Sacred Places, Emerging Spaces: Religious Pluralism in the Post-Soviet Caucasus 9781785337833

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Sacred Places, Emerging Spaces

Space and Place

Bodily, geographic and architectural sites are embedded with cultural knowledge and social value. The Anthropology of Space and Place series provides ethnographically rich analyses of the cultural organization and meanings of these sites of space, architecture, landscape and places of the body. Contributions to this series will examine the symbolic meanings of space and place, the cultural and historical processes involved in their construction and contestation, and how they are in dialogue with wider political, religious, social and economic institutions. Volume 1

Berlin, Alexanderplatz: Transforming Place in a Unified Germany Gisa Weszkalnys Volume 2

Cultural Diversity in Russian Cities: The Urban Landscape in the Post-Soviet Era Edited by Cordula Gdaniec Volume 3

Settling for Less: The Planned Resettlement of Israel’s Negev Bedouin Steven C. Dinero Volume 4

Contested Mediterranean Spaces: Ethnographic Essays in Honour of Charles Tilly Edited by Maria Kousis, Tom Selwyn and David Clark Volume 5

Ernst L. Freud, Architect: The Case of the Modern Bourgeois Home Volker M. Welter Volume 6

Extreme Heritage Management: Practices and Policies from Densely Populated Islands Edited by Godfrey Baldacchino Volume 7

Images of Power and the Power of Images: Control, Ownership, and Public Space Edited by Judith Kapferer Volume 8

Performing Place, Practising Memories: Aboriginal Australians, Hippies and the State Rosita Henry Volume 9

Post-Cosmopolitan Cities: Explorations of Urban Coexistence Edited by Caroline Humphrey and Vera Skvirskaja

Volume 10

Places of Pain: Forced Displacement, Popular Memory and Trans-local Identities in Bosnian War-Torn Communities Hariz Halilovich Volume 11

Narrating Victimhood: Gender, Religion and the Making of Place in Post-War Croatia Michaela Schäuble Volume 12

Power and Architecture: The Construction of Capitals and the Politics of Space Edited by Michael Minkenberg Volume 13

Bloom and Bust: Urban Landscapes in the East since German Reunification Edited by Gwyneth Cliver and Carrie Smith-Prei Volume 14

Urban Violence in the Middle East: Changing Cityscapes in the Transition from Empire to Nation State

Edited by Ulrike Freitag, Nelida Fuccaro, Claudia Ghawi and Nora Lafi Volume 15

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Post-Ottoman Coexistence: Sharing Space in the Shadow of Conflict Edited by Rebecca Bryant Volume 17

Sacred Places, Emerging Spaces: Religious Pluralism in the Post-Soviet Caucasus Edited by Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

Sacred Places, Emerging Spaces Religious Pluralism in the Post-Soviet Caucasus

[• • ] Edited by

Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

berghahn NEW YORK • OXFORD www.berghahnbooks.com

First published in 2018 by Berghahn Books www.berghahnbooks.com © 2018 Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without written permission of the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A C.I.P. cataloging record is available from the Library of Congress British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN: 978-1-78533-782-6 hardback ISBN: 978-1-78533-783-3 ebook

Contents List of Illustrations vii Acknowledgements ix Introduction 1 Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite Chapter 1.  Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions? Situating Shia Saints in Contemporary Baku Tsypylma Darieva

19

Chapter 2.  Women as Bread-Bakers and Ritual-Makers: Gender, Visibility and Sacred Space in Upper Svaneti Nino Tserediani, Kevin Tuite and Paata Bukhrashvili

46

Chapter 3.  The Chain of Seven Pilgrimages in Kotaik, Armenia: Between Folk and Official Christianity Levon Abrahamian, Zaruhi Hambardzumyan, Gayane Shagoyan and Gohar Stepanyan

70

Chapter 4.  Sacred Sites in the Western Caucasus and the Black Sea Region: Typology, Hybridization, Functioning Igor V. Kuznetsov

97

Chapter 5.  The Power of the Shrine and Creative Performances in Ingiloy Sacred Rituals Nino Aivazishvili-Gehne

113

Chapter 6.  Accompanying the Souls of the Dead: The Transformation of Sacral Time and Encounters Hege Toje

133

Chapter 7.  Not Sharing the Sacra Florian Mühlfried Chapter 8.  Informal Shrines and Social Transformations: The Murids as New Religious Mediators among Yezidis in Armenia Hamlet Melkumyan

150

177

vi Contents

Chapter 9.  Sharing the Not-Sacred: Rabati and Displays of Multiculturalism 203 Silvia Serrano Index 227

Illustrations Figures 2.1  Church building in Svaneti and associated land

64

2.2  Traditional Svan home and consecrated land plots (based on Chartolani 1961: 13)

64

4.1  Transforming the sacred space of the shrine at Lidzava village 109

Illustrations 1.1  A traditional carpet with Mir Mövsum Agha’s portrait in the middle 29 1.2  The Firdousi street in central Baku, May 2015

30

2.1  Lat’ali women presenting offerings at Samt’äiši Lamǟria (festival of Həliš, 7 June 2015)

65

3.1  St Poghos (Paul) church, Poghos-Petros pilgrimage site. Kotayk province, 14 April 2013 (the third pilgrimage of the chain) 74 3.2  Pilgrims approaching Tzaghkevank shrine with sacrificial roosters. Kotayk province, 9 May 2013 (the seventh pilgrimage of the chain) 4.1  A ritual chalice from Lidzava shrine, 2013

79 105

4.2  Vova Gochua, a Lidzava priest, at the altar. Lidzava shrine, 2013 108 5.1 and 5.2.  Female prayers at Yel baba shrine, 10 May 2009 in Aserbaidschan, in Şəki District, Aivazishvili-Gehne

123

7.1  The Synagogue in Oni, Georgia, 2014

154

7.2  New Jewish Cemetery in Oni, Georgia

156

viii Illustrations

8.1  The informal yard shrines in Zovuni, Armenia, 2013

182

8.2  The owner is introducing the interior of the informal yard shrine. In central position is the image of St Yazid with a bowl in his hand and a small stage is located in front of him. Left of Yazid are the icons of Jesus Christ and Malak Tawuz. Zovuni, Armenia, 2013 183 9.1  Rabati, April 2015, view with old mosque, madrasa, the reconstructed St Marine church; Serrano

204

Maps Map 0.1  Contributors’ fieldside locations in the North and South Caucasus Map 3.1  Map of the Kotayk province with seven pilgrimage sites

3 71

Tables Table 1.1  The differences between pirs and mosques

23

Table 2.1  Ritual spaces in the church and domestic realm

51

Table 2.2  Outdoor sites in Lat’ali where women perform lidbäš

57

Table 2.3  Gender-linked trajectories and their associations with ritual space in Svaneti and Pxovi (Xevsureti)

59

Table 2.4  The sacred sites of Lat’ali ranked by visibility

63

Table 4.1  Sacred sites in the Western Caucasus (number of items) 98

Acknowledgements

This volume draws upon the results of the three-year research proj-

ect ‘Transformation of Sacred Spaces, Pilgrimage and the Notion of Hybridity in the post-Soviet Caucasus’, which was initiated by Kevin Tuite and Florian Mühlfried and conducted by the Department for Caucasus Studies at Friedrich Schiller University Jena (2013–2016). The main analytical aim of the research project was to understand the prominence and viability of shrines associated with local Islam, Christianity and Judaism in the post-Soviet Northern and South Caucasus, more precisely the role played by ‘folk’ sacred sites in the construction and maintenance of social interactions, rhizomic networks and the ways their functions, status and design changed and were influenced by different actors in the recent time. What makes the volume unique is an extensive use of first hand ethnographic data on micro-dynamics of pilgrimages and local narratives ranging across political borders and ethnic conflict lines in various regions in both the Northern Caucasus (Russian Federation) and the South Caucasus (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia). This perspective gives way to an emergent Caucasus area viewed from the ground up: dynamic, continually remaking itself, within shifting and indefinite frontiers. With this perspective we hope to stimulate a rethinking of the presuppositions underlying the stereotype of a violent Caucasus. The composition of the research project included six teams from Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Russian Federation (Krasnodar and Moscow) and Jena, three consultants from USA, France and Germany; all together twenty-one established and younger scholars participated in this research endeavour. The co-editors and the project members wish to thank above all, the Volkswagen Foundation, the research initiative ‘Zwischen Europa und Orient – Mittelasien und Kaukasus im Fokus der Wissenschaft’ for generous funding that made the realization of this project possible, and led to further transregional cooperation and ­expertise-sharing among scholars. We wish to thank Vladimir Bobrovnikov, Stephan Dudeck, Agnieszka Halemba, Maria Louw and Sergey Shtyrkov, who offered valuable comments and raised challenging questions during discussions at Friedrich Schiller University in Jena in October 2015. Our gratitude goes to Bruce

x Acknowledgements

Grant and Glen Bowman who provided very stimulating and insightful comments to this volume, which helped us to improve our theoretical issues. Sebastian Härter, Michael Stürmer and Stefan Schönrock, our student assistants, were very supportive at different stages of preparing the manuscript, the latter also in preparing the index to this volume. We thank Matthew Blackburn (University of Glasgow) for his excellent English editing of the chapters at the beginning of the book’s editorial production. Our thanks also go to Sarah Sibley for copy editing the final manuscript chapters as well as to Amanda Horn and Caroline Kuhtz from Berghahn Books for their wonderful editorial support.

Introduction TSYPYLMA DARIEVA, FLORIAN MÜHLFRIED AND KEVIN TUITE

In the fall of 1997, one of the editors of this volume (Kevin Tuite)

attended the autumn festival Alaverdoba, centred around the medieval cathedral of St John the Baptist at Alaverdi, in eastern Georgia. The festivities took place in three concentric spaces: outside the churchyard walls were campgrounds, a bazaar and a first-aid station (where doctors cared for pilgrims who walked barefoot to Alaverdi, in fulfilment of a vow). Within the walls was a constant stream of people bearing offerings of bread and live chickens, and leading sacrificial sheep and bulls, in a triple counter-clockwise circuit around the church. A ruined building near the wall, which we were told was once a mosque, had been visited the day before by Chechens from across the border. Finally, inside the cathedral itself, pilgrims lit candles and prayed, and later heard Mass said by the local bishop. When another of the editors (Florian Mühlfried) went to the same festival in 2006, the second of the three ritual spaces had been suppressed, replaced by an abrupt binary distinction between Orthodox Christian interior and secular exterior. The new bishop of Alaverdi banned the procession of sacrificial animals, and any rituals not sanctioned by the Church, from the churchyard and the cathedral. In an interview, he denied any association of the festival or the site with Muslims. Even the name of the town Alaverdi – which means ‘God gave’ in Azeri Turkish – was explained away as the deformed pronunciation of a Georgian or Chechen expression.1 Why did the authorities of the Georgian Orthodox Church take such an interest in the events at Alaverdi, to the extent of erecting fences, posting instructions on correct behaviour and controlling access to the churchyard? Seen in the light of similar confrontations at other sacred sites in the Caucasus region – not only in Orthodox Georgia, but also Islamic Dagestan, Azerbaijan and Monophysite Christian Armenia – it becomes evident that there is more at stake than property rights. Two sets of narratives and practices come into contact, and conflict, at these

2  Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

sites: on the one side, the normative and exclusive concepts of identity and behaviour authorized by the institutions of Church and State; on the other, the community-based, non-canonical fluid and variable rituals and discourses commonly labelled ‘folk religion’. The new restrictions at Alaverdi cathedral could be said to be among the less-noticed consequences of the desecularization of post-Soviet societies. Desecularization studies, popularized by a 1999 collection edited by Peter Berger, have for the most part focused on the increase of fundamentalist and evangelical religious movements in the West, and the state-supported resurgence of Christianity and Islam as privileged vehicles of national identity and culture in the former socialist states of the Eastern bloc. The literature on the desecularization of the ex-Soviet republics has by and large portrayed the religious landscape in the USSR before its dissolution as one of secularism fostered by seventy years of official anti-religious policy and schooling (Kyrlezhev and Shishkov 2011; Shishkov 2012). On the ground, and in particular, in the Caucasus region, the situation was more complex. Modernizing struggles against religious experiences had started already in the mid nineteenth century. The Bolshevik campaign was predated by the process of native secularization initiated by national intelligentsiya in Azerbaijan and Dagestan (Swietochowski 1995: 115). Influenced by the modernist reforms undertaken by Russian Muslims in Kazan and Crimean Tatars, local cultural Jadidist movements called for the modernization of traditional religious educational institutions (maktabs), language and alphabet reforms, and the Europeanization of behaviour norms and lifestyles both among the clergy and the civil population. The ‘print modernization’ of religious experiences among Muslims, developed in larger cities such as Baku and Tiflis, included a harsh critique towards ‘backward’ mullahs that found its expression in the popular satirical magazine Molla Nasreddin, an eight-page bi-weekly founded in 1906 in Tiflis (Khalid 1998; Fenz 2008). Another important aspect of the desecularization process goes back to the historical experience of socialism and the Christian Orthodoxy in the former Soviet Union (Wanner and Steinberg 2008; Wanner 2012). Sergei Shtyrkov and Zhanna Kormina (2015) address and identify the early period of the religious ‘revival’ in the 1970s after Khrushchov’s anti-religious campaign that led to an incorporation of a variety of religious symbols into construction of the national culture in Soviet Russia. The strict limitations on religious activities imposed by the Soviet government, and the sharp reduction in numbers of clergymen, left most of the churches, cemeteries, pilgrimage sites and other types of sacred places untended by trained priests and mullahs. While there was some targeting of ‘folk’ religious practices by the authorities during the

Map 0.1  Contributors’ fieldsite locations in the North and South Caucasus. Map design by Stefan Schönrock

