to temporary or permanent movement from one community to another registered in common law,"13 gave peasants the chance to protect their interests to a certain extent. In the
9 T.A. Achugba, O problemakh natsionalnogo samosoznaniia naseleniia iugo-vostochnoy Abkhazii, Sukhum, 2006, p. 7.
10 See: P.I. Kushner (Knyshev), "Etnicheskie territorii i etnicheskie granitsy," Trudy Instituta etnografii, Vol. 15, Moscow, 1951, p. 7.
11 See: Etnograficheskie paralleli: Materialy VIIRespublikanskoy sessii etnografov Gruzii (5-7 iiunia 1985 g., Sukhumi), Metsniereba, Tbilisi, 1987.
12 Yu.G. Argun, L.Sh. Levidze, "Predvaritelny otchet o rabote sovmestnoy gruzino-abkhazskoy etnograficheskoy ekspeditsii," in: Etnograficheskie paralleli, p. 146.
13 P. Kraevich, "Ocherk ustroystva obshchestvenno-politicheskogo byta Abkhazii i Samurzakani," SSKG, Issue 3, 1870, p. 2.
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19th century, asasstvo allowed peasants to protest against the mounting feudal exploitation and injustices of feudal lords. Quite often, protesting families moved away together with their relatives and even namesakes.14 The 1867 fiscal census (kameralnoe opisanie) revealed that there were at least 5 to 15 asas families in every Samurzakano village.15
Any community member was free to accept asas without asking permission from the other members. According to the estate-land commission, "frequent movement of people from one place to another ... either individuals or families, extended families, or those who were serfs of one person or one family was quite common"16 in Samurzakano.
An asas migrant could expect to be received by a poor family or an extended peasant family; more often he was patronized by a prince or a noble. In any case, "he acquired all the rights of a permanent resident of the village."17 A stretch of land from which he removed the trees became his property, while he could use the forest along with the other villagers.18 A quarrel with his patron did not mean that the patron could merely get rid of him: it was far from easy, especially if the migrant had lived on the land for over a year.19 Asases paid small taxes; revenge for insults was taken by the patron of the insulted, the patron's clan, or even the entire community.20
On the whole, the rights of the asases were strictly observed mainly because the nobles found this institution profitable. Late in the 1860s, the princes and nobles of Samurzakano declared in official documents that the population of practically all their villages consisted of asases: to populate their domains they distributed land among newcomers free of charge.21 There were Abkhazians among the newcomers, but the bulk of the migrants were Megrels.
In Megrelia, peasants could not change landlords; if there was not enough land the landlord might allow his peasant to move to the lands of another landlord and pay dues to both. This category of peasant was called mindobili in Megrelian or khizani in Georgian (both terms meant "assumed patronage"); sometimes they were called stumari (guests). Although similar, these terms were applied to two different institutions.
Asasstvo survived as a legal institution until the late 1860s; it was finally banned in 1869 "to put an end to vagrancy and stealing." Under the Project of Land Settlement of the People of the Sukhumi Military Area, the asases were instructed to choose a place for their permanent domicile.22
According to historical sources, transfer from one feudal lord to another was a widely used form of class struggle in this region. Peasants fled from Megrelia, where serfdom was especially harsh, to Abkhazia, where the situation was much better.23 In the 1860s, Konstantin Borozdin wrote that peasants fled quite often because "the land there (in Abkhazia.—L.S.) is twice as fertile as in Megrelia and there is no serfdom." If dissatisfied with his life for any reason, the peasant "piled chestnut boards, the foundation of his saklya (house—Ed.), onto a cart and moved to Samurzakano or Abkhazia together with his family and cattle."24 Fugitive peasants comprised a large share of the migrants. In 1847, Megrelian Prince Dadiani demanded that 140 families of serf peasants who had fled to Samurzakano from the Zugdidi (62 families), Sujun (18 families), and Jvari (60 families) districts be returned to their owners.25
