The London Abkhaz Adyghe Cultural Association was established by members of the Circassian and Abkhazian diaspora who sought to preserve a shared inheritance — one carried across continents since the great dispersal of the nineteenth century.

What began as informal gatherings of families in London has grown into an organised cultural body dedicated to the continuity of our identity. From its earliest days, the Association set itself a clear purpose: to ensure that the languages, customs and historical memory of the Adyghe and Apsua peoples would not fade in exile, but flourish anew in Britain.

OUR FOUNDINGBorn of memory, built for the future

The Caucasian community in the United Kingdom is small but deeply rooted. Drawn together by ties of kinship, faith and a common history, its members recognised the need for an institution that could speak for them, gather them, and represent their heritage with dignity.

LAACA was founded on the conviction that culture is not merely inherited — it is actively kept. The Association serves as custodian of that culture, organising commemorations, supporting language learning, and fostering links between the British-Caucasian community and the wider homeland diaspora across Turkey, the Levant and the Caucasus itself.

OUR PURPOSEA bridge between homeland and home

Today the Association stands as a cultural anchor — a place where the elder generation can pass on what they remember, and where young Britons of Caucasian descent can discover where they come from. We host lectures and exhibitions, mark the days that matter to our people, and welcome all who wish to learn about the rich civilisations of the North-West Caucasus.

I · ORIGINS & HISTORYFrom the mountains of the Caucasus

The Adyghe are an indigenous people of the North-West Caucasus, whose presence in the region stretches back thousands of years to the civilisations of the Black Sea coast.

Known historically to Europeans as the Circassians, the Adyghe once inhabited a broad territory between the Black Sea and the Kuban River. They were organised into a constellation of tribes — the Kabardians, Shapsugh, Abzakh, Bzhedugh and others — united by a common language and a shared social code.

The nineteenth century brought catastrophe. Following the long Caucasian War, the great majority of the Circassian people were forced into exile, dispersed across the Ottoman lands. This event — remembered each May — gave rise to the worldwide Circassian diaspora of which our community in Britain is a part.

II · CULTURE & TRADITIONSThe code of the Adyghe

At the heart of Circassian identity lies Adyghe Khabze — an unwritten code of conduct governing honour, hospitality, respect for elders and the bearing of the individual. It is this code, more than any border, that has held the people together through dispersal.

Circassian culture is rich in music and dance. The stately and fiery rhythms of Adyghe dance, performed in flowing traditional dress, are among the most recognisable expressions of Caucasian culture. Craftsmanship in metalwork, weaponry and gold embroidery has long been celebrated, as has a tradition of horsemanship without equal in the region.

III · LANGUAGEOne of the world's most distinctive tongues

The Circassian language belongs to the North-West Caucasian family — among the most phonologically remarkable languages on earth, celebrated for its extraordinary range of consonants. It survives today in two principal literary forms, Adyghe and Kabardian.

For a diaspora community, language is the most fragile inheritance and the most precious. The Association's language workshops exist precisely to keep this living link to the homeland from being broken.

IV · THE HOMELANDThe North-West Caucasus

The ancestral homeland of the Circassian and Abkhazian peoples lies along the eastern shore of the Black Sea and the northern slopes of the Caucasus mountains — a land of dramatic peaks, deep forests and fertile river valleys. For the diaspora, the homeland is both a real place and an idea: the source of identity, language and longing carried across generations in exile.

V · CIRCASSIAN DIASPORAA people scattered, a people united

Today, the overwhelming majority of Circassians live outside their historic homeland, in communities spanning Turkey, Jordan, Syria, Israel, Europe and the Americas. Despite this dispersal — or perhaps because of it — the Circassian diaspora has maintained a fierce attachment to its identity.

The community in Britain, though modest in number, is part of this global family. Through the Association, British Circassians remain connected to their kin worldwide and to the cultural revival under way in the homeland.

I · ORIGINS & HISTORYPeople of the Apsny

The Abkhazians call themselves the Apsua and their land Apsny — the “Land of the Soul.” Theirs is one of the oldest continuous presences on the eastern shore of the Black Sea.

Closely related to the Circassians through the shared North-West Caucasian heritage, the Abkhazians developed their own distinct identity along a coastline that has been a crossroads of civilisations for millennia — touched by Greek colonies, Byzantine churches and the kingdoms of the medieval Caucasus.

Like their Circassian kin, many Abkhazians were swept into exile in the nineteenth century, establishing diaspora communities that endure to this day across the Ottoman world and beyond.

II · CULTURE & TRADITIONSApsuara — the Abkhazian way

Abkhazian life is governed by Apsuara — a moral and social code comparable to the Circassian Khabze, emphasising honour, restraint, respect for age and an almost sacred duty of hospitality. A guest, in Abkhazian tradition, is a gift from above.

The culture is renowned for its polyphonic singing — extraordinary multi-voiced choral music — as well as for spirited dance, feasting traditions and the famed longevity of its elders, long the subject of fascination far beyond the Caucasus.

III · LANGUAGEA treasury of sound

The Abkhazian language is a member of the North-West Caucasian family — kin to Circassian and equally famed among linguists for its rich inventory of consonants set against very few vowels. It is a language of remarkable subtlety and antiquity.

For the diaspora, keeping the Abkhazian tongue alive far from Apsny is a labour of love and an act of preservation that the Association is proud to support.

IV · ABKHAZIAN DIASPORAFar from Apsny, close in heart

A substantial Abkhazian diaspora lives beyond the homeland, principally in Turkey and the Middle East, with smaller communities across Europe. These communities have preserved their language, customs and the deep bonds of kinship that define Abkhazian society.

In Britain, Abkhazians stand alongside their Circassian kin within the Association — two peoples of one Caucasian family, sharing a single cultural home in London.