Introduction
Shiri is a small mountainous village in the North Caucasus in the Republic of Daghestan, the southernmost and the most multiethnic republic in the Russian Federation [see map Additional file
1]. The research area belongs to the Caucasus Biodiversity Hotspot (WWF and Conservation International). There are over 6500 species of vascular plants, around 25 % of which are local endemics [
1]. Simultaneously, it is a place of high cultural and linguistic diversity.
In the Daghestani highlands there are many social and cultural practices associated with plant collection. Therefore, we find it important to understand the relationships between people and plants. Various species of wild leafy vegetables are collected by local inhabitants in the area surrounding Shiri. While knowledge about those plants is still prolific, it is slowly being forgotten or not passed on, due to migration processes and low interest among the younger generations. To understand the cultural role of wild leafy vegetable uses in a given settlement, it is important to learn not only about the species and their uses, but also about the social aspect of practices linked to their collection.
During our research, we tried to answer the following questions: what species of wild leafy vegetables are collected and why? What are they used for? Why are leafy vegetables important to the local people? What makes them an object of desire for migrants?
In this article we will describe what species of wild plants are collected as leafy vegetables in Shiri and what makes them important to the local people. We will discuss both the local practices and the narratives. We will show the social context of leafy vegetable collection. We see such context of plant collection as critical component of people-plant relationships that are often omitted in ethnobotanical analysis (cf. Howard on gender relations [
2]) and are not widely discussed in the literature. Therefore, we find it important to undertake this discussion.
Daghestan and its social and botanical diversity have not received much academic attention in recent years. It is one of the last places in the Caucasus where people live on the slopes of the mountains, sometimes in very remote villages where wild leafy vegetables constitute an important element of their diet. While this is likely to change in the coming years due to migration, we found it important to take a closer look at wild leafy vegetables, their uses and social significance. Besides, as for example Rivera and colleagues point out studying wild vegetables may add to the knowledge of food sciences and toxicology [
3].
Daghestan with its high contemporary biocultural diversity and early agriculture development is a very interesting research spot for ethnobiologists but, according to our knowledge ethnobotanical research has not been done in the region. According to the survey on medical ethnobotany in Europe (including the Caucasus) done by Quave, Pardo-de-Santayana and Pieroni, most of the research in Europe is conducted in Mediterranean regions including the Balkans, while no work was cited from the Caucasus [
4]. The reason for this may be that the Caucasus is sometimes regarded as a part of Europe and sometimes as a part of Asia, Central Asia in particular. There is no published contemporary ethnobotanical research based on fieldwork from Daghestan. Hardly any research has been done in other parts of the Caucasus. There is a recent ethnobotanical survey from Georgia done by an international team of researchers, and the work on the subject is going to be continued [
5]. In their analysis of Mediterranean gathered food plants, Rivera and colleagues present a comparison with GFP in the Caucasian diet and they admit that there is not enough data on the subject. Their main source is the work “Rastitel’nye Bogatstva Kavkaza,” by Grossheim, published in 1952, which enumerates 500 gathered food plants for the whole Caucasus [
3]. There is an interesting work in Russian on wild food plants in the traditional cuisine of the Kabardinians. The book was edited in 2003 by Shkhagapsoiev, Shorova and Kozhkov, and sums up the work on the subject from the 1970s–2002 [
6].
Background
Daghestan is the most unstable republic of the Russian Federation, torn by internal political and social conflicts. Conflicts between power structures and the so-called Islamic underground, corruption, crime and overpopulation are but a few problems the republic faces (more [
7]). Most Dagestanis are Sunni Muslims and, in recent years, many have become more observant with regard to nutrition.
The Caucasus, and Daghestan in particular, is the place with the greatest linguistic variation in Europe, so it is not only a botanical but also a linguistic ‘residual zone’ – a place whose geographical characteristics are crucial for the survival of many language families in a small area [
8]. Shiri village is located in the mountains in the Dakhadaevsky region of Daghestan, near Kubachi, a bigger settlement famous for its production of silver jewelery. People in Shiri speak a distinct language which belongs to the Kubachi subgroup of the Dargi languages [
9] and has not been documented until recently.
1
The village of Shiri is situated on the northern slope of the mountain at the altitude of around 1500 m above sea level [see Additional file
2]. There are only eleven households in the village, seven of which are inhabited by Shiri people, and two by so-called newcomers. Some of them have been living in the village for over ten years, yet arrival from a different village (Tselibki) results in their “guest” status. There are also two mixed households. Over the three years that our research was conducted, some households changed dwellers, and two Shiri inhabitants died. Two households (with one elder each) were inhabited only from spring to autumn, while winter was spent in the lowlands, where access to medical care and shops is easier. In the event of snowfall or excessive rain, the road from Shiri to Kubachi is impassable. In other seasons it is accessible only by a four-wheel-drive vehicle. There is a mosque in the village and a small elementary school from first to fourth grade, with five students and two teachers. Older children are send to relatives in other settlements with better access to educational facilities. Most inhabitants of Shiri live off old age or disability pensions, cattle-breeding, cheese making or beekeeping (2 persons).
