Kafdagh

A short and belated note on the title of this blog... A reoccurring and always interesting debate in Anthropology concerns the tension between the universal and the particular and I use language here as an illustration. As you see by the title of the blog, there is more than one way to refer to the geographical area in which I presently reside, the Caucasus. I'm sure one could find even more ways if one were to conduct a search, as these mountains have figured largely in the lives of many societies and populations. Mt. Elbruz, for example, is just one example. It has passed down to us through the mythical world of the Greeks, as a backdrop for the famous torture of Prometheus, the human who was too wily for his own good.

But the one reference of which I am familiar is Kafdagh (or Kafdagi). In a way, it neatly indexes the wider relationship between peoples and histories that forms the backdrop of my interest in anthropology. I came to understand the connection between "Kafdagi" - a mythical mountain to which my mother would refer as a place of mischief - and the Caucasus much later. For me it was merely a quirky reference of my mother's, a way to make light of something ridiculous, as in "Surely you quip? or "It must come from Kafdagi." Here is where lay the beauty of place names. The individuals using the terms often have no idea that theirs is not the only way to refer to a place, but merely an illustration of this or that societies' particular relationship to the land. Adding more interest to the Turkish case is that an actual term exists for the geographical area, the "Kafkas" mountains. And so the mythical reference exists in addition and, for most purposes separately, from the political reference which indexes a real place. In both cases, "kaf" or what in ancient Turkish referred to the "whiteness" links them to their common reference of the snow-capped mountains (with dagh or dag merely meaning mountain).

Place names thus are the link that discloses history and the meetings of peoples, who sometimes accurately and sometimes not come to "name" places and people in their own ways. Language is a muse for all who wonder about the world's peoples, about their differences yet links to eachother. I am quite sure that in Turkish story-telling "Kafdagi" came to be passed down from generation to generation as a borrowed idea, a land where monsters and mischief occurred. This is probably what real-life Caucasians were telling their Turkish neighbors or new family members, as many Caucasians were brought into the Turkish fold as young servants, wives, or military conscripts. Over the course of time, their own myths, of Narts and other giants, merged and were translated into a general idea of a mountain in which the unimaginable could happen. That these were for thousands of years impenetrable mountains, unparalleled in height but for the Alps and the Himalayas, added to this impression of awe and mystery. Thus how geography has come to tie Turks and Caucasians not just as a space of social and political confrontation, but through shared symbols, ideas, story-telling, and the general processes of social conviviality.

I implied how language could perhaps clarify the debate between the universal and particular. Communication experts have always been curious about finding a universal language, hence the great efforts that had been put forth to create Esperanto, that universal language with its supposed democratic features. This is why I could not decide on just one reference to the Caucasus for this blog, but opted them all, mythical and real. They are all true and all real, for this is a unique place in the world and meaningful for all who behold it, each in his or her own way. I believe that comprehending this diversity will reveal the overlapping and common interests that often pave these meetings.