Tinto Maps #18 - 13th of September 2024 - Persia & Caucasus

[Ekyman]

@Ekyman suggested confronting the data with the Global Lakes and Wetlands database, but that data was published in 2004(!), so not the most accurate resource (considering GIS was still an emergent discipline then).

I'm using GLWD v2, which seems to have been released this January (!! wow, I knew it was newer than the 2004 version but I didn't realize it was that new).

 

[Sulphurologist]

I'm using GLWD v2, which seems to have been released this January (!! wow, I knew it was earlier than the 2004 version but I didn't realize it was that new).

You absolute CHAD, can't wait to get my hands dirty with this puppy

 

[ZigTheNorweigan]

a new location suggestion, Rutul should be split into 2 so as to be able to represent the 2 aforementioned polities of Tsakhur and Rutul (both Lezgian culture) (the province names will be the same as the tag names) Rutiul is the eastern half while Tsakhur is the western half and for 2 new locations to be created out of the northern half of Tpig and the Southern half of Kubachi and also the Southern half of Kubachi and rhe northern half of Khuchni.

The Kaitag Utsmiate would hold Kubachi and. Kubachi the northern most location could be renamed too Urkarakh as that was the capital of the Kaitag after the Mongol invasion and before Tamerlane's. While the new location made out of Khuchni's northern half could be Kubachi.

White is the Kaitag Utsmiate. Red is the Tabasaran Maisumstvo/principality, Pink is Tsakhur and Lime green is Rutul and black is Zarakhgaran.

Kaitag, Sirichgaran/Zirikhgeran/Zarakhgaran and their respective locations should be Dargin, while Tsakhur,, Rutul and Tabasaran should be Lezgian, technically most of them today are their own individual cultures and ethnicities but were not sure if the divergence has already occurred and i dont know if PDX wants to go that granular lol

In addition the new location around the Northern half of Tpig could be called after the Khochan free society or Aghulsky modern district Aghulsky or Arsgu or Khochan after the Khochan free society or Aghulsky modern district they would also be either Dargin or Lezgian culture or both

Кошанский союз — Википедия

ru.wikipedia.org

 

[giorgi1999]

According to the Global Lakes and Wetlands Database Poti is mostly some sort of wetlands (though much of it is only "seasonally flooded") but Anaklia is mixed at best. Anaklia has more wetlands than most surrounding areas but if you're looking for places that are a majority wetland or something it doesn't seem to meet that. Will depend on what your standards for giving out wetlands are. Maybe there are better datasets though, I'm not sure.

There could also be an argument that historically there was more but I think that would require more evidence.

View attachment 1200851	View attachment 1200852
Main class of wetland in each cell, only cells with >50% wetland	Main class of wetland in each cell - dryland (grey/no color) means the cell has no wetland

There was more historically.

Sone of the swamps got drained during the kast 2 centuries, especially during the Soviet times.
Especially in what is the location of anaklia in the game, vua the construction of the Inguri hydro power station cascade.

But was it like that in the 14th century too?
Idk.

 

[Georgian Noble]

There was more historically.

Sone of the swamps got drained during the kast 2 centuries, especially during the Soviet times.
Especially in what is the location of anaklia in the game, vua the construction of the Inguri hydro power station cascade.

But was it like that in the 14th century too?
Idk.

here is a Russian map from 1810 which proves you correct

 

[giorgi1999]

View attachment 1200975

here is a Russian map from 1810 which proves you correct

Dude this makes the Mingrelians look like swamp Georgians.

Was it really this extreme?

 

[Georgian Noble]

Dude this makes the Mingrelians look like swamp Georgians.

Was it really this extreme?

yeah, that's why Gurians, Mingrelians and Imeretians fought so much on Sajavakho and Sachilao. Other than that, West Georgia is mostly Forests, swamps and mountains

 

[giorgi1999]

yeah, that's why Gurians, Mingrelians and Imeretians fought so much on Sajavakho and Sachilao. Other than that, West Georgia is mostly Forests, swamps and mountains

Meanwhile the kings of kakheti chilling in their palaces, overlooking farmlands as far as the eye can see, sipping some wine and rolling around in gold coins they got from their silk plantations.