14 See: Ibid., p. 15.
15 Central State Archives of Abkhazia (TsGAA), rec. gr. 57, inv. 1, f. 5, sheet 178rev.
16 TsGAA, rec. gr. 57, inv. 1, f. 5, sheets 128, 135, 137rev.; inv. 3, f. 11, sheet 34.
17 P. Kraevich, op. cit., p. 14.
18 TsGAA, rec. gr. 57, inv. 3, f. 11, p. 10.
19 TsGAA, rec. gr. 57, inv. 3, f. 4, sheet 57.
20 See: P.V. Gugushvili, Selskoe khoziaystvo i agrarnye otnoshenia, Vol. II, Tbilisi, 1950, p. 549.
21 See: S.S. Esadze, Istoricheskaia zapiska ob upravlenii Kavkazom, Vol. I, Gutenberg, Tiflis, 1907, p. 514.
22 TsGAA, rec. gr. 57, inv. 3, f. 11, sheets 37-39.
23 See: Ocherki istorii Abkhazskoy ASSR, Part 1, Sukhumi, 1960, pp. 115, 186.
24 K. Borozdin, "Krepostnoe sostoianie v Mingrelii," Zapiski Kavkazskogo otdela Imperatorskogo russkogo ge-ograficheskogo obshchestva (ZKOIRGO), Book 7, Tiflis, 1866, pp. 60-61.
25 Central State Historical Archives of Georgia (TsGIAG), rec. gr. 4, inv. 1, f. 652, sheets 7-14.
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The shortage of arable land drove Megrelian peasants to Samurzakano: by the 1850s, the population density in Megrelia was approximately 2.5 times higher than in Samurzakano (30 persons per 1 sq. verst in Megrelia and 12 in Samurzakano).26 Abolition of serfdom in Megrelia in 1866 opened a new stage of migration from this region.
It should be said that the nobles of Samurzakano needed tenants from Megrelia because the local peasants and peasants in other parts of Abkhazia avoided hired labor as an improper or simply degrading occupation.27 According to G. Rybinsky, in the 1890s, "migrants from Mingrelia"28 were hired hands.
Judging from the archival materials and other sources, Megrelian migrants adapted easily to the new conditions; on rare occasions they went back home to visit relatives and pray in the local churches. For example, in 1864, T. Sajaya and his family arrived in the village of Nabakevi from the Megrelian village of Mukhuri and went back once "to pray in a Kutaisi church."29
Ethnolinguistic Processes
The process which finally created the ethnically mixed population of Samurzakano largely affected practically all aspects of the traditional everyday culture—material and spiritual, the local identity of the region's population, and linguistic processes.
For a long time, Abkhazo-Megrelian bilingualism of a large part of the autochthonous population remained the main type of bilingualism, which developed due to the following factors: the district's location in the borderline area; the specifics of population development in this part of Abkhazia; large-scale migration from neighboring Megrelia; and the long-standing political and economic contacts with Western Georgia (mainly Megrelia). There was another no less important factor: for a long time Samurzakano was ruled by the influential Megrelian princely family of Dadiani, which meant that the Megrelian language predominated as a vitally important communication tool. Even when Samurzakano became an independent administrative unit nearly all the local officials (court interpreters), as well as clerics and teachers, descended from West Georgian families and knew neither Russian nor Abkhazian. Simon Basaria, for example, used this fact to explain why the Samurzakano people had abandoned Abkhazian and started using Megrelian (the language of communication with officials).30
Mixed Abkhazian-Megrelian families, a more or less common feature of the time, used Megre-lian in everyday life; the rapidly developing trade with the Megrelian-speaking economic centers (Zugdidi, Senaki, Ochamchira, and Gudava) made Megrelian even more important; Megrelians, who had monopolized internal trade, made their language indispensable. It was needed to communicate with seasonal workers from Western Georgia (not infrequently it was used when dealing with the Svans and Rachins). According to 19th-century authors, Megrelian became the "international language" because the Abkhazian language (especially its phonetics) proved too difficult for the ethnically diverse Samurzakano population.