4  Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

Stalin years (in Abkhazia, for example), and occasional attempts to limit attendance (or at least keep outsiders away), traditional rituals and festivals continued unabated throughout the period. The Alaverdoba festival is a case in point: not only did it continue to be celebrated throughout the Soviet years, it was even portrayed in a 1962 film of the same name, directed by Giorgi Shengelaia. In an important sense, then, this volume is about the impact of post-Soviet desecularization on the contemporary religious landscape of the Caucasus, including those sacred places that Soviet ethnographers associated with ‘archaic’ beliefs, ‘survivals’ (perezhitki) of the past, and pre-Christian and pre-Islamic traditions. The contributors to our volume draw on extensive first-hand ethnographic data and narratives, ranging across political borders and ethnic conflict lines in the Northern and the Southern Caucasus. The geographical spectrum of selected ethnographies covers different regions from lowlands and mountain areas to the steppe and the coastal zones at the Black and Caspian Seas. Located predominantly in rural and small town areas, the scope of ethnographic settings also includes areas in larger urban centres such as Baku. The aim of fresh ethnographic studies in the Caucasus is to contribute to the recent debates in social sciences on desecularization processes in multi-ethnic societies and religious homogenization in the context of globalization. Most of the contributors to this volume discuss the consequences of the reassertion of institutional control over sacred sites, including attempts to review and renew social boundaries between religious and secular, and reassert control, sometimes in the face of resistance from local actors. Among the consequences of institutional (re)appropriation is the appearance of authorized clergy at these sites, often accompanied by the marginalization of ritual functions performed by women. Given the tight interconnection between institutionalized ‘national’ religion and the state in the post-Soviet Caucasus, desecularization projects are simultaneously state-making projects. This is apparent in Georgia and Armenia and to a lesser extent in the Northern Caucasus and in Azerbaijan. At the same time, other countries strive to preserve their secular heritage, most of them in the name of fighting religious extremism. The government of Azerbaijan, for example, tries to disentangle religious and political activities. Yet other political entities such as Abkhazia try to secure equal political representation of Christians, Muslims and adherents of ‘traditional religion’. Tendencies of desecularization and attempts to preserve secularity thus coexist in the Caucasus region, but all of them are deeply affected by current attempts to redefine state- and nationhood. State interest in features of the earlier religious environment can be manifested as patrimonialization projects,

Introduction  5

such as the reconstructed fortress of Akhaltsikhe examined by Silvia Serrano (this volume), or even the recognition of a normative form of traditional religion as an official cult alongside Christianity and Islam, as in Abkhazia (Kuznetsov in this volume). With this approach, we hope to contribute to a growing awareness of emerging and vanishing hybrid sacred places in the process of desecularization, their regional histories and contemporary micro-dynamics of change. This perspective can bring theoretical developments in the anthropology of sacred spaces, the notion of hybridity and religious pluralism into a creative exchange.

Why the Caucasus? Centred on a mountain range straddling the frontier between Europe and Asia, on the peripheries of the Near Eastern, Hellenic, Roman and Iranian spheres of influence, the Caucasus region has been, since prehistory, both a residual zone – conserving old genomic and linguistic lineages (Nichols 1992; Bulayeva et al. 2003) – and a crossroads between north and south, east and west (Grant and Yalcin-Heckmann 2007). So-called ‘world religions’ have a long history in the Caucasus.2 Judaism has been present for twenty-five centuries, if not more, and Zoroastrianism was widespread, at least among elites, in those regions of the eastern Caucasus under Iranian influence. Christianity was implanted by the third century, and Islam within decades after the death of the Prophet. In view of its dual nature as residual zone and crossroads, it is not surprising that the Caucasus landscape abounds in sacred sites of all sorts. Going under various names, such as ziyarat (Arabic for place of pilgrimage), pir (Persian term for holy, respected person), ocag (Azeri), salotsavi, xat’i (Georgian), matur, surb (Armenian), svyatoe mesto, svyatilische (Russian), sacred places share certain features. They are linked to identifiable locations such as natural landmarks, built objects or ruins and are typically associated with narratives (often variable, changing, contradictory or contested) linking the site to some manifestation of supernatural power, or an individual regarded as sacred or as a saint. Sometimes the story of the site is transmitted through dreams, visions and apparitions. Visitation and pilgrimage practices at sacred sites may include speech directed at invisible ‘interlocutors’, and acts of exchange and offering in hopes of obtaining healing, protection or strength. Activities performed at or near sacred places include climbing as a group to mountain-top sites; banqueting at outdoor locations

6  Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

near holy water-springs and trees; sharing food, sweets and the meat of slaughtered animals; and collecting alms, all of which creates flexible spaces for mundane socializing and modes of convivial sociability. Inside some shrines, for instance in Azerbaijan, hospitality must be given to all visitors, as they are considered to be under the protection of saints, who do not discriminate on religious or ethnic grounds. The field studies presented by our contributors were carried out in all three South Caucasus countries, including the non-recognized republic of Abkhazia, and in the Russian North Caucasus. Examples demonstrate that with respect to narratives as well as practices, sacred sites become venues for contestation between institutionally supported and informal actors.

Community-Based Sites and Practices in the Face of Institutional Power Seen from above, the Caucasus region is segmented among four recognized (and three unrecognized) nation states,3 with more or less coherent association of the titular nation with one of the three Abrahamic faiths (with the exception of Abkhazia). On the ground, however, the situation is more complex, and the confessional divisions are not as neatly cut. The territory of the Caucasus is covered with sites that are considered ‘sacred’ in some sense. At many of these places, institutional – and, typically, state-supported – religious frames of perception and behaviour confront community-based practices, commonly labelled as manifestations of ‘folk religion’. These are usually thought of as vestiges of ancient religious systems pre-dating the implantation or Christianity and/or Islam, but they can be of recent origin, such as the Baku-based Shia cult of the ‘Boneless Saint’ examined by Tsypylma Darieva in this volume. Whether of ancient or modern origin, so-called ‘folk’ religious practices are by no means static, but rather continually changing and adapting to circumstances created in large part by institutional state and religious authorities. Competing understandings of proper piety and religious practices at sacred places can be observed in almost all chapters in this volume. A number of articles raise the important question of folk Christian and Islamic sacred sites contested by different groups, in particular by representatives of the official clergy. There are different forms of practice and contestation between conventional institutionalized versions of religious practices and folk faith practices (initiatives ‘from below’). There is a lack of clear juridical frameworks for the operation of sacred sites, so

Introduction  7

that management, protection and claims for sacred sites are negotiable in the realm of secular, common or religious laws (see Melkumyan in this volume). Regardless of nominal confession in Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia or Dagestan, there is a striking similarity in the labelling of local shrines and other peripheral worship sites as ‘pagan’ by the clergy and purists. Competition can take different forms, and conflicting approaches to a given site among pilgrims and participants can remain latent and hidden (see chapters by Nino Tserediani et al. and Hamlet Melkumyan), or escalate to a visible confrontation. For instance, saints’ graves and other popular shrines are mostly tolerated in Dagestan, but there is a growing tendency to install plaques at these places informing visitors about the ‘proper’ meaning and history of the place (Vladimir Bobrovnikov, personal communication). This can be interpreted as an attempt of the state to attain hegemony over the interpretation of such sites. In Chechnya, the local form of Islam, based on Sufi traditions, is officially advertised as a remedy against Islamist fundamentalism. The autocrat leader of the republic, Ramzan Kadirov, is often seen publicly joining the Sufi zikr dance in order to illustrate his attachment to ‘traditional’, that is, peaceful Islam. Any form of religious deviance in the field of Islam is violently repressed, and the label ‘Wahhabi’ serves as an easy discrediting label for potentially oppositional political forces. The local Sufi Islam is declared as the embodiment of religious tolerance, and ‘religious tolerance’ in this context serves dictatorial purposes. Yet, there are also attempts to link to the larger world of Islam and to brand the country as fervently Muslim. It is worth noting that one of the largest protests against the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists took place in Grozny, on 19 January 2015. Other places in the North Caucasus such as Kabardino-Balkaria are characterized by a widespread absence of non-canonical sacred sites. Places of worship are mainly mosques, but also churches and synagogues, with almost no traces of ‘folk religion’ to be detected in the sacred landscape. The reasons for the extensive absence of hybrid or pre-Islamic sacred places are to be found in past efforts to symbolically demarcate ‘proper’ Islam in contrast to formerly prevailing forms of Christian and pagan religiosity, and in the current omnipresent fear of ‘Wahhabi’ fighters, who have targeted such places in the past.4 The process of visible re-inscription of the Russian Orthodox Church in local community landscapes and life-rituals in Kuban region is described by Hege Toje, who views the role of the Russian Church as a new source of tension and ambivalence in a multi-ethnic village. Similarly, in Armenia, female caretakers of abandoned shrines in the Kotaik region face harsh critique from representatives of the Armenian Apostolic Church for performing ‘paganism’

8  Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

as they ‘pollute the territory with self-made low-quality ­candles’ (see the chapter by Abrahamian et al.). Without going into greater details, it should be noted that these important observations on transformative characters of sacred sites highlight the role of women as actors in ritual observance. Women play important roles in maintaining shrines and sacred places as the ‘shadow workers’ (in Ilich’s sense) of religious observances, preparing offerings and attending services (more often than men). In some instances, women come to the foreground as ritual performers or shrine administrators, as demonstrated in the chapters by Nino Tserediani et al., Hamlet Melkumyan and Tsypylma Darieva. Male domination can be observed in zones associated with principal institutional religions (Christianity, Islam, Judaism), as well as with the indigenized ‘­paganisms’ of Abkhazia, Ossetia and Pshav-Khevsureti. In contrast to orthodox institutionalized faiths, scholars portrayed sacred sites in Central Eurasia, including the Caucasus, as a part of the ‘little tradition’– that is, one that is rural, small, unofficial and female. In opposition to this, for example, Sunni Islamic institutions should be interpreted as part of the institutional, ‘great tradition’ that reflects the dominant male, urban, religious lifestyle (Redfield 1955; Basilov 1970; Grant 2011). Tsypylma Darieva outlines significant shortcomings in this division, as it obscures interactions between different actors, believers and non-believers, including rural and urban pilgrims with a common identity, as belonging to the ‘same’ religious and ethnic community. Moreover, this differentiation between literate and institutionalized versus oral and localized fails to address change and diversity existing in the discourses and practices that cluster around pilgrimage sites in the modern Caucasus. Thus, we question the appropriateness of the model of ‘little’ and ‘great’ traditions of religious practice, which proposes a clear hierarchy between shrines and institutionalized churches and mosques.

Sharing vs. Not-Sharing Much attention has been paid to the discussion on shared and mixed sacred sites (Hayden 2002; Albera 2012; Bowman 2012) in different parts of the world. Literature published on such sites in the Mediterranean, the Near East and India outlined how crucial these places are for the maintenance of local social life and everyday interaction, and how they have been increasingly marginalized and limited in time and place (Bigelow 2010; Bowman 2012; Albera and Couroucli 2012; Barkan and Barkey 2014).

Introduction  9

According to Albera a typical mixed shrine in the Mediterranean region is located in a rural and peripheral area, beyond the reach of central authorities and clerical presence, which presumably makes them conducive to interfaith crossovers (Albera and Couroucli 2012: 228). But we need to avoid assuming a simple uniformity of coexistence modes. Sacred places that have a larger attendance and are under a stronger surveillance by the clerics may generate significant bonds that encourage people to cross the religious divide. For example, in Baku, Azeri Muslim women and men visit the Russian Orthodox Church for their own purposes, namely because it is believed that the Russian priest has the power to get rid of the evil eye. In Azerbaijan, practices of sharing sacred sites are still observable and can be found in everyday narratives, popular stories and hagiographic literature on saints and pirs. There is a certain disagreement concerning the mode of tolerance and quality of openness underlying the nature of this sharing or mixing. Some say that sharing sacred sites fosters sentiments of mutual belonging, and attachment to place (e.g. Bowman 2012). Others argue, in contrast, that it is rather antagonistic tolerance that comes into play here: groups accept the presence of other groups only as long as they cannot be expelled (e.g. Hayden 2002). Not much attention has been paid to the not-sharing of sacred sites, however. This void could be indicative of the implicit assumption that not-sharing equals hostility, or at least hinders the friendly coexistence of groups. But is this really so? There is ample evidence in anthropological literature that not sharing artefacts may posit a mode of participation in certain contexts. Annette Weiner (1992), for example, pointed out that preserving certain objects from free circulation creates the kind of value that is a precondition for material transactions. These objects provide the reserves for individuals and societies that allow them to interact with a world that is difficult to calculate and to understand. Not sharing, in this sense, is not to be seen as antagonistic, but as a way of engagement with other groups and the world at large – a way of engagement that is oriented towards ­sustainable social and human-nature relations. Against this backdrop, it is worth asking whether not sharing sacred sites is necessarily a sign of lack of tolerance, or at least awareness, towards other groups, or could – in certain specific contexts that need to be spelled out – also contribute to getting along well. It is worth asking, then, whether not sharing sacred sites may be an expression of tolerance instead of intolerance. This point makes us rethink political or social theories of cohabitation in this region. Florian Mühlfried explicitly poses this question in his contribution to this volume, drawing

10  Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

on case material concerning the relations of Christian and Jewish populations in a highland area of Georgia. Furnishing this question with a certain twist, Silvia Serrano, in contrast, asks what it means to share the non-sacred in a multi-confessional context. The example she is drawing upon stems from the desacralized religious complex in Rabati (Georgia), which contains a mosque, a church and a synagogue, manifesting a political discourse of hierarchy between those who tolerate and those who are tolerated. Serrano discusses how holy places become part of the political arena and how policy makes fuzzy religious frontiers tangible. As these case examples from the Caucasus indicate, cohabitation does not necessarily lead to sharing, collaboration or religious mixing. This observation runs against the widespread hope among scholars that in crisis regions like the Caucasus or the Balkans, which are currently dominated by nationalism, ethnic competition, and social conflict, examples from the past or remote spaces will show us genial collaborations and cooperation. Instead, the further afield we go, we may find, effectively, genealogies of the present. This challenges mainstream perceptions of the Caucasus as a space of contact that creates shared lifeworlds. Whereas historical heterogeneity is without any doubt a core feature of the Caucasus, a shared sense of belonging is not to be taken for granted.

