Vovnushki

Vovnushki is the image that most people carry away from the mountains of Ingushetia: stone towers that seem to grow straight out of the rock, standing on two cliffs above a deep, narrow gorge of the Guloykhi river. The complex has three main towers. Two rise together on the summit of one crag, and the third crowns the facing cliff across the chasm, with the remains of a lower residential tower on the slope below. The walls are laid so tightly against the stone that from a distance it is hard to tell where the natural rock ends and the masonry begins, and on the side of the gorge a defensive wall added a further line of protection.

These are battle towers of the classic Ingush type: four storeys under a flat roof, the walls tapering upwards into a truncated pyramid, with narrow loopholes rather than windows. Their exact age is unknown. The towers of the Ingush highlands were built over several centuries of the late Middle Ages and early modern period, and the first reliable written descriptions of Vovnushki date only from the early eighteenth century. The name is usually explained from the Ingush language as "the place of the fortress" or "of the battle towers", and the towers are traditionally held to have belonged to the Ozdoy clan. Their position, commanding the gorge from both sides, made them a natural watch post over the route along the valley.

The ensemble lies within the Dzheyrakh-Assa state museum-reserve, which protects the tower villages, sanctuaries and burial vaults of the region. Nearby, on the approaches, stand stone crypts and a small sanctuary, part of the same historic landscape. In 2008 Vovnushki was one of the finalists of the national "Seven Wonders of Russia" competition, and it has since appeared on a Russian postage stamp and a commemorative silver coin. Seen from across the gorge, the whole composition of cliffs, towers and ravine reads at once; in the soft light of early morning or evening the stone takes on the colour of the surrounding rock.

Getting there

Vovnushki lies in the Dzheyrakh district in the mountains of southern Ingushetia, near the hamlets of Birgi and Kekki, at about 1,250 m above sea level. The nearest town in a straight line is Surkhakhi, about 44 km away, and the nearest airport is Magas (IGT), about 58 km away; Vladikavkaz is about 70 km by road. The usual route follows the Georgian Military Road south into the Dzheyrakh gorge, then continues past Dzheyrakh, Armkhi, Olgeti and Guli and over the Tsey-Loam pass, with the last stretch on an unpaved road.