 

[GenericUsername1444]

Dude this makes the Mingrelians look like swamp Georgians.

Was it really this extreme?

As someone with a Mingrelian surname I hereby accept the term "Swamp Georgians" in the name of all Megreloids

 

[ZigTheNorweigan]

@SuperLexxe Hey i dont have time to research it in depth currently but have you looked at the Principality of Egil and the Principality of Zirqan? i think they might have been polities there at the time as well. I might be mistaken though i think you have better expertise than me in this

Principality of Eğil - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Principality of Zirqan - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[SuperLexxe]

@SuperLexxe Hey i dont have time to research it in depth currently but have you looked at the Principality of Egil and the Principality of Zirqan? i think they might have been polities there at the time as well. I might be mistaken though i think you have better expertise than me in this

Principality of Eğil - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Principality of Zirqan - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

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Zirqan in 1335 would be based in Silvan (Mayyafaraqin on map), maybe they are the same country? However, the Artuqids (Mardin branch) is said to have ruled Mayyafaraqin until 1409, but currently the dynasty of Mayyafaraqin is "Hazro", not Artuqid. Maybe "Hazro" is a euphonym for the ancestor of the Mardin branch of the Artuqids, Ilghazi?

Egil also seems to be the Bulduqani, as the suggestion that added them talks of the Bulduqani having good relations with the Aq Qoyunlu, and the Wiki says Egil had good relations with Aq Qoyunlu also.

---

 

[ZigTheNorweigan]

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Zirqan in 1335 would be based in Silvan (Mayyafaraqin on map), maybe they are the same country? However, the Artuqids (Mardin branch) is said to have ruled Mayyafaraqin until 1409, but currently the dynasty of Mayyafaraqin is "Hazro", not Artuqid. Maybe "Hazro" is a euphonym for the ancestor of the Mardin branch of the Artuqids, Ilghazi?

Egil also seems to be the Bulduqani, as the suggestion that added them talks of the Bulduqani having good relations with the Aq Qoyunlu, and the Wiki says Egil had good relations with Aq Qoyunlu also.

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Yeah after looking through it a bit i think your right thats good. mb

 

[Georgian Noble]

Meanwhile the kings of kakheti chilling in their palaces, overlooking farmlands as far as the eye can see, sipping some wine and rolling around in gold coins they got from their silk plantations.

just so those plantations could be raided 6 times a month by Dagestanis haha

 

[GenericUsername1444]

Why is Paradox so reluctant to give out farmlands outside of Europe?

 

[nima.msf]

Is Azeri supposed to be Iranian and Adhari Turkic?

no adhari is old azeri the Language before Turkification in there

 

[VinceDreux]

Are there any plans on having Yarsanism spawn later in the century?

 

[Polesie Admiral]

hey there was a sizable minority of jews in Iraq(maybe call the culture Iraki) alongside kurdish jews

 

[giorgi1999]

just so those plantations could be raided 6 times a month by Dagestanis haha

Life is pain

 

[giorgi1999]

Hey.
Well dude I think you based most of what you said only on looking at maps of places you've never been to.
Nothing wrong with that per se, but it seems some of your interpretations were quite a bit off.

I'm not sure what you mean with impassables on rivers? I did not alter the impassables in this part. I also agree with tinto that they should be there though; it is very inhospitable territory, with even today next to no roads going through. View attachment 1200940 View attachment 1200941 The purples lines are suggested ridge crossings for units to get a penalty when trying to cross them directly instead of going around. I don't intend them to be impassable.

There are no ridges, at least on the east of Khornabuji.
If anything, that line you drew matched the river not the ridge.
Khornabuji is itself a castle on the ridge and if you think that is enough to add this ridge crossing penalty to it, then most of Georgia needs ridge crossings.