In Soviet times, people tried to grow vegetables in small gardens near their homes, yet nowadays only three of these plots are maintained. “Vegetables do not grow here as well as they do in the lowlands. And the Colorado potato beetle [(Leptinotarsa decemlineata)] eats them up,” one woman explained “I only keep potatoes and carrots for the children because it is ecological, clean of fertilizers”. Due to the economic growth in Russia in the 2000s, most inhabitants of Shiri can afford to buy potatoes, onions, carrots and occasionally cucumbers and tomatoes in nearby Kubachi. Watermelons and melons are brought to Shiri by minivan once in the season.
The number of people in Shiri is constantly decreasing from year to year. In the late 1950s, after returning from Chechnya, where the inhabitants of Shiri were forcibly resettled in 1944 by Soviet authorities (after the deportation of Chechens to Central Asia), many, seeing their houses destroyed, were both forced and encouraged by the state to move to the collective farms (kolkhoz) in Chinar (Derbentsky District) and Druzhba (Kayakentsky District), or to cities in the republic of Daghestan (Makhachkala, Derbent, Izberbash) and elsewhere.
Most of current inhabitants of Shiri were born either in Chechnya or in Daghestan shortly before or after the deportation to the Chechen village of Mayurtup. Some of them have learned about edible greens only in the late 1950s after coming back from Chechnya. They have some memory of collecting wild fruits in the forests of Chechnya but none of them remembered collecting the leafy greens. The parents of our interlocutors, who experienced famine during the 30s and 40s, might have collected edible greens as famine foods, yet the contemporary inhabitants of Shiri do not consider them as such and do not remember stories about collecting wild greens because of the famine.
The collapse of infrastructure following the fall of the Soviet Union has left many of them unemployed, resulting in seasonal migration to Moscow and other bigger cities outside of Daghestan.
Nowadays elders from Shiri are encouraged by their children to join them in the lowlands, while the younger generation looks for permanent or seasonal work outside the republic. Similar threats to biocultural diversity were found in mountainous regions of Georgia (Caucasus) in the survey conducted by Bussmann and colleagues in Georgia [
5] after [
11].
In the lowlands, Shiri speakers usually switch to Russian to communicate with neighbors of different ethnicity, while their knowledge of the standard Dargi language, based on Akusha-Dargwa, is usually limited to what they have learned at school [
10].
Once a year, around June 21, many migrants of Shiri origin visit Shiri to perform mavlid (recitations of specially written poems to commemorate the Prophet Mohammad’s birthday, also practiced on special occasions in Daghestan, like births, weddings, funerals, etc.) It is performed at the shrine (ziyarat) of sheikh Hasan, and visitors donate some money for the community. Wealthy migrants sponsor renovations of the ziyarat, mosque or other significant places in Shiri. In Daghestan the possession of goods or money obligates one to share with kin and co-villagers.
Knowledge about plants, including wild leafy vegetables, is most common among women, cf. [
12]. It is mostly girls who are socialized to traditional women’s roles (cooking, housekeeping, child-rearing). They learn about wild leafy-vegetables used in the kitchen from older women in the family. Yet, knowledge about wild leafy vegetables eaten on the spot (snacks) is also shared among boys, who are more often than girls send up to herd cattle, which is traditionally considered a man’s job.
Traditional knowledge about wild leafy vegetables is only partially passed on to members of the younger generation, most of whom visit Shiri only in summer. Due to migration to multiethnic settlements, the Shiri language is gradually dying out, along with the people’s knowledge of plants. A majority of the wild leafy vegetables available in Shiri are not available in the dry lowlands, so uses and names are being forgotten.
Methodology
This article is based on fieldwork conducted in Shiri, Daghestan, between 2012 and 2014. There were three field trips in May, June, July and August, altogether eight weeks of fieldwork. Wild leafy vegetables are most commonly collected in this period. The research period was chosen based on the first author’s previous numerous visits to other regions of Daghestan (altogether 1.7 years in the field). Interviews and trips were video-recorded in order to grasp both what is collected and how it is done. The authors’ experience of fieldwork in Daghestan, in 2004–2014, was useful for a broader cultural context [
7,
13].
Our methodology was based on participant and non-participant observation, forest walks with 5 key-informants (all of them female, aged approximately from 40 to 90) and several semistructured interviews with each of 10 adult female and 5 male inhabitants of Shiri village, all of them non-specialists in plant knowledge. The age range of informants was from the mid 30s to 90s, however the older inhabitants’ knowledge was visibly deeper and they were more eager to share it.
There was at least one person interviewed from each household in the village. Each interview was voice-recorded, and all of the forest walks were video-recorded. Food preparation, plant sorting at home and some of the interviews were also video-recorded (see Video 1 on ħuˤlkni with leafy vegetable preparation). During the interviews and walks, we asked about current plant use, but we did not focus on historical data or memories on former plant use. Before each interview verbal informed consent was obtained.