New States, New Boundaries Within desecularization processes, we observe homogenizing projects with the tendency to purify, nationalize or eradicate ‘deviant’ hybrid places, practices and memories from the mental map of the nation and religious congregation. The studies carried out in the Mediterranean area help to shed light in religious homogenization and religious mixing around sacred places (Albera and Couroucli 2013). In many respects, the situation of shared sacred sites in the post-Soviet Caucasus is comparable with the post-imperial landscape in the Mediterranean area, marked by the disappearance of the joint use of sacred sites by Muslims and Christians (forthcoming Darieva, Kahl and Toncheva). The role of the state in these processes has been neglected. However, shrines, tombs and sacred sites do not operate independently from political forces. The micro-dynamics of social change and a new choreography of hybrid sacred places may be influenced by the state authorities either to appropriate or abolish it. In both cases state institutions or state sponsored clerics produce narrative claims, purification rites and performative practices to take control over ‘informal’ and alternative sites. While acknowledging the rise of a new control, state authorities do not necessarily possess a

Introduction  11

monopoly for defining and shaping the social life and conflicts surrounding sacred places. There are at least three types of actors: state-sponsored mainstream religious institutions (the Georgian Orthodox Church, the Armenian Apostolic Church, Qafkas Müsülmanlari Idaresi in Azerbaijan (QMI), and the North Caucasus Muslim Spiritual Board in the Russian Caucasus); religious ‘purists’ (such as Salafi Muslims); and the intelligentsiya. All three types of actors for legitimizing activities and claiming proper behaviour can invoke the name of the state. The criticism of ‘deviant’ rituals and ‘unacceptable’ local customs at sacred sites, expressed by new religious ‘purists’, is paradoxically shared by scholars and educated young people (compare with Abashin and Bobrovnikov 2003). In Dagestan the veneration of Muslim saints is opposed to official Islam as a relic of the premodern past (Bobrovnikov 2014). The purification events described at the beginning of the introduction have given way to isolation of the Christian and the Muslim communities in north-east Georgia, a process that could lead to mutual religious radicalization. It is the state, which is much more interested in controlling clerics and lay people simultaneously. But some places are exceptions; for example, in Abkhazia, where hybrid shrines are actually linked ‘from above’ to the making of the nation. Purification and eradication of hybrid sacred sites is not part of desecularization processes in the north-western Caucasus as Igor Kuznetsov shows in this volume. In Abkhazia, ‘folk’ shrines are at the centre of state attention. The flag of Abkhazia features seven stars as references to its seven main ‘pagan’ shrines, and one of these shrines (Dydripsh-nykha) serves as a venue for state performances, as in 1993, when the Abkhaz victory over Georgia was celebrated there. It is also quite unique that the shrine priest of Dydripsh-nykha, Zaur Chichba, was the first person to deliver a congratulatory speech and blessing of President Vladislav Ardzinba at his inauguration in 1997.5 Viewed together, five modes of interaction with hybrid sacred sites can be identified: • Outright destruction (such as occurred in the Pankisi valley of Georgia where a traditional shrine was allegedly destroyed by Islamic fundamentalists). • Purification (as in the case of the Alaverdoba festival, mentioned earlier). • Toleration (as to a certain extent in Armenia and Azerbaijan). • Control (as in Dagestan and Chechnya, where authorities impose norms and control access to shrine territories, but do not directly interfere in veneration practices).

12  Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

• Appropriation and incorporation (as in Azerbaijan and Abkhazia, where some communal (‘folk’) practices are usurped by state authorities as identity markers).

These modes allow for a rough and preliminary, yet significant, mapping of the current state of religious affairs in the Caucasus. What we find is a sketchy mosaic of religious radicalisms, revivalism projects, amalgamations of civic and religious virtues, instrumentalizations of sacred sites for secular endeavours, and sanctifications of ‘paganism’. This ‘map’ can only be reasonably interpreted when considering the role of the state in the processes and phenomena depicted. For it is the state that backs religious institutions such as the Georgian Orthodox Church or the Armenian Apostolic Church; it is the state that initiates educational projects like the setting up of plaques at sacred places; it is the state that tries to instrumentalize ‘traditional’ forms of Islam in order to oppose the real or fictional threat of global religious fundamentalism; and it is state-sponsored authorities and discourses that assign ‘traditional religion’ a constitutive role to the nation. In contrast to the prevalent ‘ethnographic’ depictions of sacred sites in the Caucasus as fixed in time and space and untouched by modern achievements, we advocate not only a processual approach, but one that takes seriously the role of the state in the recent transformation of religious regimes in post-secular societies. Some accounts provided by the volume demonstrate that sacred sites and belief in the power of saints are not necessarily in a permanent contradiction with the state. The veneration of saints and pilgrimages may undermine or support political authority and national grand narratives, and even emerge from the state.6 These observations are in contrast, for instance, with the Western view on Islam in Eurasia, which generally identifies the notion of ‘being Muslim’ in the Soviet Union as an oppositional one to the secular state and more precisely as an expression of ‘alternative’ and underground forces in the secular society (Bennigsen and Wimbush 1985; Saroyan 1997). In many areas there is a relatively peaceful cooperation between pilgrims, the state and caretakers of ‘folk’ shrines and pilgrimage sites. Explicitly or implicitly, interacting with ‘others’ can occur without denying them (male, official religious institutions, state). One important observation to emphasize in this volume is the fact that pilgrims and participants of shrine festivals, by recognizing local differences and deviant practices from the conventional tenets, do not oppose themselves to Christianity and Islam, the Church and Umma, rather they actively present themselves as being true Christians or true Moslems and part of larger Christian or Muslim communities without religious polarization. Some research findings indicate that local

Introduction  13

communities develop different strategies for legitimizing and claiming their own sacred places: the role of dream narratives (Armenia), incorporation of secular figures such as communist leaders in saint narratives (Azerbaijan), informality (no site keepers in Dagestan, Svanetia), or the flexible modification of shrine rituals as a response to new border regimes between Georgia and Azerbaijan (see the chapter by Nino Aivazishvili-Gehne). This is to say ‘weapons of the weak’, whereby locals use different strategies as tools for legitimation, conformity with the state authorities and the continuous adjusting of local practices to new political and social realities. The transformation of sacred places, competition and contestation with respect to the proper way to worship and behave are by no means specific to the post-Soviet Caucasus. However, the research findings in this volume offer a new perspective in understanding and theorizing desecularization processes and religious pluralism in the post-socialist Caucasus beyond the prevailing views and divisions between premodern and postmodern practices and ideas, and discourses on little and great traditions. The process of contestation reveals a plurality of ways of being Christian and Muslim in a secular world. The sites in the Caucasus can accommodate a plurality of meanings, interpretations and practices. The question is to what extent the ‘return’ of state ­control over shrine and pilgrimage networks will affect religious life and the permeability of religious b ­ oundaries in a long-term perspective. Tsypylma Darieva is senior scholar at the Centre for East European and International Studies (ZOiS) in Berlin and teaching at Humboldt University Berlin. Her research and teaching interests include anthropology of migration, diaspora and homeland, urbanity and sacred places in Central Eurasia. She has conducted fieldwork in Azerbaijan, Armenia, Kazakhstan and Germany. Darieva is the author of Russkij Berlin: Migranten und Medien in Berlin und London (LIT, 2004), co-­editor of Cosmopolitan Sociability: Locating Transnational Religious and Diasporic Networks (Routledge, 2011), Urban Spaces after Socialism: Ethnographies of Public Places in Eurasian Cities (Campus, 2011) and of the forthcoming volume Sakralitat und Mobilitat in Sudosteuropa und im Kaukasus. Florian Mühlfried is a social anthropologist in the Caucasus Studies Programme at the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena. Previously, he

14  Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

was a research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology and a visiting professor at UNICAMP, Brazil. He has published the monograph Being a State and States of Being in Highland Georgia (Berghahn, 2014), a book on feasting in Georgia (ibidem, 2006) and edited the volume Mistrust: Ethnographic Approximations (Transcript, 2017). Kevin Tuite is Professor of Anthropology at the Université de Montréal. He also held the chair of Caucasus Studies at the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena from 2010 to 2014. Since 1985, he has conducted ethnological and linguistic fieldwork in Georgia, with focus on the highland provinces of Svaneti, Pshavi and Khevsureti. His publications include the Anthology of Georgian Folk Poetry (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1994); Kartvelian Morphosyntax (LINCOM, 1998), and Language, Culture and Society: Key Topics in Linguistic Anthropology (Cambridge University Press, 2006, co-edited with Christine Jourdan).

Notes Note on Transliteration: The range of languages represented in the contributions to this volume includes Georgian, Svan and Abkhaz (South and West Caucasian), Azeri (Turkic) and Armenian (Indo-European). The transliteration systems used for these languages were selected by the individual authors. For Russian, however, we use the standard English transliteration provided by the Library of Congress, available at http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/roman.html. 1. For details concerning the transformation of the Alaverdoba festival, see Mühlfried (2014: 142–144; 2016) and the documentary Alaverdoba 2006 by Dato Kvachadze and Florian Mühlfried, depicting the changes introduced in 2006 and the reactions of the affected populations. The film is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MtWczbtiX0. 2. By the term ‘world’ religion we refer to those institutionalized beliefs and religions that spread beyond their places of origin due to imperial influence, mobility, missionary activity, military conquest, etc. 3. The Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, South Ossetia and Abkhazia are three partially recognized or unrecognized states in the Caucasus. 4. For details, see Mühlfried 2016. 5. See also in Agababyan (2016). 6. Caroline Humphrey outlined this perspective in studies of the history of shamanism in inner Asia as constitutive of social realities in contexts of powers. See in Humphrey (2008).

Introduction  15

References Abashin, S. and V. Bobrovnikov (eds). 2003. Podvizhniki islama: Kul’t sviatykh i sufism v Srednei Asii i na Kavkaze. Moscow: Vostochnaia literatura. Agababyan, A. 2016. ‘“Vo chto my verim?” Vozrozhdenie “traditionnoi religii” v postvoennoi Abkhazii’, Gosudarstvo, religiia, tserkov’ 2(34): 67–91. Albera, D. 2012. ‘Combining Practices and Belief: Muslim Pilgrims at Marian Shrines’, in G. Bowman (ed.), Sharing the Sacra: The Politics and Pragmatics of Intercommunal Elations around Holy Places. Oxford and New York: Berghahn Books, pp. 10–24. Albera R. and M. Couroucli (eds). 2012. Sharing Sacred Spaces in the Mediterranean: Christians, Muslims, and Jews at Shrines and Sanctuaries. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press. Barkan, E. and K. Barkey. 2014. Choreographies of Shared Sacred Sites: Religion, Politics, and Conflict Resolution. New York: Columbia University Press. Basilov, V. 1970. Kul’t sviatykh v islame. Moscow: Mysl’. Bennigsen, A. and E. Wimbush. 1985. Mystics and Commissars: Sufism in the Soviet Union. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Berger, P. 1999. The Desecularization of the World: Resurgent Religion and World Politics. Washington DC: Ethics and Public Policy Center. ______. 2014. The Many Altars of Modernity: Toward a Paradigm of Religion in a Pluralist Age. Boston, MA: De Gruyter. Bigelow, A. 2010. Sharing the Sacred: Practicing Pluralism in Muslim North India. New York: Oxford University Press. Bobrovnikov, V. 2014. ‘Gibridnaya religioznost v kul’te sviatykh u musulman yuzhnogo Dagestana’, in E. Larina (ed.), Vostokovedcheskie issledovaniia na postsovetskom prostranstve’. Moscow: Izdatel’stvo MGU, pp. 122–35. Bowman, G. 2012. Sharing the Sacra: The Politics and Pragmatics of Intercommunal Relations around Holy Places. Oxford and New York: Berghahn Books. Bulayeva, K. et al. 2003. ‘Genetics and Population History of Caucasus Populations’, in Human Biology 75(6): 837–53. Casanova, J. 1994. Public Religion in the Modern World. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Darieva, T. 2016. ‘Prayer House or a Cultural Center? Restoring a Mosque in Post-Socialist Armenia’, Central Asian Survey 35: 292–308. Darieva, T., T. Kahl and S. Toncheva (eds). Forthcoming. Sacrality and Mobility in the Caucasus and Southeast Europe. Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences. Eliade, M. 1957. The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion. New York: Harvest/HBJ. Fenz, H. 2008. ‘Zwischen Fremdherrschaft und Rückständigkeit: Die Satirezeitschrift Molla Nasreddin als Medium der Aufklärung im Südkaukasus’, in I. Pflüger-Schindlbeck (ed.), Aserbaidschan: Land des Feuers: Geschichte und Kultur im Kaukasus. Berlin: Reimer, pp. 41–60.

