The history of the Caucasus is a story of domination and resistance. Mostly the fighting was directed against foreign rulers, but the peoples of the Caucasus also have a rich tradition of feuds against each other. All struggled for self-preservation. This strife is the leading thread running through their common history. Crucial themes from this history are: deportation, emigration, the role of Diasporas, territorial conflicts which were ‘frozen’, discussions on genocide and ethnic homogenization, and the search for a new ethnic-political federalization. This introductory chapter depicts how these issues shaped the modern ethnic-political composition of the peoples of the Caucasus.

Ethno-political history

Among the Caucasian peoples, only the Georgians and Armenians can boast of an old tradition of statehood. It was King David IV (1089-1125) who collected the Georgian lands into one state and who conquered Tbilisi from the Seljuk Turks in 1122. With his tenure the Georgian Golden Century started, reaching its peak during the reign of Queen Tamar (1184- 1213). After this golden age a period of decline started, resulting in the partition of Georgia between a Persian dominated east and an Ottoman dominated west in the fifteenth century. The history of the Armenian state is comparable to the Georgian. Only during the tenth century, under the reign of the Bagrationi royal family, she was mighty and really independent. This was the ‘Second Golden Century’ of Armenia. The ‘First Golden Century’ was the period of nearly complete sovereignty within the Roman Empire ten centuries before. Nevertheless, the predominant identity narrative of the indigenous peoples of the Caucasus is about foreign rule. The Caucasus was the playing field of foreign powers penetrating from the west and from the east, such as the Greeks, the Romans, Byantium, the Khazars, the Mongols, the Persians, the Ottoman Empire, and Russia. Before the Soviet era the identity of the Caucasians was almost solely based on clan, family and village ties. A national identity in terms of statehood is a rather modern phenomenon.

A decisive turning point in the ethnic-political history of the region was the intrusion in the nineteenth century of the Russian empire from the north.