Starting in the 1830s, eye-witnesses testified to Abkhazian-Megrelian bilingualism in Samur-zakano. One such witness, Fedor Tornau, wrote that "it was hard to say anything about the ethnic
26 See: I.A. Lavrentiev, "Kutaisskoe general-gubernatorstvo," in: Statisticheskoe opisanie guberniy i oblastey Ros-siiskoy imperii, Vol. 16, Part 5, St. Petersburg, 1858, p. 77.
27 See: G.A. Rybinskiy, Sukhumsky okrug. Abkhazia v selskokhoziastvennom i bytovom otnoshenii, Tiflis, 1894,
p. 15.
28 G.A. Rybinsky, "Skotokradtsvo v Abkhazii i Samurzakani," Novoe obozrenie, No. 3042, 1892.
29 TsGIAG, rec. gr. 231, inv. 1, f. 269, sheet 71.
30 See: S. Basaria, Abkhazia v geograficheskom, etnograficheskom i ekonomicheskom otnosheniiakh, Sukhum, 1923, p. 101.
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origins of the local population" because the people used "sometimes Abkhazian and sometimes Mingrelian."31 Frederic Dubois de Montpereux confirmed this. Born in Samurzakano where he spent his childhood and youth, Konstantin Machavariani wrote that in the 1850s "few people used Mingrelian while Abkhazian was widely used."32 Other sources related to the Nabakevi and Sabe-rio areas (between the Ingur and Ertistskali rivers) say that in the 1860s people spoke Megrelian.33 At the same time, most authors testify to the fact that bilingualism was fairly widespread: many of those who lived in Okumi and Bedia (where Abkhazian was the main language) knew Megrelian; in Ilori, 160 households of "peasants of Mingrelian origin" who used Megrelian also knew Abkhazian.34
Linguist Avksenty Tsagareli, who visited Samurzakano in 1877, supplied interesting information about the correlation of languages. He pointed out that in the territory which stretched between the Ingur to Galidzga Abkhazian and Megrelian "predominated in equal degrees" and bilingualism was widespread to the extent that he sometimes found it hard to "say which was the native language and which was not." In the borderland, people normally spoke two languages—their native tongue and the language used across the border. Many of the men who lived on the left-hand bank of the Ingur (the villages of Purashi, Ettseri, Jvari, Pakhulani, Ganarjiashmukhuri, Koki, and Khetush-Mukhuri of the Zugdidi District) knew the Abkhazian language and used it.35
In the eastern part of Samurzakano (between Ingur and Ertistskali), people used Megrelian in the family and for official purposes; many men also knew Abkhazian. This was how things stood in the villages of Saberio, Dikhazurga, Tskhiri, Chuburiskhinji, Tageloni, Nabakevi, Bargebi, Oto-baiya, Dikhaguzube, Ettseri, Barbala, and Ettseri-Mukhuri. Those who helped Tsagareli collect information, namely, Prince Kvaji Akyrtava from the village of Chuburiskhinji and Prince Bakhva Chikovani from the village of Jvari, had an equally good command of Abkhazian, Megrelian, and Georgian.36
According to the same author, Megrelian was the "language of the family" in the villages situated between the rivers of Ertistskali and Okhuri, while outside the family both languages were used. This information relates to the villages of Abjigdara, Kumuzi, Atabja, Abja, Nadjikhevi, Sagurgulio, Sachina, Reka, Sakhukhubio, Bedia, Eshketi, Chkhortoli, Rechkhi, Okumi, Tuarche, Repi, Gali, Mukhuri, Shesheleti, and Gudava. In the territory squeezed between the Ohuri and Galidzga rivers, Abkhazian dominated in the family and outside it; nearly all men spoke Megrelian, or at least understood it. Women and children did not know Megrelian (the village of Ilori, where people spoke only Megrelian, was the only exception).37
According to Avksenty Tsagareli, in the 1880s, the top social groups, princes, and nobles, preserved Abkhazian longer than the lower classes and even "flaunted" it. In the 1860s, Dmitry Kipiani called Abkhazian the "fashionable language among the Samurzakano people." Abkhazian preserved its position as the language of church services: according to the available information, as late as the end of the 19th century, people prayed to the Zhini deity in Abkhazian.38
Russian State Military Historical Archives (RGVIA), rec. gr. 482, f. 57, sheet 7.