16  Tsypylma Darieva, Florian Mühlfried and Kevin Tuite

Gottschalk, P. 2013. ‘Introduction’, in M. Cormack (ed.), Muslims and Others in Sacred Space. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 3–14. Grant, B. 2011. ‘Shrines and Sovereigns: Life, Death, and Religion in Rural Azerbaijan’, Comparative Studies in Society and History 53: 654–81. Grant, B. and L. Yalcin-Heckmann (eds). 2007. Caucasus Paradigms: Anthropologies, Histories and the Making of a World Area. Berlin: LIT. Hadjy-Zadeh, H. 2011. Islam and Religious Freedom in Independent Azerbaijan: Analytical Reviews, Essay and Sociological Research on Religiosity in Newly Independent Azerbaijan. Saarbrücken: Lambert. Hann, C. (ed.). 2008. The Postsocialist Religious Question: Faith and Power in Central Asia and East-Central Europe. Münster: LIT. Hayden, R. 2002. ‘Antagonistic Tolerance: Competitive Sharing of Religious Sites in South Asia and the Balkans’, Current Anthropology 43(2): 205–31. ______.  2013. ‘Intersecting Religioscapes and Antagonistic Tolerance: Trajectories of Competition and Sharing of Religious Spaces in the Balkans’, Space and Polity 17(3): 320–34. Humphrey, C. 2008. ‘Shamanic Practices and the State in Northern Asia: Views from the Center and Periphery’, in M. Lambeck (ed.), A Reader in the Anthropology of Religion, Malden, MA: Blackwell, pp. 519–31. Jödicke, A. 2015. ‘Religion and Politics in the South Caucasus’, Caucasus Analytical Digest 72: 2–3. Kehl-Bodrogi, K. 2006. ‘Who Owns the Shrine? Competing Meanings and Authorities at a Pilgrimage Site in Khorezm’, Central Asian Survey 25: 1–16. Khalid, A. 1998. The Politics of Muslim Cultural Reform: Jadidism in Central Asia. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. ______. 2007. Islam after Communism: Religion and Politics in Central Asia. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Kormina, Z. and S. Shtyrkov. 2015. Izobretenie religii: desekuliarizatsiia v postsovetskom kontexte. St Petersburg: Izdatel’stvo Evropeiskogo Universiteta. Kyrlezhev, A. and A. Shishkov. 2011. ‘Postsecularism in Post-Atheist Russia’, Politics, Culture and Religion in the Postsecular World. Conference, Faenza, Italy. Lynch, G. 2013. The Sacred in the Modern World: A Cultural Sociological Approach. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mühlfried, F. 2014. Being a State and States of Being in Highland Georgia. Oxford, New York: Berghahn Books. ______. 2016. ‘Religion, Reinheit und Radikalisierung in Georgien – Vom Ende des Alaverdoba-Festes’, Osteuropa 9–11: 587–98. Nichols, J. 1992. Linguistic Diversity in Space and Time. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Reader, I. and T. Walter (eds). 1993. Pilgrimage in Popular Culture. Basingstoke: Macmillan.

Introduction  17

Redfield, R. 1955. ‘The Social Organisation of Tradition’, The Far Eastern Quarterly 15: 13–21. Saroyan, M. 1997. Minorities, Mullahs and Modernity: Reshaping Community in the Former Soviet Union. Berkeley, CA: International and Area Studies. Shishkov, A. 2012. ‘Desecularization in Post-Soviet Russia’, in D. Bradshaw (ed.), Ethics and the Challenge of Secularism: Russian and Western Perspectives. Portland, OR: Council for Research in Values & Philosophy, pp. 89–96. Swietochowski, T. 1995. Russia and Azerbaijan: A Borderland in Transition. New York: Columbia University Press. Turner, V. 1969. The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Wanner, C. 2012. ‘Introduction’, in C. Wanner (ed.), State Secularism and Lived Religion in Soviet Russia and Ukraine. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 1–26. Wanner, C. and M. Steinberg. 2008. ‘Introduction: Reclaiming the Sacred after Communism’, in M. Steinberg and C. Wanner (eds), Religion, Morality, and Community in Post-Soviet Societies. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, pp. 1–20. Weiner, A. 1992. Inalienable Possessions: The Paradox of Keeping-While-Giving. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

[•  Chapter 1  •]

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?

Situating Shia Saints in Contemporary Baku TSYPYLMA DARIEVA

W

Introduction

hile riding on the buses and marshrutkas (microbuses) of Baku, it is not unusual to come across a bleached photocopy of a portrait next to the driver’s seat. Looking closer, one will see a disabled person sitting on a European-style chair. The man is in his fifties and his right foot, face and body seem to suffer from a spastic gait. He somehow manages to look both banal and enigmatic at the same time. The man’s old-fashioned dress and his papakh (male headgear) indicate that he belongs to Baku’s pre-war urban merchant class. The cheap photocopy seems to bless not only the bus driver, but also the passengers within the busy city traffic. The name of this person is Mir Movsum Agha or Et-Agha, ‘Flesh Agha’, ‘the Boneless saint’. Mir Movsum Agha is worshipped by Bakuvians of different social backgrounds for his ability to heal without medication and perform miracles, regardless of his apparent physical disability. The description of traditional shrines and sacred sites in Azerbaijan has been the focus of a number of studies. The motivation for contributing to this area of research was the desire to better understand how far the cult of Shia saints and pilgrimage to a pir (sacred site) is embedded in Baku’s urban life, how the secular authorities interact with it and to what extent these sacred sites can be shared by members of a diverse multi-ethnic population. Recent anthropological literature on ‘urban religions’ has questioned how religious networks are incorporated into urban environments and how large cities affect religious diversity, innovation and the decline and vitality of beliefs (Orsi 1999; Desplat 2012;

20  Tsypylma Darieva

Burchard and Becci 2013; Becker et al. 2013). In fact, the relationship between urban secular settings and religious practices in the Caucasus has attracted little scholarly attention. This chapter seeks to understand how the notions of ‘miracle’ and ‘saint’ have been maintained throughout the Soviet period in an urban context and consider how these notions have been reinforced and contested in contemporary Baku. The practice of pilgrimage to pirs (saints’ tombs, graves, sacred trees or mountains) has typically been associated with the traditional lifestyles of Azerbaijan’s rural population and theorized as a ‘little’ tradition of practising Islam (Redfield 1955; Basilov 1970; Bennigsen and Wimbush 1985; Bobrovnikov 2014). However, it is obvious that practices of pir and beliefs in saint’s miracles form a significant part of modern urban lifestyles in Azerbaijan. Based on an ethnography of place-making conducted at selected pilgrimage sites and a review of the hagiographical literature, I explored the relationships between urban secular settings and the practices of ‘folk’ Islam by looking at how one popular saint is venerated in the heart of Baku. The initial aim of this study was to explore the ways Shia sacred sites are constructed on the micro-scale in the post-socialist urban context, by examining their design, function, materiality and sacred boundaries. It soon became clear that a historical perspective had to be included, especially with a focus on the early socialist period, which is particularly helpful in understanding how relationships between religious practices and urban secular culture evolved. One important point to make here is to underline the value of ‘peaceful’ coexistence between ‘folk Islam’ and the secular ‘ordinary’ world, in particular the role political regimes and state authorities play in maintaining the reputation of the saint. Certain authoritative figures seem to have been central to supporting the popularity of the saint and reviving religious practices in urban spaces, a somewhat paradoxical feature for the Stalinist era, which is perhaps better known for its anti-religious policies. In following the story of one popular Shia saint, the ‘Boneless’ healer (Sayyid Mir Movsum Agha) and the pilgrimage site associated with his life in Baku, highlights the manipulative character of the relationships between state authorities and miraculous power. The following questions are considered in this chapter. What innovative practices turn a place, in this case, a residential house in central Baku, into a sacred place? Who controls local Shia sacred places? How do Shia Muslims incorporate ‘outsiders’ into their narratives and what arguments are employed to prove the saint’s m ­ agical power? The research was conducted at two Shia pilgrimage sites located in Baku and Shuvelyan that are associated with the figure of the Boneless

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  21

saint and form part of the regional pilgrimage network. Methodologically, the use of a place-making ethnography and analysis can be understood within the theoretical framework of a situational approach. This method has the benefit of providing a more fruitful approach for understanding pirs and ziyarət gah (another term for holy sites) in a creative perspective. Place has always played a central role in the construction of sacredness, and my aim is to resist viewing them as timeless manifestations of religious power by conceiving the sites as socially constructed spaces and elaborating an actor-centred perspective (Lefebvre 1991). Systematic observations and an ethnographic case study were carried out at selected local pilgrimage sites to provide more focus on the behaviour and beliefs of contemporary pilgrims, as well as to shed light on how internal and external spaces of worshipping sites are used by pilgrims. Together with two field assistants, Yulia Alieva1 and Aynur Zarintac, I was able to conduct an informal survey with ordinary pilgrims at the saint’s residence house in Baku and at the Shuvelyan shrine. After considering the theoretical framework, I provide a description of the sacred site in Baku and the rituals carried out there. Following this, I examine the saint’s profile and look at how people narrate their experiences of making contact with the saint. By reflecting on this narrativization in the modern hagiographic literature alongside personal constructions of the pilgrimage, this chapter moves the focus to the perspective of pilgrims and their ways of turning the site into one of religious importance.

Pir and Ziyarət Gah in Azerbaijan Traditionally, sacred sites associated with pilgrimage and saints in Azerbaijan are called pir and ziyarət gah. Comprehensive anthropological literature exists on the veneration of saints and pilgrimage to pirs in rural Azerbaijan (Meshchaninov 1931; Yampolsky 1960; Balaev 1970; Pfluger-Schindlbeck 2005; Grant 2011). Etymologically, both terms come from Persian; pir means a holy site associated with ‘an older respectful man’, ‘master’, and ziyarət gah refers to a place one visits. Both terms are widely used by a variety of Islamic religious groups in the neighbouring regions of the North Caucasus, Georgia, Armenia, Iran, Central Asia and Turkey (Basilov 1970; Kehl-Bodrogi 2006; Louw 2006; Couroucli 2012). According to local anthropologists (Meshchaninov 1931; Alekperov 1960; Kulieva 2007), pirs and ziyarət gahs can be divided into two different types: archaic or traditional pirs, which find their origin in pre-­ Islamic, animistic beliefs developed in premodern egalitarian societies

22  Tsypylma Darieva

and more recent pirs influenced by Islam and Islamic styles in foundation narratives, design and architecture. Water springs or trees that are drawn on pieces of cloth tied to the tree’s branches can be identified as traditional pirs. These pirs can include isolated natural areas and objects like cliffs, stones, caves or natural countryside scenes representing regeneration rituals, fertility, health and local celebrities. The second category of pirs and ziyarət gahs have emerged from practices dedicated to the commemoration of pious Muslims, and are associated with names of Islamic missionaries and martyrs who became famous in the region due to their ‘supernatural deeds’ and power to heal people. Their location is usually indicated by a gravestone, a tomb construction or a small shrine (gumbez, mazar). The authority of pirs and ziyarət gahs is usually based on their genealogical links to a specific Islamic lineage known as sayyid, which provides a chronology of those considered to be the direct descendants of Prophet Mohammed. Sayyids can carry spiritual power, provide healing and act as communicators between human beings and Allah. They are recognized in the Caucasus as a category of privileged people forming a social cast of educated pious Muslims. However, not all sayyids can achieve the status of saints. In this regard, like any other sacred site, pirs are not abstract domains, but distinct places, which can be imagined, constructed, experienced and modified.

The Dichotomy between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions Over the past decades, pir and ziyarət gah have been understood by many scholars in opposition to official high-level religious institutions and spaces like mosques. Within this classification, Muslim Shia saints are believed to act as middlemen or transmitters between Allah and human beings (Asad 1986; Saroyan 1997; Gottschalk 2013). In contrast to orthodox institutionalized Islam, sacred sites in the Caucasus have been seen as a part of a ‘little tradition’ – that is, one that is rural, small, unofficial, unorthodox and female. In opposition to this, scholars have portrayed Sunni Islamic institutions as part of an institutional, ‘great tradition’ that reflects the dominant male, urban, religious lifestyle. According to Redfield (1955), mosques in the Middle East and Africa were always at the heart of the ‘orthodox’, male Islam that is practised in towns and cities. Shrines, on the other hand, were seen to represent various manifestations of a ‘popular’ Islam practised by rural believers with little knowledge of scriptural Islam.

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  23 Table 1.1 The differences between pirs and mosques Pirs and ziyarət gahs Mosques

Unofficial, informal, mixed, female, rural Official, formal, orthodox, male, urban

This division, however, obscures interactions between the different actors, including rural and urban believers and non-believers. Moreover, this differentiation fails to address change, complexity and diversity existing in the discourses and practices that cluster around pilgrimage sites in modern Azerbaijan. While Soviet scholars also followed this dichotomy when interpreting local practices such as saint veneration, an important difference should be noted. Whereas for Western scholars the great versus little tradition dichotomy organized differences in spatial terms by opposing a rural Islam to an urban Islam (Desplat 2012), for Soviet scholars it was important to emphasize that pirs and sacred sites in the Caucasus and Central Asia originated in pre-Islamic and pre-Christian traditions and meanings. In the Soviet historiography, the notion of pre-Islamic tradition was closely related to the evolutionist explanations of earlier societies sharing a sense of common property. By treating sacred sites as archaic, the Soviet evolutionary approach actually separated them from ‘real religious institutions’. This view still can be found in contemporary local discourses on the meaning of pir tradition in Azerbaijan. As Meshchaninov posited in his influential article, the specific feature of pirs is their universality: ‘Pirs do not reveal to us the world of an ethnos so much as that of world history more broadly’ (Meshchaninov 1931: 17). In this way pirs have been seen as ‘alternative’ and ‘other’, and this explains why shrines were able to retain a local meaning separate from ‘pure’ Islam. Moreover, some scholars have argued that pirs even flourished during the communist rule, as officials turned a blind eye to activities there. Those were seen as spaces where local traditions could exist without having a significant impact on people’s behaviour; instead they were considered to be the domain of private female religiosity and the superstitions of ‘old people’. Another influential opinion was expressed by Bennigsen and Wimbush (1985), who, in employing works by Soviet Russian orientalists,2 argued that pilgrimage to pirs was related to underground Islamic movements, which have been referred to as a ‘parallel Islam’ and Sufi offshoots existing outside the mosques (Saroyan 1997: 14). This movement is deemed to have been critical to the Soviet authorities and to have spread throughout the Northern Caucasus and Central Asia. However, this interpretation appears to exaggerate the heroic role of pirs during socialism.