While Gori itself is on the flatlands near the river, it is elevated above 500m and situated in a higher valley. Combined with the fact that over 50% of the surface area of the Location is in the mountains, It's more than deserving of the 'plateau' indication to me. The red circled location is a very hilly and rugged plateau, which still has a lot of mountains on its rim as well. The mountains also extend into all its neighbors (including Gori), which is why I think it could be considered mountains. Flatlands is absolutely no option here. I could live with hills, but this would remove mountains from this chain entirely, to which I don't agree. The blue circled location is a rugged plateau, but the location shape also includes several mountains and hills. However, considering I just made my point for the mountains of red circle, I think it is fair to shift the mountains to that location and keep plateau for blue. I'll adjust it in my post. Version of my TRI map with more granularity: orange: plateau burnt orange: rugged plateau gray: hills bright red: mountainous / very rugged hills / low mountains burgundy: high/rugged mountains black: impassable/peaks View attachment 1200964

The Gori location might not line up completely correctly, but it is obviously there to represent the inner kartlian plain.
It is flatlands. Yes, it isn't very flat, it has kind of a rolling hills vibe in some places, but in terms of the game, it definitely should be flatlands, most probably with farmlands too.

Plateaus usually are used for quite high places and having Javakheti and inner Kartli both be plateaus makes no sense.
One is a cold grassy plain where trees barely live and the biggest agricultural product is the potato, while the other is the fruit garden of Georgia, lush with vegetation.
Oh and the Javakheti plateau is on average 1000-1500m higher than the inner Kartlian plain.
Both being plateaus makes no sense.

The leftmost one is Darial pass and is absolutely the most logical one to keep for historical reasons. I agree the central one, Jvari pass, should be opened due to it being a silk road route. Actual military usage was only later into Imperial Russian history it seems. However, the 2 right ones (within your red circle) are Abano pass and Datvisjari Pass. Datvisjari's road was only built in the 1970's, and both Abano and Datvisjari are only accessible between June and October with 4x4 vehicles. This does not sounds like terrain you're easily goin to send armies across.

Ok here, I think, it really shows that you are unfamiliar with the area, because you got it straight up wrong.
The left one is the Roki pass,not the Darial pass, that's the middle one.

The Jvari pass is actually the pass you have to go over first to reach the Darial pass.
Jvari pass is the actual mountain pass technically, while the Darial pass is a tight river valley/gorge that then leads to the north caucasian plain.

And Datvisjvari pass is another pass connecting the south and north Caucasus, but in practice it's a connecting point between two subregions of one of Georgia's ethnographical regions, Khevsureti.

Datvisjvari is also in the game and you also closed it, I just didn't comment on it.

Regarding sending armies through the Datvisjvari and Abano passes, yeah you're kinda right.
But we do have accounts of raiding bands using them.

Here, red is roki, green is Datvisjvari with those subregions I mentioned and the blues are Jvari and Darial, Jvari being the southern one and Darial being the northern one.
You can see how they lie on the same road.

And regarding closing the Abano pass.
If we do that, then a single location that should be under Georgia, will be isolated and inaccessible to Georgia and I'm not sure if that is correct.
And we have accounts of forces from dagestan crossing over to Georgia in pretty sizeable numbers.
They actually most probably used even tougher passes, which aren't even shown in the current game.

 

[Georgian Noble]

You might be joking, but I don't think calling the Abkhaz, Abaza and Ubykh "Savage Tribsmen", is very flattering.

I'm unsure with Lata being within Svaneti.

Poti might be too small in its pixel count to qualify for being a separate location.

Yeah, but we don't really know how true that is, especially when it comes to the Apshilae. I'm no linguist, but that A in the beginning looks suspicious to me.
Nor do we fully know the geographic areas of these groups.

I feel like this is more of a possibility, than even a well-argumented theory.