The main language of research was Russian and Shiri. All but two of the inhabitants of Shiri spoke Russian well enough to prefer it as a language of communication without the need to speak via interpreter. Russian is the lingua-franca in Daghestan and it is the most common language of communication with people outside of the village. Shiri is spoken only in the village (and in the lowlands where Shiri people migrated) while mutually comprehensible languages are only found in some nearby settlements. Translation was needed during one forest walk, while interviews were recorded both in Russian and in Shiri, depending on the speaker’s will and ability to communicate comprehensibly in Russian. Shiri language has never been documented before so interviews in Shiri were part of the linguistic documentation of the project.
Voucher specimens were collected during the forest walks and were deposited in the herbarium of the University of Warsaw Botanic Garden. Plant and author names were verified according to The International Plant Name Index (
http://www.ipni.org/) and The Plant List (
http://www.theplantlist.org). Local Shiri names were transcribed according to the standard transcription for Caucasian languages. Research was done in accordance with the ISE code of ethics, where appropriate.
Conclusions
Knowledge of wild leafy vegetables is common in the village of Shiri. There are 24 folk species of wild leafy vegetables gathered there. All of them are in everyday use by most members of this small community. As many as 72 % of all greens taxa used are consumed as snacks. The number of snack-plants seems to be very high in the European context [
24]. Around 36 % of leafy-vegetable taxa recorded are used for cooking (mainly
chudu and
kurze). Some plant taxa are used in more then one way. Knowledge of cooked greens is more evenly spread than knowledge of snack-plants, particularly among females living in the village.
In many places in Europe traditionally characterized by elaborate knowledge of green vegetables, this knowledge is diminishing (e.g., [
24,
48]). In our research site, wild leafy vegetables have high significance but migration to the lowlands will definitely influence it. “Healthy” and “ecological” lifestyle trends may have their impact as well.
Wild leafy vegetables are a significant element of everyday social life in Shiri in regard to mutual care, respect for elders and local identity and pride.
Knowledge about plants is mostly the women’s domain cf. [
5]; it is both individual and strongly embodied, yet there is also a specific social dimension to it which goes beyond casual skills and the exchange of knowledge among those practicing plant knowledge. Though they do not collect and prepare wild greens, elderly men are customarily asked about plants collected and brought to the village. They serve as consultants, and they may suggest the name of a plant, even if they have to invent it on the spot, yet women are the ones who practice skills and local knowledge about plants. The names of the plants are publicly discussed with elders and are not always fixed: sometimes they are even invented on the spot both by men and women. Much research also shows that men often collect plants from ‘men’s spaces’ and women collect from ‘women’s spaces’ [
12]. The spaces farther from the village (in surrounding mountains and valleys) are shared by both genders. As both men and women were involved in everyday cattle herding, they had an opportunity for plant collection outside the village. Snack-plant collection is performed by both genders in similar places, so there was no gendered space division in this context. In Shiri, we identified a place near the houses where greens for
chudu grow as a women’s space. This is the space men knew little about. Generally women's knowledge about plants was more extensive then men’s.
In Shiri care is often expressed by sending wild leafy vegetables to kin in the lowlands. This helps to sustain social ties between migrants and Shiri inhabitants. Wild leafy vegetables help express love and care to one’s family, kin or strangers, who eagerly receive packages that they can later share with those around them.
Wild leafy vegetables are also spoken about quite frequently. There is a strong discourse of health, naturalness and “ecology”, that is adding value to local knowledge about wild leafy vegetables. Living in a “natural” environment full of appreciated and loved local wild leafy vegetables and being able to provide them for others is very important. It also constitutes an important element of the local identity. In times of migration to the lowlands, Shiri people also fear that one day, when the old people die, the young ones will leave the village looking for a better life. They perceive themselves as the last ones struggling to live in difficult climatic and environmental conditions, yet proud to be there, to stay where their ancestors lived and died, where they cared for their families, and where they collected wild leafy vegetables and other plants. When the older generation of women passes away, so will the knowledge about wild leafy vegetables and medicinal plants. Their knowledge is only partly passed on to the younger generation, which is no longer interested in long, often exhaustive walks, and prefers to have a pack of chips for a snack. Bussmann and colleagues made similar observations in Georgia: “young villagers know only plants that grow in the village. The plant knowledge is concentrated in women, and men rely on that knowledge when needed [
5]”.
We find it crucial to continue our research and document both the specimens and social practices connected with their collection, both in Shiri and in other scarcely populated neighboring villages in the Dakhadaevsky region. Daghestan is the last place in the whole Caucasus where mountain slopes are populated throughout the whole republic. While it is likely to change, more research is needed before most of the mountaineers moves to the lowlands.
Competing interests
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
Authors’ contributions
IK and IKD participated in the design of the study. IK conducted fieldwork. Both authors analyzed the data and wrote the manuscript. Both authors read and approved the final manuscript.