31 -
32 K. Machavariani, "Ocherki Abkhazii," Chernomorsky vestnik, No. 41, 1900.
33 See: D. Machavariani, I. Bartolomey, "Nechto o Samurzakani," ZKOIRGO, Issue 6, 1864, p. 76.
34 "Iz puteshestvia arkhiepiskopa imeretinskogo Gavriila dlia obozrenia abkhazskikh i samurzakanskikh prikho-dov," Kavkaz, No. 13-14, 1869; Z.V. Anchabadze, Iz istorii srednevekovoy Abkhazii, Sukhumi, 1959, p. 297.
35 See: A. Tsagareli, Mingrelskie etiudy, Issue I, St. Petersburg, 1880, pp. VII-VIII; idem, "Iz poezdki v Zakavka-zskiy kray," Zhurnal Ministerstva narodnogo prosveshchenia, No. 12, 1877, p. 209.
36 See: A. Tsagareli, Mingrelskie etiudy, p. VII.
37 See: Ibid., p. VIII.
38 See: N. Albov, "Etnograficheskie nabliudenia v Abkhazii," Zhivaia starina, Issue III, 1893, pp. 305, 324; A. Okumeli, "News from Samurzakano," Kvali, No. 27, 1894 (in Georgian); K. Machavariani, "Religioznoe sostoianie Abkhazii," Kutaisskie gubernskie vedomosti, No. 14, 1899.
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Throughout the 19th century, the Megrelian language strengthened its position in Samurzakano; the transfer from Abkhazian-Megrelian bilingualism to the new unilingualism (to Megrelian as the native language) took some time. According to information dating to the late 19th century, people living around Okumi mainly used Megrelian, although there were people who still spoke Abkhazian. In the villages along the banks of the Ingur (Saberio, Dikhazurga, and Chuburiskhinji), the transfer was complete, but old people still remembered that "in the olden days, Abkhazian was much more frequently used."39 Early in the 20th century, linguist Iosif Kipshidze wrote about the relatively recent transfer to Megrelian and pointed out that until quite recently the Abkhazian language had been as widespread as Megrelian.40
The two languages coexisted in Samurzakano for a long time, which accounts for certain specifics of the locally used language. Avksenty Tsagareli pointed, in turn, to the phonetic and lexical specifics of the Megrelian language used in Samurzakano: it was not considered a "good Megrelian language" since it contained many Abkhazian words; certain sounds were used more frequently than in normal Megrelian and were more pronounced (for example, not infrequently "i" was replaced with "u," etc.). Iosif Kipshidze wrote about the phonetically specific Samurzakano-Zugdidi dialect in the Megrelian language. In the 20th century, linguists pointed out that Abkhazian strongly affected the Megrelian language used by the people living in the Gali District. On the other hand, Nikolai Marr and Nikolai Yakovlev pointed to the "Samurzakano dialect" in the Abkhazian language. Shalva Inal-ipa also wrote that there was a Samurzakano dialect of the Abkhazians of the Gali District (the villages of Okumi and Chkhortoli, as well as the villages of Bedia and Reka in the neighboring Ochamchira District).41
There is enough information to confirm that in Samurzakano the Abkhazian and Megrelian languages coexisted and cooperated and that the latter gradually spread throughout the area. It seems that transfer of part of its population from bilingualism to one language proved to be the decisive factor affecting ethnic self-awareness. It seems, however, that linguistic and ethnic transfers were not always simultaneous. There is evidence that not infrequently the ethnic identity problem was subject to various short-term considerations. Contemporaries pointed to a sort of local Samurzakano identity: they did not count themselves among the Abkhazians or the Megrelians and "were proud to call themselves a special Samurzakano tribe."42 The following fact says a lot about the specific features of the Samurzakano identity: in 1918, the Menshevik government of Georgia made an attempt to join Samurzakano to the Kutaisi Gubernia only to be forced two months later to return it to Abkhazia because the locals objected to "territorial and cultural alienation from Abkhazia" as extremely unfair.43
According to the population census of 1926, about 26% of the people of Samurzakano described themselves as Abkhazians (12 963 people); the majority, however, believed that Megrelian was their native language. Abkhazian was the native language for only 10.6% of those living in the Gali District (5,295); they lived mainly in the village communities of Agu-Bedia, Reka, Bedia I, Bedia II, Chkhortoli, etc.44 It seems that they were mainly older people. In 1925, for example, Evgeny Schilling wrote that "younger people are gradually abandoning Abkhazian."45
This means that there is enough information to show that the two languages long coexisted in Samurzakano and that the Megrelian language finally won. Even as late as the 1920s, the process of