That I also know and for sure that could be proof of what you say.
But it also could just mean that many of the place names of the area ended up in Georgian via Svan.

Same with this.
Afaik, we simply have no idea regarding the population dynamics and makeup regarding this area, around this time.
And we mostly base it on indirect evidence, like toponymics.
That's why both sides of this conflict often find it easy to claim very one-sided interpretations of the history of the region.

If I'm wrong and we got more direct evidence, via some accounts or something like that please tell me.

Is this your guess or did some historian also mention it with some possible proof?

Idk man, unless we see those ruins, I don't think this can count as any sort of evidence.
Sadly, it's not like we can go and verify these claims either.

Can you tell me how those toponyms are translated via Svan?
I personally wouldn't trust this idea, until someone, with knowledge of both Abkhaz and Svan goes and really thoroughly checks the toponyms on a deep linguistic level.
Better yet would be if both sides brought their own individual theories for the possible explanations of the toponyms and a third party would vet them.
I'm not sure if that happened yet or not.

What are you basing this on? Like sources and other sorts of proof that supports this idea.

Sounds like something that could be one of those urban legends, people in our parts are so willing to believe, without checking first.
But might also be true too.
Sounds similar to how the Ossetians would use the words for Georgian and Slave interchangeably sometimes. They practiced slavery and slave trade sometimes, often targeting Georgians.

I'll give u answers on every of those questions, but because I'm compiling sources, that I've used for my critiques right now. So I can just give you a brief overview for now. (I don't know how quote-answer here, so I'll try numeration)