24  Tsypylma Darieva

If we consider the discourse of local scholars, it is worth noting that the practice of saint veneration and pilgrimage to pirs are seen as a form of ‘traditional’ and ‘vernacular’ Islam followed by men and women, without making distinction between great and small traditions (Nemat 2010; Gasimoglu 2012; Alieva 2013). Nariman Gasimoglu, a Baku scholar who became famous in Azerbaijan for his liberal translation of the Quran into the Azeri language, and a member of the thinktank group at Baku’s Multicultural Center, points out (2012: 1) that Azeris are generally less ‘religious’ within the larger Islamic world and that local religiosity is different from what is practised in other Muslim countries (Hadjy-Zadeh 2011). He asserted that pilgrimage to pirs forms part of ‘old religious habits, which were inherent in the belief system of ancient Turks’ (Gasimoglu 2012: 3). According to local sociologists, pilgrimage to shrines functioned as a substitute for regular praying at the mosque during socialism. ‘In particular they rely on flexibility of pirs in crossing boundaries between the sacred and the secular: their ability to correlate with secular society enabled Azeris to maintain their faith during communism and to keep shrines undemolished’ (Alieva 2013: 150). The claim of local authors that pirs were not demolished throughout the time of socialism is only partly true. In her justified critiques, Pfluger-Schindlbeck argued that during early socialism pirs and shrines were also confronted with closure, prosecution and physical elimination. ‘Perhaps, one could even say that so called pure Islam or a high variant of Islam was to be created by the Soviets through their legalizing and officialising politics, as it is nowadays by the modern independent state’ (Pfluger-Schindlbeck 2008: 115). A study of the hagiographical literature and archive documents at the State Archive for Political Parties provides further evidence that urban and rural shrines and pirs were demolished during Soviet anti-religious campaigns, particularly during the 1930s. The tearing down of the Bibi Heybət mosque in 1937 in Shikh (Shikhovo) and the closing of the Təzəpir məscidi in central Baku in the 1940s are perhaps the most prominent examples. Moreover, the veneration of sayyids was condemned by the party by the end of the 1920s, with persecution continuing right up to the 1970s (Balaev 1968, 1970). By this period, sayyids faced exclusion from Soviet society and were labelled as ‘charlatans’ and tuneyadtsy (parasites) by Soviet officialdom. In line with these criticisms of the distinction between little and great traditions (Grant 2011; Desplat 2012; Bobrovnikov 2014), I agree that there are significant shortcomings in this dichotomy. Firstly, it obscures a great variety of Muslim practices and interpretations. Secondly, it reifies the right of Islamic theology to articulate a vision of a proper and ‘pure’ orthodox Islam. This dichotomy strengthens hierarchical relationships

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  25

between this ‘pure’ Islam and other varieties. Thirdly, this rigid dichotomy ignores the fact that shrines are also located in urban environments and that the practice of pilgrimage to them is an important element of everyday urban life. Among pilgrims at popular pirs in Baku and its suburbs one can find a large variety of visitors, both urbanites and villagers. The so-called ‘Little tradition’ is not, in actual fact, all that little and rural as earlier scholars of Islam have claimed. Shrines and sacred places can be modified and they can reappear in new forms and sometimes develop new meanings for pilgrims and society.

Religious Policy in Azerbaijan In the 1990s and at the beginning of the 2000s Azerbaijan experienced various forms of religious resurgence including the rebuilding of churches and mosques, an increased number of people making pilgrimages to Mecca and the increasingly visible practice of young ladies wearing head scarfs. In spite of these trends, it should be underlined that Azerbaijan remains a secular state and that urban life is not determined by religious rules and lifestyles. The monument for ‘Liberated Women’, built in 1970, became a symbol of secular Azerbaijan during socialism and still plays a significant role in the monuments landscape of Baku. Furthermore, in order to counteract recent religious activism originating from Iran and Turkey, the Azerbaijani government has attempted to increase its control over religious life in the country. From 2006 to 2008, the Azerbaijani authorities cancelled a number of Islamic television programs as well as Koranic education courses. They placed greater restrictions on the sale of Islamic literature in bookstores and on when the call to prayer in Baku’s mosques is held. Also the access to Sunni mosques was limited during Ramadan, and more recently during the European Olympic Games in summer 2015. Moreover, tougher administrative controls were introduced in 2009 following implementation of stricter re-registration requirements for religious organizations by the state (Motika 2008; Lilles 2013). In contrast to neighbouring Armenia and Georgia, which treat the mainstream religion, Christianity, as the state religion protected by the Constitution, Islam is not explicitly privileged in Azerbaijan. In this sense, it should be noted that the recent public revival of religion goes hand in hand with the growth of new secularism in Azerbaijan. These contradictory processes can be observed throughout the whole region of Central Eurasia. One could argue that sacred spaces and religious institutions in the post-Soviet Caucasus seem to perform as ‘a modern category, constituted

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by the hegemony of the secular’ (Casanova 2011), in which mosques, churches and shrines become visible sights and signs of various disputes. On one hand, relations between state elites and religion are shaped by the legacy of centralized Soviet policies that deeply shaped private domains and everyday life in the post-Soviet societies. On the other hand, some religious institutions and symbols became part of the state ideology and national narratives (Martin 2001; Louw 2006; Hann 2008). Pirs and ziyarət gahs are an important element in official Azerbaijani grand narratives, including that of the Aliev dynasty. The spectacular rebuilding of the Bibi Heybət mosque-sanctuary (the mosque was destroyed in 1937) inaugurated by Heydar Aliev (Heydər Əliyev) in 1998 is strongly associated with the strengthening of national institutions, rituals of the state and even with the signing of oil contracts with international companies. In this case it is perhaps not surprising that ‘traditional’ sacred places operate without getting into conflict with the secular world. Anti-religious policies in the Caucasus have had significant implications on how sacred sites have been transformed and conducted. Flexibility and obscurity both influence the ways pirs are managed in contemporary Azerbaijan. Two state institutions regulate larger pirs: Qafqaz Müsəlmanları İdarəsi (the Board of Caucasus Muslims) and Dini Qurumlarla İş üzrə Dövlət Komitəsi (the State Committee for Work with Religious Organizations of Azerbaijan, SCWRA). SCWRA is a secular governmental agency within the Cabinet of Azerbaijan charged with regulating the activities of religious organizations.3 According to the State Committee for Work with Religious Organizations, in 2014, more than 740 pirs and ziyarət gahs were registered in Azerbaijan.4 The Azerbaijani state does not place any serious restrictions on maintaining and restoring pirs as it is the case among some new Muslim communities and ‘non-traditional’ Christian sects. On the contrary, many larger pirs are managed by an aхund (a caretaker at Shia mosques), who receives a regular income from the Board of Caucasus Muslims. There is a significant number of informal pirs that have emerged around saints or pious Muslims’ tombs, gravestones and along larger roads. These are managed privately by those who claim to be blood descendants of the respective dead saint. The most obscure element in the process of managing sacred sites remains the question of how alms and donations from pilgrims are appropriated and distributed. Generally, the practice of venerating saints and pirs in Azerbaijan includes visiting shrines or the graves of saints. Contrary to normative and collective praying rituals according to a specific time schedule in a mosque, the act of pilgrimage to a pir and ziyarət gah is a social act, informal and relatively easily performed by individuals, both adults

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  27

and children. Visits can take place at any time (day or night) and any weekday for a variety of reasons. Pilgrimage does not involve collective praying under the guidance of an imam nor require reading books and knowledge of the Arabic language. This is an important aspect that allows the veneration of saints and shrines to be easily integrated into busy everyday urban life. Visiting pirs is thus always embedded in social processes and deeply intermingled with the everyday life of families and individuals. In 1931, Meshchaninov, a Soviet archaeologist, described how visiting a pir was embedded in the e­ veryday life of peasants: Villagers in Azerbaijan have successfully adjusted themselves to the new mode of life. A villager becomes a member of cooperatives, he registers his name at the local Idare-Ispolkom (administrative center), and he goes to Genje or to Baku, takes care of his businesses and stays for a night in a hotel. But before that, on the way to Baku, he visits his pir, a sacred tree and binds a piece of cloth to a tree branch. After his trip to Baku and having fulfilled his desire, he goes back to the sacred tree and removes the piece of cloth. He does not visit the mosque until the next large holiday, and, in any case, the mosque does not define his everyday lifestyle. (Meshchaninov 1931: 7)

Similarly, Pfluger-Schindlbeck outlined the pragmatic aspect of pir pilgrimages in rural Azerbaijan: ‘To be religious among rural people means, first of all, to believe in the viability of pirs and ziyarət gahs and less in an abstract notion of the divine world’ (2005: 125). Ziyarət visitors believe in the healing and therapeutic power of the place, which can be obtained through touching and kissing material objects: trees, stones, graves or other objects. Drinking water at a pir’s well is also associated with the act of healing and communication with Allah. Bringing alms and thanksgiving gifts, usually coming in the form of sweets, slaughtering a sacrificial animal or taking gifts brought by other pilgrims can help fulfil the desire to reach one’s goal faster. A common characteristic of any pir is that they are marked by the nazir-qutusu (the alms chest), which is usually a simple metal box fixed on a road close to the place of worship. For instance at Bibi Heybət mosque and pir, located on the southern outskirts of Baku, one can observe drivers going up to the grave, giving alms to the pir without leaving their vehicle (usually one to five Azerbaijani manats) and driving on after that. Altay Goyushov, Azerbaijan’s premier historian, remembered in his interview that his father, a teacher of Scientific Atheism in the period, always donated one ruble at the site. Drivers believe that they can obtain Allah’s

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protection from car accidents on the roads by paying their respect to the soul of a saint in such a manner.

Mir Movsum Agha and his Sanctuaries in Baku Mir Büyük Agha Abutaly-oglu, the real name of the Boneless healer, was born in 1883 in the İçərişəhər district of Baku’s old town and died in 1950. He was diagnosed with infantile paralysis and poliomyelitis that destroyed his motor neurons and led to disability and muscle weakness from childhood. Due to his physical weaknesses and immobility the saint received the folk name Et-Agha, the ‘Boneless one’ or the ‘Flesh Lord’. Somewhat paradoxically, given his disabilities, the boneless healer is worshipped by Bakuvians of different social backgrounds for his ability to heal without medication and perform miracles by touching, spitting on or looking at a pilgrim. This healing power can also be received through sweets, sugar and meat. The pieces of food must be eaten or drunk at the site and brought back to the home and distributed among family and household members.5 According to the hagiographic literature, Et-Agha’s grandfather, who was an educated merchant, moved from Kerbala (Iraq) to Baku in the 1870s. Hailing from a sayyid family, the descendants of the seventh imam Musi-Kazim, Et-Agha’s holy purity is based on his reputation for following a modest and sober lifestyle, avoiding such things as alcohol and sex. In narratives and pilgrim stories he is recognized as a pious person who deeply loved children and weak and poor people. These charismatic features overlap with descriptions of his worldly character as an ordinary human interested in current news and anecdotes, in particular stories about Mоlla Nəsrəddin.6 Rufad Mahmudov, Agha’s cousin’s nephew, described the social figure of Et-Agha in the following manner: Agha was a slim person; he did not eat that much, just minced meat. He did not drink any alcohol; however he smoked a lot, mostly ‘Kazbek’ papirosy (cigarettes without filter). He used to wear comfortable and simple garments; and he was always wearing his smooth leather shoes made by his Jewish neighbor, whose name was Maryash. This Jew really liked Et-Agha. (Zapletin 1999: 5)

There are two worshipping places that are ‘branded’ with the name of Mir Movsum Agha in the greater area of Baku: Mir Movsum Agha’s sanctuary in Shuvelyan (a dacha district 20 km from Baku) built in the

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  29

Illustration 1.1  A traditional carpet with Mir Movsum Agha’s portrait in the middle. Photograph taken by the author at his residence in Baku, April 2014

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Illustration 1.2  The Firdousi street in central Baku, May 2015. Photograph taken by the author

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  31

mid 1990s at his gravestone and his residence in Firdousi Street 3, in central Baku. It was this residence in İçərişəhər that was transformed into a ‘branded’ urban worshipping site during the Stalinist era. By ‘branded’ I mean that the site was established in the hagiographical literature and became an important canon in miracle stories and visuals for ­distribution among pilgrims and for sale among tourists. Until the end of the 1980s, a modest gravestone in Shuvelyan cemetery was ‘protected’ by local policemen to keep pilgrims away from the site. After 1991, Iranian investors and a local merchant, Nizami Suleyman-ogli, joined forces to erect a shrine edifice in the cemetery. Nizami became the custodian of the shrine later on. The contemporary ziyarət gah complex in Shuvelyan encompasses the large territory of the local cemetery in what is now a spectacular sanctuary edifice with two prayer halls and a minaret, which bears an architectural resemblance to the Imam Reza Shrine in Mashad (Iran). There is also a hotel for the pilgrims, a large canteen house for pilgrims, the poor and orphans, a gigantic covered parking lot and a modern slaughtering house, known as the gurban gah. In 2015 a poliklinik (health centre) was built for those volunteers who donate blood for medical purposes during the Muharram month (the Shia Muslim commemoration day of Imam Hussein’s death). Blood donation is becoming increasingly popular among men and women in Azerbaijan as a sign of Muslim piety. In the middle of the magnificent sanctuary, two gravestones, Mir Movsum Agha’s and his sister Sakina hanum’s, attract thousands of pilgrims, who arrive not only from the region, but also from neighbouring Dagestan. Along the spacious roads one can see flowers and bushes; it is clear that the complex is well maintained. Both pilgrimage places are managed separately by different keepers. Built at the end of the nineteenth century, Mir Movsum Agha’s residence house is located in İçərişəhər, an elegant stone house with a large wooden balcony. İçərişəhər, the walled Inner City in central Baku, is a ‘segregated’ community. It is a residential complex associated with the medieval traditional Muslim mahala neighbourhood, which was the core of the city before Baku became part of the Russian Empire and before industrialization, which started in the second half of the nineteenth century. This district largely avoided constructional alterations during socialist modernization, especially in terms of the sewage system and spatial ordering. It is not surprising that during the Soviet period the walled Inner City was considered to be a ‘backward’ district populated mostly by ‘traditional’ Azeri families and rural migrants (Rumyansev 2008). İçərişəhər’s status dramatically changed during the 2000s, particularly after UNESCO included the Şirvan Shah Palace and

