Maghas

Maghas within medieval Alania (10th-12th century), according to Ossetian historian Ruslan Suleymanovich Bzarov.

Maghas or Maas — more properly, Mags or Maks — was the capital city of Alania, a medieval kingdom in the Greater Caucasus. It is known exclusively from Islamic sources. On the territory of the Karachays was the capital of Alania (Lower-Arkhyz settlement), where three 10th-century churches still stand. The destruction of Maghas is ascribed to Batu Khan, a Mongol leader and a grandson of Genghis Khan, in the beginning of 1239. Some Russian geographers, like D. V. Zayats, point to a location in Ingushetia.