1. I didn't mean "Savage" as an insult. It can be taken as one, but it's not necessarily an insult. Just like word "Heathen" is not.
2. It was not part of "Duchy of Svaneti" as it was a part of duchy of Mingrelia. But these parts are historically Svan (or Zan).
3. yeah, but there is a locations like Andorra which are smaller already in the game.
4. I don't think Apsilae have anything to do with XIV century Kodori gorge but I'll explain anyways haha. Apsilae is just a Greek translation, god knows what their original name was. What we do know though is that: firstly, to the west of them lived a tribe of "Sanigs" and to the north of them - “Misimians". Most of ethnologists are united around the consensus, that both of them are ether Svans, or close relatives. San-igs, San -Svan. Misimian - Mushuan (meaning Svan in Svan language). So how exactly did Abkhazo-Adyghean speakers got sandwiched between two Svan speaking peoples? Secondly, Apsilae and Misimians spoke the same language, which, than again, says that those guys were probably not Abkhazians, they were ether Zans or Svans, personally I lean towards them being Svans, so called "Soano-Colchs" by Strabo. Finally, there are people to the west of Sanigs "Abasgoi" that are actually the perfect candidate for being Abkhazians.
5. There is no need for a theoretical proof Svan toponyms are still there where Sanigs lived, while Svans are not. It's ether Abasgs that kicked Svans out or it's Zans who did so. Zans are actually a good possibility as there are a ton of Mingrelian toponyms around Tsebelda, Gulripshi and Sokhumi as well. I highly recommend reading Geronti Gasviani's book "Essays from the history of medieval Svaneti" ("ნარკვევები შუა საუკუნეების სვანეთის ისტორიიდან"), where he talks about specifically these issues from page 197 onwards.
6. Did they not end up in every other language from Svan though? There is no other name of the town of Tskhumi that have ever been mentioned earlier
7. It's generally agreed between Georgian and unbiased foreign ethnologists and historians that before XVI century Georgian-Abkhazian ethnic borders were somewhere between Gumista-Kelasuri-Kodori rivers. Kodori is the easternmost Abkhazians could have lived at the time. Arcangelo Lamberti, XVII century Italian missionary, states that beyond river Kodori Mingrelian is changed with Abkhazian, like beyond Rioni Georgian is changed with Mingrelian and this is in mid-XVII century mind you, before that Abkhazians would've lived even more to the west. Here is a link to a paper that summarizes the issue: https://www.scribd.com/doc/25462939/Kartveluri-Memkvidreoba-II-Cxadaia
8. Well, it's my guess about Svans, because same thing actually happened to Mingrelians during XVII century. As I've mentioned, Abkhazia was slowly overrun by pagan tribesmen that's why during time of Evdemon (Chkheidze) as a patriarch of west Georgia (1557-1578) the center of church went from Bichvinta to Gelati (near Kutaisi). In late XVII century the situation becomes much more dare for bot Georgians and principality of Mingrelia after the death of Levan II Dadiani (1611-1657). During this time the peak of slave-trade starts, Mingrelian princes become extremally decadent, weak and miserable (evident by the fact that weak feudal-lords from Chikovani family become the practical rulers of Samegrelo at first and then overthrew Dadians themselves), Abkhazian princes, nobles and peoples start enslaving, selling and killing Mingrelian populus. Patriarch David (Nemsadze) (1673-1696) and Gregory II (Lortkipanidze) (1696-1742) both tried saving local Megrelian peasants many times. Gregory II went over Enguri river himself and tried to collect 30 families of peasants, the church owned, from one village, but when he arrived, only 6 families were left as others were ether dead or sold into slavery, so patriarch settled all the church peasants over Enguri river. Same accuracies might have been true for Svans. Also, there are literally family names that could remember their ancestors being from Dali gorge, like Gvaramians.
9. Ruins and toponyms are not the best evidence, but they are the evidence still, when we consider that there are no evidence of Abkhazians being there before XVI-XVII centuries ether, the hypothesis of Svans being there, become more and more realistic. As I've established earlier, there is no chance of Abkhazians living past Kodori. There are three versions who could have lived there: Svans, Mingrelians or no one. There are documented abandoned villages with tower structures which means that people lived there. There are practically no Mingrelian toponyms in upper parts of Kodori gorge (Dali gorge), only Svan ones. In lower parts of Kodori gorge (Tsebelda, Lata) there is a mix between mostly Svan and Mingrelian and couple of Abkhaz toponyms as well. Abkhaz ones are 100% later ones. Therefore, I think that Upper Lata, at the time, would probably be Svan, while lower one would be mixed between Svans and Mingrelians. P.S. I went through the files of Abkhaz muhajirun (Muslims that migrated to Ottoman empire in XVIII century) from Tsebelda and they have Same surnames as Abkhazians living in, what's now, Gudauta municipality, at the time, which also means that Abkhazians migrated to Kodori gorge from there.
10. I don't know if there is even one person on this planet that is fluent in both Abkhaz and Svan. Even if there was, there is no need, as those toponyms have been deciphered many time already, ask any Svan that is from Kodori and they'll agree. Even if you don't know ether Georgian, Svan, Mingrelian, Abkhaz, Adyghe or Russian, you can still tell place names apart. Like - Abkhaz toponyms are: Amazhta(ამჟთა), Akhista(ახისთა), Bzhou(ბჟოუ), Adzibzhara(აჟიბჟარა), Pshu(ფსჰუ), Aibga(აიბგა) ets. Mingrelian ones: Jikhashkari(ჯიხაშკარი), Amtkeli(ამტყელი), Ontipuri(ონთიფური), Tsebeli(წებელი), Otoronjia(ოტორონჯია), Tskalba(წყალბა), Baghmarani(ბაღმარანი), Omarishara(ომარიშარა) Ets. Svan ones: Lata(ლათა), Tsebelda(წებელდა), Getvishi(გენწვიში), Budzguri(ბუძრური), Ptishi(პტიში), Tvibrasheri(ტვიბრაშერი), Gutia(გუტია), Chkhalta(ჩხალთა), Sakeni(საკენი), Kvapchkara(ქვაფჩარა), Buchukuri(ბუჩუყური) Ets. I'm not a linguistics expert but I can easily tell those apart, only Abkhaz-like name I could find in Dali gorge is Atsagara(აცაგარა) - but even this one can be explained in Svan, as Tsagar means - spiky place, like Tsageri the center of Lechkhumi. Tsag means Spike is Svan, ar/er-is a suffix wich gives the base of the word meaning of "place". Therefore, you can break down village name in three parts A-Tsag-ar, this A in the beginning is probably added after Abkhazians migrated here after Svans. Even I, a guy who has no knowledge of Svan, could decipher it lol. Also I can give you few Georgian, Svan and Mingrelian location names in Lechkhumi for better comparison. Georgian: Bardnala(ბარდნალა), Usakhelo(უსახელო), Lekhidristavi(ლეხიდრისთავი), Sairme(საირმე), Spatagori(სპათაგორი), Vanischala(ვანისჭალა),Lashchala(ლაშჭალა), Tkhizurga(თხიზურგა). Svan: Tsageri(ცაგერი), Kulbaki(ქულბაქი), Orbeli(ორბელი), Leshkashi(ლეშკაში), Lajana(ლაჯანა), Tvishi(ტვიში), Latsoria(ლაცორია), Leshkeda(ლეშკედა), Leshuana(ლეშუანა), Dekhviri(დეხვირი), Surmushi(სურმუში), Kvishari(ქვიშარი), Lailashi(ლაილაში) ets. Mingrelian: Opitara(ოფიტარა), Chkumi(ჩქუმი), Gagulechi(გაგულეჩი), khoji(ხოჯი), ochoneshi(ოჭნეში), khomli(ხომლი), okureshi(ოყურეში) ets.
11. U're right. This is my version of Abkhazian migrations. I thought, they would start migrating towards mountains in XV century, after the break-up of The united kingdom of Georgia, but in XIV century they most likely lived beyond Gumista river so there is no way they would start migrating that far into the east at the time. All the evidence suggests them migrating past Kodori river during second half of XVII century, not earlier, so this map needs a bit of correction.
12. It's not an urban legend of any sorts, peasant in Abkhazian is "Agiruaa", while Mingrelian - "Agyrua", practically the same. The reason why is that so, is not so hard to explain. Abkhazians were mostly tribal societies, only peasants they would have frequent interactions with, at first, were Mingrelians living to the east of them. After some of Abkhazian population was forced into feudal system by Georgio-Abkhaz nobles, the word for Mingrelian naturally would become a word for a peasant. Like word "Slave" in English language, as most of the slaves people of England had interactions during middle ages were of Slavic origin (thanks to Norsemen).

