ABSTRACT
It is not easy to give a simple answer to the question, who are the Lezghi? Although they are apparently one of the oldest groups settled in the eastern part of the Caucasus mountain range, the written history of the Lezghi (also sometimes Lezgi) can be traced back only to the Middle Ages. In the past their name was applied to local mountain peoples as a whole. The Lezghi’s only close relations are a number of even smaller ethnic groups in the same area—neither Slav nor Turkic (the major groups of the area) but rather northeast Caucasian.