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the neighbourhood into the list of world heritage sites in 2004 and recognized the neighbourhood as a key part of Azerbaijan’s cultural heritage.7 Gentrification processes have been underway in Baku over the last ten years (Darieva 2015) and the neighbourhood has been converted into a strategic site in the development of state tourism in Baku. Agha’s relatives share the ground and the first floor of the house with house guardians and pilgrims. The house of the Boneless healer is the site where religious practices occur and private domestic spaces merge with the public space. The worshipping area is around nine square meters in size, a tiny room without windows, and is located between the private living room of the shrine keepers and a kitchen. Everyone has access to this room at any time of the day. A large portrait of the saint made of black and white mirrored glass decorates the room. Underneath, according to the shrine keepers’ statements, one can touch Mir Movsum Agha’s personal armchair covered by an inexpensive plastic Persian carpet. Before entering the room, female worshippers put a scarf on their heads, approach the portrait, look at it, touch it, clean it or kiss it. After a short prayer, pilgrims leave a small amount of money (one manat or fifty gapik) on the table inside the prayer room, take sugar and sweets from a bowl and leave the holy room backwards. During my first visit to the prayer house, the shrine keepers showed me additional rooms in the cellar, which were supposed to serve as a sort of mosque for the Eurovision event in 2012. Two small rooms served as separate prayer rooms for male and female visitors, however they were usually empty. Later on, Hasan, the ziyarət gah keeper, explained to me that the most effective way to fulfil one’s desire is to sit on Et-Agha’s holy armchair. One should make an appointment with the guardians of the place, purify her or his body at home before coming to the place at around 9 PM, and sit on the chair for a while. The shrine keepers or custodians of the house in İçərişəhər are considered to be genealogical descendants of the holy Boneless. Mir Movsum Agha’s brother’s daughter, Goncha-hanum, her husband Hasan and their two adult children manage the house and guide the pilgrims in their ritual practices. The shrine keepers (pir-yiyeleri) have a variety of tasks to perform including: receiving pilgrims, offering informal ritual services like reading the Yasin surah for the dying (the thirty-sixth surah in the Quran), sustaining gurban gah (a ritual place for slaughtering animals), receiving and distributing alms (nazir) among the poor, old and orphans and shrine keepers. Custodians organize a regular ehsan (funeral repast) feast for members of the local neighbourhood community, friends and honourable guests, which is dedicated to the commemoration of Et-Agha’s death day (18 November) and Mavlud sessions

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  33

(feasts related to the birthday of Prophet Muhammad and to the birthday of Fatima, Ali’s wife). It is interesting that Madina, the 38-year-old daughter of the houseshrine keeper, is the one who serves as the ‘Quran reader’ in the Yasin surah reading, which, as an important element of the Islamic burial rite in Azerbaijan, is usually performed by unregistered imams or both male and female elders (Roi 2000). In her study of ziyarət gahs and pirs in Azerbaijan’s rural countryside, Pfluger-Schindlbeck (2008) noted the clear prescription that only elders can serve as a Yasin reader for the dying. In the case of female custodians, usually only those women who have passed through menopause are accepted by pilgrims. The urban context seems to enjoy more flexible prescriptions; Madina is also actively involved in mundane activities, such as running a beauty salon for women in central Baku. Another three persons, who are not direct descendants of the Boneless one, are relatives of the shrine keepers and are responsible for keeping the prayer room and courtyard area clean, making tea, washing and slaughtering sacrificial animals, emptying the money alms tray and filling in the nazir bowl with sweets. For their ­services they receive a part of the alms. The site receives a lot of pilgrims, especially on Fridays and Thursdays. No trees or pieces of ‘sacred cloth’ mark the site. However, there are three beggars sitting near the house, a small souvenir kiosk sells various religious reliquary objects, copies of Mir Movsum Agha’s portrait and kitschy souvenirs. Opposite to the house, there is a water spring (bulaq), a nicely renovated stone niche with comfortable seat places and flowers. The niche is a rare example of a place designated for animal sacrifice (gurban gah) in central Baku and the well-observed hygiene of the site seems to be an attractive feature for urbanites. An iron construction for hanging the slaughtered animal and a small groove with a hole in the earth for channelling blood are kept clean and well maintained.

The Pilgrims The area offers a specific protected site differing from the noisy Istiqlaliyyət Avenue, with its traffic and high-rise buildings. Bakuvians come to the place from dawn to dusk to ask for energy and strength in persevering, not only during times of individual, family or other crisis. It is also a site where visitors can take ‘spiritual’ rest and access a power that exists outside of Baku’s hectic everyday life. The pilgrims’ behaviour and the routine of their movements is standardized; while there is variation as to how much time they spend sharing their experiences with

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other visitors, they usually do not stay in the pir very long and hurry off to their next appointment. Some enter the place for qurban (slaughtering a sheep), and to distribute nazir among the other pilgrims. Others do not enter the house at all; instead they pass by, touching the door and the house walls. In contrast to larger mosques and official religious spaces that are dominated by males and often controlled by the state authorities, the house is a private space that appears to be simultaneously ‘owned by the people’. According to my observations in April 2014, within two hours more than 200 people visited the house. Visiting the sacred site usually takes around five minutes. Compared to pilgrimage practices in Shuvelyan or other larger shrines in Nardaran or Beshbarmak-ziyarət gah, which is a time-consuming activity involving the climbing of a mountain and a picnic at the end, it is a brief act. If we consider this visit within the context of modern urban life and phenomena such as fast food and take-out culture, we could call it an urban fast-prayer site. Even the activity of slaughtering animals does not take a long time; a sheep is professionally slaughtered within thirteen minutes. Pilgrims visit the holy place with a special niyyet (in Arabic: intention, desire) that can be fulfilled by visiting the saint’s house. A believer, whose desire has been fulfilled, brings sweets, usually white and yellow sugar pieces, halva or cakes for distribution among other site visitors. The act of sharing is a never-ending circulation of votive offerings. Those who distributed halva and meat were associated with giving a sort of blessing and good power to continue achieving goals. This sacred merit was not only for the person individually, but for the sake of the community in general and for poor people. Yampolsky, who studied pirs and their origin in the 1950s and 60s, emphasized the ancient pre-Islamic social meaning of nazir distribution as being typical for primordial egalitarian societies (pervobytno-obshinnyi byt), where the value of mutual property and collective usage of a territory around the pirs was an important feature of society (Yampolsky 1960). In this context, food serves as a material and spiritual agent of transformation that binds different worlds – the ordinary and the sacred. However, from the individual point of view, pilgrimage sites are seen as an aid in fulfilling secular wishes connected to the daily worries of people within the realities of urban life. This mundane world can involve a wide range of desires and plans, from passing school and university examinations to having children, getting married, buying a house or successfully coming through surgery at the hospital. Pilgrims and prayers are a very heterogeneous group of visitors, including old and young, children, families, female and male, poor and rich, traditional ‘rural’-looking women in scarfs (kəlağay) and ultra

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  35

muassir insanlar (very modern people) dressed up in Western-style clothes without covering arms and legs. The latter are made up of Baku’s well-heeled urban middle class; the pilgrims can range from a simple taxi driver to a professor at Baku State University. According to our observations and informal talks to pilgrims (thirty-two persons) in May 2015, a significant proportion of pilgrims use public transportation to reach the prayer house in İçərişəhər; others come by foot. All of those interviewed visit Et-Agha’s house regularly; however, with varying intensity: some of them come twice a year and others twice a month. The average worshippers learn about the pilgrimage site from their family members or neighbours. At the same time, modern channels of communication such as TV programmes, newspapers and Facebook are playing a significant role in ‘branding’ the saints’ reputation. It is interesting that a significant number of pilgrims have heard about the effectiveness of the Boneless’s healing capacities from doctors in the hospital. Thus, in the eyes of the pilgrims, official European-style medicine does not stand in opposition to beliefs in traditional healing methods. There are no strict regulations on the choreography of pilgrimage in İçərişəhər. Individuals, families, groups of students or schoolchildren, female and male worshippers visit Mir Movsum Agha’s shrine and the saint’s house by using the same entrance; they move in the same prayer room and use the same water spring. There is no strict spatial separation for male and female pilgrims. Though the majority of pilgrims are women, it would be wrong to state that pir veneration is a purely female tradition in the Caucasus. Many men attend the place as individual worshippers and not only as a driver or accompanier of female family members. A Bakuvian intellectual expressed his understanding as to why the majority of the pilgrims are women in the following manner: Usually you can find two types of people at pirs, lucky and unlucky people, both female and male. The fact that you see more women at this place says that they are less lucky and successful in this city, as it is not so easy to hold together a job and a family. The practice of visiting Agha’s house is popular among female business ladies, artists, and politicians like Guler Akhmedova, who was recently imprisoned for corruption.

The value of the pilgrimage to Et-Agha’s sanctuaries among female and male pilgrims can be defined as universal as it is suitable for different niyyets: the hope of changing one’s social situation or to improve her or his social status by alleviating general uncertainty, infertility, family problems, unemployment, parents’ or children’s diseases. Buying an

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apartment or a house, passing an exam at the school or university without having to pay an unaffordable bribe were popular motivators for venerating Agha’s power. For instance, a 54-year-old-female Bakuvian considers Et-Agha’s qaramat (healing reputation) to be important in maintaining a good life and the luck of one’s family in Baku. After she started to visit the site regularly and to give nazir, her daughter married an American citizen, and her son was lucky to avoid military service in the border area near Karabakh. The desire to marry and have children is a popular niyyet among female and male pilgrims, but not exclusively. Male visitors legitimized their beliefs in Et-Agha’s power by referring to the respectful attitude concerning Agha from the side of secular authorities like Heydar Aliev and Mir-Jaffar Bagirov. A 55-year-old male with a golden Tissot watch revealed his belief in healing capacities by ­emphasizing the pir’s flexibility: I am a true Muslim, however ‘bez fanatisma’ (without being a fanatic). I follow all the rules and obligations we know from Muhammad: namaz (prayer), oruc (fasting period). Unfortunately, today many Muslims have become fundamentalists. Islam is against terrorism and blood. I respect all holy books, the Quran and the Bible. Moses and Jesus were both Jewish, and today some of Muslims call for killing Jews. This is not a proper Islam.

Urban pilgrims consider Et-Agha and his house in İçərişəhər to be evidence of local flexibility in religious life. By enacting the sacred site in their own city, some of Baku’s pious Shia Muslims view the process of pir visitation as an act resembling or even replacing the grand pilgrimage (hajj) to the Kaaba in Mecca. A 35-year-old Russian-speaking Bakuvian woman, who introduced herself as an educated ultra muassir insan (very modern person), whose mother is Lezgi (ethnic minority in Azerbaijan) and whose father is an atheist, who ‘eats and drinks a lot’, said she was an active pilgrim believing that Islam should be seen in a broader sense: The meaning of our stones at ziyarət gah and pir is similar to the black stone in Kaaba. The sacred stone in Kaaba became black because of the sins many pilgrims left there. Basically, it is a memorial place like any pir in Azerbaijan. Shiites are more sensible for venerating saints and Sunni are more radical.8

It is exactly this belief and act of venerating saints that ‘purists’ claim to be incompatible with normative Sunni Islam. Indeed, Sunni

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  37

‘orthodox’ believers increasingly denounce pirs as sites of ‘pagan’ idol worship (idolopoklonnichestvo), and consequently condemn pir visitation as an ‘incorrect’ form of Islam. At the same time, some educated male and female Azeris explicitly distance themselves from traditional pilgrimage sites, which they view as a backward, naive and superstitious survival. If we talk about antagonism and intolerance evolving around these practices, then it is not along the lines of different religious confessions, but rather within different Islamic milieus. It is in this way that the Shia popular saint veneration practices construct flexible ‘shared’ spaces, which are not only sites of passage and ‘portals’ to other worlds, but also the sites where the city’s social life and history are inscribed.

Muslim and Secular Although pilgrims and shrine guardians say that the circumstances under which the house was turned into a pilgrimage site are uncertain, the general view is that the transformation was a natural result of his reputation for being an extremely effective saint in Baku. Several hagiographical books were published in the period between the 1990s and the middle of the 2000s containing various narratives ‘advertising’ Et-Agha’s life and his achievements, especially the miracle stories the saint p ­ erformed during his lifetime in Baku. Three basic types of the hagiographical ‘stories’ may be distinguished in these sources: 1) evidence of Et-Agha’s miracle healing reputation (qaramat) that became famous and simultaneously dangerous for the authorities; 2) the universal effectiveness of Et-Agha’s bərəkət (blessing) for people of different nationalities and religious belongings, and 3) stories of the ‘spiritual kinship’ between the saint and communist political leaders. It is interesting to note that a large number of these miracle stories are set in the 1940s during the Great Patriotic War. The most important milestone in Agha’s narrative is the year of 1943, which is frequently mentioned in the majority of the stories. I remember wartime very well and how Agha helped people. I saw how many men visited his house to get his blessings before they went to the front line. They took their shirts off and left them at Agha’s house. In doing so, they would say that if they survive this war, they would return to this house; take their shirts back and donate a nazir (alm). In 1943 we saw mountains of shirts stacked in Agha’s house. That was how strong the belief in Agha’s power was. (Zapletin 1999: 28)

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During my fieldwork in 2014 and 2015, I often heard that Et-Agha’s miraculous power could be useful for a person of any status, age, sex and nationality. Saints do not discriminate on religious or ethnic grounds said Goncha-hanim, Agha’s direct relative and the house guardian. From the end of the nineteenth century onwards and also in later periods, many scholars emphasized the high levels of social acceptability given to the mixing of religious groups on the territory of modern Azerbaijan (Meshchaninov 1931; Yampolsky 1960). Over recent decades, however, explicit references to such practices seem to have faded. Nevertheless, many stories still refer to this porosity of boundaries. Oral narratives and written accounts of the saints’ life and healing capacities manifest the basic openness towards the other, which includes not only local non-Muslims, but also tourists and foreigners living in Azerbaijan, among them the Swedish winner of the Eurovision Song Contest in 2012, the US ambassador in Baku and the Russian oligarch painter Nikas Safronov. There is a model of narratives and experiences that tell how the Boneless healer was venerated by non-Muslims, in particular by Russian Orthodox, Armenians and Jews, during World War II. As I was living in Agha’s neighbourhood, I witnessed many different things. But one episode I will never forget. It happened in 1943. One day I saw three Russian sailors (Black Sea Marine soldiers) visiting Agha’s house. But how did these sailors enter this house? By crawling from Monolit House at the Kommunisticheskaya Street to Agha’s house door in İçərişəhər! During the war, their warship was bombed and blew up. All the troops on the ship suffered a tragic death except these three sailors. Because, before jumping into the sea, they called Agha for help by repeating his name. They survived. After that they swore that when they came back to Baku they would crawl to Et-Agha’s house. (Zapletin 1999: 19)

