Caucasians. Prussian scientist Peter Pallas visited Ingushetia and made observation of Ingush people, he also confirmed that Ingush people are completely different from their neighbors in his book “Thravels through the Southern Provinces of the Russian Empire in the years 1793 and 1794” pp. 435–436: “There is a tribe of people differing entirely from all other inhabitants of the Caucasus, in language as well as in stature, and the features of the countenance: their national name is LAMUR, signifying inhabitants of mountains; by others they are called Galgai, or Ingushians … Their manner of pronouncing appeared to us, as if their mouths were full of stones. We were informed that they are an honest and brave set of people, maintaining their independence, and are subject only to their elders, or priests, by whom their religious sacrifices are performed. They are almost the only nation inhabiting the Caucasus, among whom the shields has been preserved, as a part of their accoutrements. These bucklers are made of wood, covered with leather, and bound with iron hoops of an oval form. The short knotty pike which forms part of their armor, serves not only as a weapon of defense, but is likewise used for supporting the gun between its forked branched, by fixing the pointed end in the ground, which enabled the sharp-shooter to take a more accurate aim. The Ingushians are excellent marksmen…” Ingush language and grammar According to the linguist Johanna Nichols, who studied languages including Chechen and Ingush in her book "Ingush Grammar" says: "To my surprise, Ingush turned out to be the most complex language of my sample, besting even polysynthetic languages like Seneca, Lakhota, and Halkomelem. Ingush is not polysynthetic; its complexity is due to large inventories of elements (phonemes, cases, tenses, etc.), a high degree of inflectional synthesis in the verb, and classification of various types – declension and conjugation classes, agreement genders, overt inherent genders, split verbal lexicon, split alignment, etc. Perhaps this complexity explains why it has taken thirty years to produce this grammar, during most of which time the project has in fact been on or near the front burner ... Ingush and Chechen are distinct languages and not mutually intelligible, but because of widespread passive partial knowledge of standard lowlands Chechen by Ingush they function to some extent as a single speech community." "Ingush is the native language of the great majority of