Lezgin

*Population estimates for 1994

The Lezgin (self designation Lezgiyar) are the people who live mostly in Daghestan and in the northwestern part of Azerbaijan.

The Lezgin are one of the native peoples of Daghestan. Historical sources mention the people of “Legi,” who lived in the eastern part of the Caucasus. Arabian sources of the ninth and the tenth centuries contain information about the kingdom of the Lakzs in southern Daghestan. Until the nineteenth century, the Lezgin were not presented as united people; they mostly formed small communities of independent country units so called “free communities.”

The main occupations are: agriculture, gardening, and cattle breeding; some part of the Lezgin work in industry.

The Lezgin speak Lezgin language, but many of them also use Russian and Azerbaijanian.

At present one can hardly ever see the Lezgin national clothes (papakha, burka, cherkesska). You can hardly hear expressive Lezgin songs in auls (villages). Only on great holidays one can see horse races, “lezginka,” and dances. Women make napy and napyless carpets with flowers and portraits, covers for saddles. The Lezgin grow gardens around their dwellings. In the mountains you can see clay huts called “saklya.” These houses have clay floor that is covered with carpets. In the built-in closets one can see dishes or bedding. Such huts are heated by stove. There are no chimneys and smoke gets out through the hole in the ceiling.

European newcomers brought Christianity, but in the nineteenth century the Lezgin accepted Islam. At present the Lezgin believers are Muslims-Sunnites.