Another story tells about an Armenian soldier, who visited Agha’s house before being sent to the front line, and how since that time Agha became his patron and protector during his lifetime. The Armenian soldier survived the war and returned to his home in Baku. At Agha’s funeral, in 1950, it was this Armenian soldier who carried the saint’s coffin on his shoulders from the saint’s house door in İçərişəhər to the cemetery in Shuvelyan. The second type of narrative – one that is often retold – on Et-Agha’s reputation as a ‘powerful saint’, focuses on his relationships with the KGB. Interactions of the ‘living saint’ with representatives of the official authorities had a performative character. ‘Pirs are connected to concrete

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  39

social figures who many either be feared or respected’, explained Bruce Grant (2011: 672). Indeed, the key ‘branded’ narrative underlining Agha’s superiority to the authorities emphasizes the moment of the near arrest of Mir Movsum Agha in his house in İçərişəhər by KGB and municipal authorities. According to the standard story, the Soviet authorities sent a truck to Mir Movsum Agha’s house to confiscate his property. Having loaded all of Agha’s possessions into the truck, the driver found he could not start the truck, which had been in perfect working order prior to this. It was only after all Agha’s property was unloaded that the truck started to work again. The most effective element in popularizing the saint’s authority was his generous ‘personal contribution’ to the victory over Nazi Germany. One narrative tells of an unexpected 300,000 ruble donation made by Et-Agha in 1943 to strengthen the Soviet military and produce tanks; another claims Et-Agha ‘was used as a secret weapon in WWII – wheeled towards the Dagestan frontier to ward off a possible German invasion’ (Elliott 2010: 153). Another mystical element of the dynamic relationships between the state and the saint comes in the form of a ‘spiritual kinship’ between the sayyid and party officials. Mir Jaffar Bagirov (Mircəfər Bağırov), the first secretary of the Azerbaijan’s Community Party (1933–1953), played an important role in protecting sayyids and popularizing the Boneless saint’s reputation. One story describes Bagirov as Et-Agha’s ‘secret admirer’, as both belonged to the lineage of sayyids. Evidence of their ‘spiritual kinship’ is provided in the name prefix ‘mir’ (Mir Jaffar, Mir Buyuk Agha), which indicates the social background of individuals or a family (Ismailov 2003: 45). In a similar fashion to Bagirov, Heydar Aliev, the former president of the Republic of Azerbaijan, chairman of the Azerbaijani KGB and member of the Soviet Politburo, also regularly appears in the ­hagiographic literature. In 1943 Aliev’s mom sent the 20 year-old Heydar to Baku to receive Mir Movsum Agha’s blessing for the whole Aliev family in Nakhichevan. At that time, Aliev was a national leader working at the Voenkomat (Committee on Defence) in Nakhichevan. Even though the saint’s house was under surveillance and Aliev ran the risk of being seen by the other chekisty (NKVD officers), he bravely entered the house, received a blessing, and as the result his niyyet was heard by Allah. (Zapletin 1999: 5)

These descriptions emphasize the intangible and complex links between the saint and the secular communist world, demonstrating the blend

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of repressive and devotional practices existing in 1943. Bagirov’s and Aliev’s appearance in these narratives make the situation more affective and likely, as the saint’s authority was located in a specific historical-political context. Altay Goyushov, an Azerbaijani historian, mentioned in his interview that saints and sayyids were first oppressed and then manipulated to achieve the party’s purposes. The most striking point in the Boneless healer’s story is that the first hagiographical book on him was written by Georgiy Zapletin, a non-Muslim former KGB officer from Baku, and was published in Russian in 1998. His contribution became the standard model in narrating Et-Agha’s activities. Zapletin’s brochure resulted in the publication of translations and a flurry of further interpretations. Thus, three basic topics have been transferred from the earlier publications and emerged, with some variations, as the leitmotif in these legends and the model for folk visionaries and individual experiences. These examples demonstrate how narratives can be deployed to forge a mutual understanding of being Muslim and secular simultaneously.

Conclusion The practice of worshipping Shia saints and shrines in Azerbaijan has been undergoing tremendous change, from persecution to strategic restoration and protection with the support of the ruling elites. In his recent article on shrines and sovereignties in Azerbaijan, Bruce Grant raised the important question of how the role of pirs changed across the twentieth century and considered who was exercising power over whom. Grant noted that pirs were seen in a more tolerant light than mosques and ‘there was a real anxiety of the part of the government that if these shrines were shut down too, they would really have a problem on their hands’ (Grant 2011: 665). While this is a very important observation, I argue that the sacred and the secular domains should be seen as intermingling fields. When considering the role of the Communist Party in the construction of the saint’s image and his authority, it should be recalled that the Party’s policy towards religion was far from uniform throughout the twentieth century, in particular when we compare the 1930s and 1940s. Anti-religious campaigns were not linear processes; in reality they were accompanied by religious revivals and the adaptation of the sacred to the secular world. Indeed, the year 1943 can be seen as a turning point in the transformation of anti-religious policy in the Soviet Union, as the state subsequently softened its attitude to religion and reopened prayer houses throughout the territory of the whole Soviet

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  41

Union. To intensify a sense of patriotism among the many different national groups in the USSR, the Kremlin turned to a variety of religious congregations to help bring order to society and additional resources in their mobilization efforts (Baberowski 2003). This policy was more of a short-lived measure to help Soviet military fortunes and their international image in 1943, on the eve of the Teheran Conference. In this context Et-Agha’s veneration was incorporated into the secular domain of patriotism and this shaped the process of turning the private house into a place of worship and made saint veneration more viable in Azerbaijan. The secular Azerbaijani government remains an important sponsor of religious institutions today and is simultaneously involved in different fields of conflict with social networks. Though pirs and ziyarət gahs are perceived as folk, informal and non-institutionalized religious practices, what is striking is that pirs and their guardians are not, as some scholars have claimed, an ‘alternative’ or ‘marginal’ to the state (Bennigsen and Wimbush 1985; Grant 2011) but actually seek the state’s protection and loyalty. The key feature of Shia shrine veneration in Azerbaijan with its local flexibility and an ability to cross ethnic boundaries and conventional autonomies has not yet vanished entirely. It is still possible to observe diversity among pilgrims and worshippers, who, in their common defence of the saint’s mystic reputation and demonstrate a shared sense of cosmopolitan social solidarity. Following the works of Bowman (2012) and Albera (2012), who studied shared sacred sites in the Mediterranean region, it is worth asking to what extent these examples can be characterized as social acceptance towards the mixing of ethnic groups in Azerbaijan. Is it better to view this as further evidence of the hospitality for which the Caucasus is famous or more an example of urban innovation resulting from secularization? It seems that in the present case, social practices around the sacred site, ideas of shared veneration can be seen as an expression of a common identity within the multi-ethnic neighbourhood of İçərişəhər. By inscribing the saint’s mystic reputation into the collective memory of the city, the practices of saint veneration have been incorporated into the field of ‘political interests’ and, in this way, Shia Islam can be seen as an essential part of the history of Stalinism in Baku. More generally, in agreement with Calhoun et al. (2011) and Casanova (2011), rather than treating religion and secularism in opposition to one another as two extremes, it is far more appropriate to view them as ‘overlapping social and political fields’. The present study took the next step, by looking at how and when beliefs in pir and saint veneration mix with secular domains and political power in Azerbaijan. The relations between the

42  Tsypylma Darieva

two domains may range from being full of tension to having mutual engagement. Tsypylma Darieva is senior scholar at the Centre for East European and International Studies (ZOiS) in Berlin and teaching at Humboldt University Berlin. Her research and teaching interests include anthropology of migration, diaspora and homeland, urbanity and sacred places in Central Eurasia. She has conducted fieldwork in Azerbaijan, Armenia, Kazakhstan and Germany. Darieva is the author of Russkij Berlin: Migranten und Medien in Berlin und London (LIT, 2004), co-­editor of Cosmopolitan Sociability: Locating Transnational Religious and Diasporic Networks (Routledge, 2011), Urban Spaces after Socialism: Ethnographies of Public Places in Eurasian Cities (Campus, 2011) and of the forthcoming volume Sakralität und Mobilität in Südosteuropa und im Kaukasus.

Notes 1. I am particularly grateful to Yulia Alieva (PhD candidate at the Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences, Institute of Archeology and Ethnography) and Emil Kerimov (Institute of Archeology and Ethnography) for their valuable support and informative discussions on pirs in Baku, and also to Niyazi Mehdi, Dilyara Mehdi (Baku State University), Novruz Nuriev and Umai Akhundzade. For thoughtful comments on different versions of this paper I am grateful to my co-editors, to Sascha Roth and Bruce Grant. 2. It was Lusitsin Klimovich’s hierarchical outlook that inspired the conceptual framework of the ‘Little’ and ‘Great’ traditions. See Klimovich (1962) and Saroyan (1997). 3. The main functions of the committee are registering and supervising the activities of religious organizations in the country. Since 1991 the government has required religious groups to re-register several times on the basis of new laws on religions or amendments. 4. See in www.scwra.gov.az. Last accessed on 29 March 2016. 5. ‘Bismillahir-Rahmani-Rahim (In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful)! Agha Seyid Ali Mir Movsum-zadeh, possesses the miraculous ability to bestow calm, belief and spiritual power upon people, who is often referred to as Et-Agha (Boneless Saint). He became a real legend back in his lifetime and achieved fame beyond the territory of Azerbaijan. Today, we know of many witnesses; Baku residents enjoyed the chance to see the Seyid, put their hopes upon him and experienced the wholesome touch of his hands. Thousands of people were saved from seemingly incurable and

Between ‘Great’ and ‘Little’ Traditions?  43

hopeless diseases thanks to his generosity and managed to make a recovery. People, as before, devoted trust in the power of his spirit, making a pilgrimage to him and bringing nazir (alms) as a token of their boundless gratitude’ (The Sanctuary of Mir Movsum Agha 2012). 6. Mоlla Nəsrəddin is the name of a famous protagonist of folk satirical stories known in Turkic- speaking and Muslim societies from the Balkans to Central Asia. 7. The walled city was removed from UNESCO’s heritage list in 2009 after uncontrolled development and damage to the buildings. Source: http://whc. unesco.org/en/list/958. Last accessed on 30 March 2016. Within the recent urban redevelopment project, the house in Firdousi 3 has been classified by Baku municipality as one of 200 memorial places on the local level. 8. A similar attitude to the centrality of local pilgrimage sites can be observed in post-socialist Balkan societies. See Henig (2012).

References Albera, D. 2012. ‘Conclusion: Crossing the Frontiers between the Monotheistic Religions, an Anthropological Approach’, in D. Albera and M. Couroucli (eds), Sharing Sacred Spaces in the Mediterranean: Christians Muslims, and Jews at Shrines and Sanctuaries. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, pp. 219–44. Alekperov, A. 1960. Issledovaniya po archeologii i ethnographii Azerbaijana. Baku: Izdatelstvo Akademiyi Nauk. Alieva, L. 2013. ‘Vernacular Islam in Azerbaijan’, Humanities and Social Sciences Review 2(3): 145–51. Asad, T. 1986. The Idea of an Anthropology of Islam, Occasional papers series. Washington DC: Centre for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown University. Baberowski, J. 2003. Der Feind ist überall: Stalinismus im Kaukasus. Munich: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt. Balaev, M. 1968. ‘Pochemu zhivet vera v ‚sviatykh’?’, Azerbaijan kadiny 8: 16–18. ______. 1970. Perezhitki kul’ta sviatykh. Baku: Elm. Basilov, V. 1970. Kul’t sviatykh v islame. Moscow: Mysl. Becker, J. et al. 2013. Global Prayers: Contemporary Manifestations of the Religious in the City. Zurich: Lars Mueller. Bennigsen, A. and E. Wimbush. 1985. Mystics and Commissars: Sufism in the Soviet Union. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Bobrovnikov, V. 2014. ‘Gibridna-ia religioznost v kulte sviatykh u musulman iuzhnogo Dagestana’, in E. Larina (ed.), Vostokovedcheskie issledovania na postsovetskom prostranstve’. Moscow: Izdatel’stvo MGU, pp. 122–35. Bowman, G. 2012. ‘Introduction: Sharing the Sacra’, in G. Bowman (ed.), Sharing the Sacra: The Politics and Pragmatics of Intercommunal Relations around Holy Places. New York: Berghahn Books, pp. 1–9.

