Djigits' customs find use in Ingush wedding traditions

In the old days, a respectable cortege on horseback used to ride to fetch a bride in Ingushetia; and the riders competed in horse riding during the movement, the ethnographers interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot" have informed.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that Ingush clergymen had decided that if the motorcade with the bride included more than four cars, or the drivers are reckless, the wedding organizer will have to pay up to 50,000 roubles in favour of the poor.

In the old days, many people went for a bride, and the djigits' (horsemen's) cortege was quite large, Sultan Mereshkov, an ethnographer and writer, reports. "They used horses. In mountainous conditions, you can't use a cart or on a chaise. Often the bride would mount a horse behind the rider. Her friends rode to the wedding, if the mountain road allowed, in a two-wheeled cart, which usually could take no more than four girls. The riders competed in horse riding (djigiting), but no one overtook the horse on which the bride was riding," Mr Mereshkov has explained.

He has treated the recent decision of the Muftiate to limit the number of cars in the wedding corteges as timely and correct. "Our roads are not wide; the speed is constantly exceeded. Just recently, three people died in a road accident due to the fault of a wedding cortege," the ethnographer has added.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on November 26, 2020 at 02:54 am MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.