I mostly try to use unbiased sources as on one side, there are, Abkhaz ethno-nationalist chauvinistic, so called, "historians" like Shalva Inal-Ipa and his kinda sell-out historians mostly from Russia and Armenia who agree with him and other Abkhazian "historians" that think that Abkhazians lived all around whole West Georgia, "Colchis" and "Lazica" were Abkhaz-Adyghean civilizations, until evil Georgians spawned Mingrelians and Svans outta thin air and kicked them into mountains hahaha, on the other hand, you have Georgian nationalist "professors" that transferred Georgian historiography into, Armenocentrist-alike, fantasy genre haha, sadly this deep stain is still felt on Georgian historiography, as all adequate scientists were murdered by communists in 1937. Those who remained were members of Pavle Ingorokva and Simon Janashia schools that argued things like : O.G. Abkhazians being actually Georgians or modern-day ethnic Abkhazians arriving form Circassia in XVIII century and so on. I even read a paper that argued the stupidest things ever, about how because of the names of plants or something, Abkhazians didn't actually exist hahaha, this is probably one of the most hilarious thing I've ever read on pars with Jesus being Armenian and Yakub inventing White people. here is a link if you wanna read it: https://www.amsi.ge/istoria/div/VIVAT_HISTORIA.pdf

P.S. Thanks for your attention and feedback!

P.S.S. here is an early XX century article about Abkhazians in Georgian paper, if you are interested.