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Burchardt, M. and I. Becci. 2013. ‘Introduction: Religion Takes Place: Producing Urban Locality’, in I. Becci, M. Burchardt and J. Casanova (eds), Topographies of Faith: Religion in Urban Spaces. Leiden: Brill, pp. 1–21. Calhoun, C. et al. (eds). 2011. Rethinking Secularism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Casanova, J. 2011. ‘The Secular, Secularizations, Secularisms’, in C. Calhoun et al. (eds), Rethinking Secularism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 54–74. Couroucli, M. 2012. ‘Chtonian Spirits and Shared Shrines: The Dynamics of Place among Christians and Muslims in Anatolia’, in G. Bowman (ed.), Sharing the Sacra: The Politics and Pragmatics of Intercommunal Relations around Holy Places. New York: Berghahn Books, pp. 44–60. Darieva, T. 2015. ‘Modernising the Waterfront: Urban Green, Built Environment and Social Life of the Baku Promenade’, Europa Regional 22(1–2): 65–79. Desplat, P. 2012. ‘Introduction: Representations of Space, Place-Making and Urban Life’, in P. Desplat and D. Schultz (eds), Prayer in the City: The Making of Muslim Sacred Places and Urban Life. Bielefeld: Transcript, pp. 9–34. Elliott, M. 2010. Azerbaijan: With Excursions to Georgia. Hindhead: Trailblazer. Gasimoglu, N. 2012. ‘Problems of Muslim Beliefs in Azerbaijan: Historical and Modern Realities’. Unpublished paper. Gottschalk, P. 2013. ‘Introduction’, in M. Cormack (ed.), Muslims and Others in Sacred Space. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 3–14. Grant, B. 2011. ‘Shrines and Sovereigns: Life, Death, and Religion in Rural Azerbaijan’, Comparative Studies in Society and History 53: 654–81. Hadjy-Zadeh, H. 2011. Islam and Religious Freedom in Independent Azerbaijan: Analytical Reviews, Essay and Sociological Research on Religiosity in Newly Independent Azerbaijan. Saarbrücken: Lambert Academic Publishing. Hann, C. (ed.). 2008. The Postsocialist Religious Question: Faith and Power in Central Asia and East-Central Europe. Münster: LIT. Henig, D. 2012. ‘‘‘This is our Little Hajj”: Muslim Holy Sites and Reappropriation of the Sacred Landscape in Contemporary Bosnia’, American Ethnologist 39: 751–65. Ismailov, E. 2003. Vlast’ i narod: Poslevoennyi Stalinism v Azerbaijane: 1945– 1953. Baku: Adiloglu. Kehl-Bodrogi, K. 2006. ‘Who Owns the Shrine? Competing Meanings and Authorities at a Pilgrimage Site in Khorezm’, Central Asian Survey 25: 1–16. Klimovich, L. 1962. Islam: Ocherki. Moscow: Izdatelstvo AN SSSR. Kulieva, R. 2007. Kul’t kamnia v Azerbaijane. Baku: Elm. Lefebvre, H. 1991. The Production of Space. Oxford: Blackwell. Lilles, T. 2013. ‘The Apparatus of Mediators: Religion in Azerbaijan’. The Tuqay, 18 March 2013, retrieved 13 May 2015, now offline.

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Louw, M. 2006. ‘Pursuing “Muslimness”: Shrines as Sites of Moralities in the Making in Post-Soviet Bukhara’, Central Asian Survey 25: 319–39. Martin, T. 2001. The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union. 1929-1939. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Meshchaninov, I. 1931. ‘Piry Azerbaijana’, IUAIMK 9: 1–17. Motika, R. 2008. ‘Religion und Staat in Aserbaidschan’, in I. Pfluger-Schindlbeck (ed.), Aserbaidschan: Land des Feuers. Berlin: Reimer, pp. 99–112. Nemat, M. 2010. Azerbaycanda Pirler. Baki: Elm ve Tahsil. Orsi, R. 1999. Gods of the City: Religion and the American Urban Landscape. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press. Pfluger-Schindlbeck, I. 2005. Verwandtschaft, Religion und Geschlecht in Aserbaidschan. Berlin: Reichert. ______. 2008. ‘Some Remarks on the Analysis of Religion in Azerbaijan’, in I. Pfluger-Schindlbeck, Aserbaidschan: Land des Feuers. Berlin: Reimer, pp. 113–24. Rasayanagam, J. 2011. Islam in Post-Soviet Uzbekistan: The Morality of Experience. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Redfield, R. 1955. ‘The Social Organisation of Tradition’, The Far Eastern Quarterly 15: 13–21. Roi, Y. 2000. Islam in the Soviet Union: From World War II to Perestroika. London: C. Hurst and Co. Rumyansev, S. 2008. ‘Oil and Sheep: Towards Baku’s Transformation from the Capital to the Capital City’, in N. Milerius (ed.), P.S. Landscapes: Through the Lens of Urban Research. Vilnius: EHU, pp. 228–66. Saroyan, M. 1997. Minorities, Mullahs and Modernity: Reshaping Community in the former Soviet Union. Berkeley, CA: International and Area Studies. Suleyman-Ogli, N. and K. Azif-Gyzy. 2006. S pokloneniem Allakhu: Nauchnoreligioznoe issledovanie. Baku: Ozan. Yampolsky, Z. 1960. ‘Piry Azerbaijana’, in Voprosy religii i atheizma. Moscow: Izdatelstvo Akdemii Nauk, pp. 9–28. Zapletin, G. 1999. Ya, Et-Agha-Jaddi! Zhizn-legenda Agha Seyida Ali. Baku: Gey-Turk.

[•  Chapter 2  •]

Women as Bread-Bakers and Ritual-Makers

Gender, Visibility and Sacred Space in Upper Svaneti NINO TSEREDIANI, KEVIN TUITE AND PAATA BUKHRASHVILI

One of the principal themes of this volume is the sharing (or

non-sharing) of sacred places. In our chapter, we wish to draw attention to another parameter, visibility, which can intersect in various ways with the susceptibility of sites to sharing or contestation. Visibility is not necessarily the same as accessibility; highly visible sites can be off limits to some groups, and less visible sites can be accessible to those who know where they are. Contributing to the visibility of a site are a number of factors, including: (i) Salience: The ease of detection of a site or installation, even by outsiders who do not participate in the local ritual economy. Contributing to the salience of a site are its size, shape, architectural features (in the case of a built object) and its prominence against its background. (ii) Coexisting or superimposed geographies of the sacred: A given territory may contain sites that are ‘visible’ to members of one community or group, but not to others. Some of the sacred sites analysed by the contributors to this volume are institutionally affiliated houses of worship (churches, mosques, etc.), which owe their visual salience to their size, placement and distinctive architecture. Other types of site – such as the gravesites of Muslim saints – are marked by ribbons and pieces of cloth tied onto a fence or tree branch by pilgrims (Grant 2011), which set them apart from similar

Women as Bread-Bakers and Ritual-Makers  47

objects nearby. Not all sacred places are so readily identifiable, however, as will be shown later in this chapter. Less salient sites included in the sacred geography of one community, might, therefore, remain undetected by other groups, including those competing for control of the local territory. Furthermore, the visibility of a given sacred site can change; this may be conditioned by a changing social or political situation, or be due to individual initiative. The pilgrimage route described by Abrahamian et al. in this volume includes shrines that are highly salient for both ‘folk’ and institutional Armenian Christianity, as well as folk-ritual sites and home shrines that only recently became ‘visible’ to the official Church (which is now seeking to exercise control over them). Sites that are ‘invisible’ to the powers-that-be are nonetheless at risk of being settled, razed, excavated or sold to developers. The literature on indigenous land claims contains numerous examples from Oceania, the Americas and elsewhere. The traditional lands of the Circassian tribes appear to have been cleansed of their sacred sites as well as indigenous inhabitants after the Russian conquest of the Western Caucasus a ­century and a half ago (Kuznetsov, this volume). In our chapter, we will present the preliminary results of what we hope will become a long-term investigation of Svan sacred sites, centred upon the issues of gender and visibility. Although (as will be shown below) the placement of sites used by both men and women appears to mirror the spatial layout of an Orthodox church and its adjoining properties, there is a marked contrast between the visibility of those sites where men perform the central ritual functions, and the near-­invisibility of women’s sites, many of which are known only to a small group of families. After a brief introduction to Svaneti and certain features of ‘folk’ Christianity as practised there, we will turn our attention to the spaces used for ritual performances, with a special focus on women’s ritual sites. The chapter will conclude with some observations concerning the intersection of visibility and contestation with regard to the sacred places of Svaneti.

Svaneti and the Svans Most of the research to be presented in this chapter was carried out in the Upper Svanetian commune of Lat’ali. Lat’ali comprises fourteen neighbourhoods or hamlets, with a total population of 1,496, according to the most recent government figures (making it the third largest commune in Svaneti). Many of those registered as residents of Lat’ali live part or all of the year elsewhere, in large cities such as Tbilisi or

48  Nino Tserediani, Kevin Tuite and Paata Bukhrashvili

even abroad. During the winter months, there appear to be only a few ­hundred people remaining in the commune. Svaneti is known for the medieval defence towers still to be seen in the villages of the upper Inguri valley (that part of the province earlier known as ‘free’ or ‘lordless’ Svaneti); the profusion of small but lavishly decorated churches; and the distinctive Kartvelian language spoken by the indigenous population, the Svans. This ethnonym (Geo. svan-, Sv. šwan-, Ming. šon- < Proto-Kartv. *śwan- (Klimov 1998: 179)) is old in Kartvelian, and in all likelihood designated the first known inhabitants of Svaneti, the oldest archaeological evidence of whom goes back to the Middle Bronze Age (Chartolani 1977). In view of the degree of its lexical and morphological divergence from its sister languages, the separation of Svan from the Kartvelian proto-language might have begun at this time. Svaneti is mentioned as early as Strabo’s Geography, from around the time of Christ, as a powerful tribe with a king, a council of 300 warriors and an army of 200,000 men. While some of Strabo’s affirmations seem unlikely to have been accurate, there is ample evidence that Svaneti was linked to the state formations of Western Transcaucasia in antiquity, and of sufficient importance to have been fought over by Byzantium and Persia in the sixth century. Orthodox Christianity could have been introduced to Svaneti around this time; claims have been made of churches dating as far back as the fifth century on Svan territory (e.g. the ruins underlying the Mother of God church at Pxut’reri, Etseri commune (Xvist’ani 2013). The principal phase of church-building in Svaneti was during the Georgian High Middle Ages of the tenth to thirteenth centuries; over a hundred churches were erected in Upper Svaneti alone. During this period the province also became a major centre of fresco painting and icon production. The local aristocracy, the most prominent members of whom enjoyed high status at the Georgian royal court, sponsored the building and decoration of churches in each village, hamlet and neighbourhood of Upper Svaneti. Aristocratic patronage also accounts for the exceptional prominence of iconographic themes favoured by the military elite: frescoes and icons of St George spearing his enemies (emperors as well as dragons), and scenes from the knightly romance of Amirani (most notably on the outer walls of a church in Lenĵeri commune).

Svan ‘Folk Christianity’ and the Ritual Uses of Public and Private Space Alongside the Georgian Orthodoxy practised in the churches that dominated public space in each Svan village, a parallel, non-institutional

Women as Bread-Bakers and Ritual-Makers  49

set of beliefs and practices emerged, which we will designate as ‘folk’ Christianity or ‘folk’ religion. The extent to which Svan folk Christianity continues the local pre-Christian religion remains a matter of investigation and debate (Bardavelidze 1957; Charachidzé 1986, 1987; Tserediani 2005; Tuite 2006). The cults of St George and Michael the Archangel – military saints popular with the medieval aristocracy – found fertile soil in Svan folk religion, as did Mary the Mother of God and Saint Barbara. The principal type of ritual is the presentation of offerings to Xoša ɣerbet (‘Great God’) or other divinities, while petitioning for assistance, prosperity, health or some other favour. Offerings take the form of (1) sacrificed animals; (2) bread; (3) vodka or wine; (4) candles; and (5) money. There are also rituals directed towards the souls of the dead, for the swearing of oaths, and for other purposes, which will not concern us here. Before proceeding further, we will explain what we mean by words such as ‘divine’ and ‘sacred’. Rather than making any claims concerning the ontological status or special attributes of sacred beings and places, we ground our usage of these terms in particular types of observable practice. Svans perform special types of speech acts, often accompanied by prestations of food, drink and candles, which are directed at invisible addressees, who do not answer (at least not in the manner of ordinary interlocutors).1 These invisible addressees can be grouped into three categories: the souls of deceased ancestors, who are commemorated on particular occasions throughout the year; demons and devils (mentioned in curses); and a third group of supernaturals, to whom Svans address prayers and offerings. The entities in this third group – invoked in prayers with the formulas didäb äǰqäd ‘may glory come to you’ or didäbi leqed ‘to whom glory comes’ – will be referred to as ‘divinities’ or ‘divine patrons’ (by this latter expression we denote those invisible addressees who are linked to a church, shrine or site). The prayers, offerings and associated acts will be designated as ‘rituals’; and the spaces where ritual acts regularly occur will be referred to as ‘sacred’ sites. Aside from Xoša ɣerbet and a few other figures, which are not linked to a specific shrine or church, most invisible addressees of prayers have composite designations, consisting in a saint’s name and the name of a locality, such as ‘Archangel of Nesk’əldäš’ or ‘Lamǟria (Virgin Mary) of Samt’äiš’. In Lat’ali, as in Svaneti as a whole, the saints’ names are drawn from a rather short list, so that a given village can have multiple sites bearing the name of St George, Mary or the Archangel. Furthermore, it should be noted that a designation of the type ‘Archangel of Nesk’əldäš’ can refer to either the divine patron or the site linked to that patron. In this chapter, we will not take a stance on the question of the individuality

50  Nino Tserediani, Kevin Tuite and Paata Bukhrashvili

of the various entities bearing the same saint’s name, nor on the extent to which the powers attributed to them inhere in (i) the sacred site; (ii) some object at the site, such as an icon or cross; or (iii) a supernatural being attached to the site. Folk-religious practices were likely to be limited to domestic and peripheral spaces within the Svan communes during the period when Orthodox clergymen staffed the local churches. With the decline of Georgian administrative and ecclesiastical control over the highland regions after the Timurid invasions of the early fifteenth century, and the imposition of Ottoman power in the Western Caucasus, the churches of Svaneti were appropriated as ritual sites by the local communities. With respect to Svan folk-Christian ritual practice, three components of church architecture and land use came to have special importance (see Figure 2.1): (i) t’ərbez. The sanctuary – which, in keeping with Orthodox practice, is oriented towards the east – continues to be the focal ritual space, as least as far as men are concerned. The Svan name for it is t’ərbez (