39 N. Albov, op. cit., p. 305.
40 See: I. Kipshidze, Grammatika mingrelskogo (iverskogo) iazyka, St. Petersburg, 1914, p. XVII.
41 See: A. Tsagareli, Mingrelskie etiudy, p. IV; I. Kipshidze, op. cit., p. XVIII; M. Tsikolia, "Abkhazian Language in the Gali District," in: Proceedings of the Abkhazian Institute of Language, Literature, and History, Vol. 30, 1959 (in Georgian); N. Ya. Marr, Plemennoy sostav naseleniia Kavkaza, Petrograd, 1920; N.F. Yakovlev, Yazyki i narody Kavka-za, Zakkniga, s.a., p. 13; Sh.D. Inal-ipa, Abkhazy, Sukhumi, 1965, p. 51.
42 N. Albov, op. cit., p. 306.
43 See: S. Basaria, op. cit., p. 103.
44 See: Vsesoiuznaia perepis naseleniia 1926 goda, Vol. 14, Moscow, 1926, pp. 100-101.
45 E.M. Schilling, "V Guadutskoy Abkhazii," Etnografia, No. 1-2, 1926, p. 61.
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one language squeezing out the other had not ended. In 1925, four villages in this district demanded that schools teach in both Abkhazian and Russian.46
Conclusion
The above confirms that language was an important factor in building the ethnic self-awareness of the Samurzakano people. The fairly long period of bilingualism contributed to the intensity of the ethnic processes underway in the district. It seems that language was the decisive factor of ethnic identity for the local population with an ethnically mixed traditional everyday culture provided the ethnic groups in contact remained close economically and culturally. Bilingualism, on the other hand, helped to preserve vague ethnic self-awareness.
At the same time, it is impossible to ignore the following fact: Megrelian migration was a gradual process; the migrants adapted to the local order and accepted the local traditions, which helped the Abkhazians and Megrelians of Samurzakano to avoid considerable conflicts; the majority of the local villages had ethnically mixed populations.
Abkhazian historian Arvelod Kuprava described the relations between the Megrels and Abkhazians in the village of Repi in Samurzakano where his aunt (his father's sister) lived in the 1930s as follows: "Repi was mainly a Megrelian village in Samurzakano Abkhazia; the best Abkhazian-Meg-relian traditions were intertwined in everyday life. The local people respected the norms of apsuar. Khimur, my father's sister, was respected by the neighbors both as an individual and as an Abkhazian who cherished the noble Abkhazian traditions. Women attentively listened when she addressed me in Abkhazian, even though they did not understand it. All the neighbors knew about my arrival as soon as I came to stay with my aunt. They welcomed me, a small boy, into their homes as a respected guest and said tenderly, 'Here is our small Abkhazian'."47 This can be fully applied to all ethnically mixed villages of that time.
The situation radically changed in the 1930s-1940s when migrants from Megrelia, Guria, Im-ereti, and Rachi moved (sometimes by force) in great numbers to Abkhazia. This tipped the ethnic balance and created the danger of conflicts. The Abkhazian-Georgian conflicts, however, are not a product of the different mentality of these peoples with a long history of peaceful coexistence behind them, but of the pernicious and short-sighted policy of the people in power.
' See: V.A. Gurko-Kryazhin, Abkhazia, Moscow, 1926, p. 13.
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47 A.E. Kuprava, Apsuara—traditsionnaia kultura abkhazov, Sukhum, 2007, p. 92.
