Дворянский кодекс чести народов Северного Кавказа: историческое наследие

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The subject of this article is the history of the formation and development of the noble (knightly) code of the North Caucasian peoples. The goal is to identify general and specific trends, as well as factors in the formation of knightly virtues in the North Caucasus. The author examines the geographical, socio-cultural determinants that contribute to the emergence of the knightly code, analyzes its conceptual provisions, proves that the knightly (noble) code is a vivid confirmation of the historical development of the common Caucasian moral and ethical code of laws. Emphasizing that the concept of moral etiquette of nobles included not only moral and ethical attitudes, but also the norms of unwritten customary law that governed the life of a highlander; The code was consistent with several key moral positions, including such eternal imperatives as loyalty, politeness, courage, simplicity in everyday life, truthfulness, humanity, hospitality, eloquence. The novelty of the stated topic is seen in the fact that the author for the first time made an attempt to solve one of the problems of Caucasian studies - the history of the knighthood of the mountain peoples, formulated in the noble code of honor, which has not been specially studied by any scholar until now. The practical significance lies in the fact that the reconstruction of the spiritual heritage of the peoples of the North Caucasus, embodied in the noble (knightly) code of honor, will help overcome the prevailing stereotypes regarding the spiritual values of ethnic groups in Russia and provide modern politicians with interesting material that contributes to a thoughtful and balanced consideration of topical modern issues related to interethnic tolerance. The author's special contribution consists in disclosing the specifics and essence of the unwritten legal code of the North Caucasus and analyzing its role in the formation of the ideal highlander, as well as in identifying the positive and negative aspects of the knightly virtues of the peoples of the North Caucasus and introducing ethnological and documentary materials into scientific circulation, many of which are published for the first time. The methodological basis of the study were general philosophical theories about the role of the people in the creation of spiritual and material culture and the idea of the influence of the environment on the specifics and originality of the development of moral attitudes of the North Caucasian nobility. It is concluded that the collection of principles and rules that make up the noble etiquette imperative refers to eternal moral categories, therefore the knightly code of the mountain peoples is a cultural paradigm, a kind of prototype of a militarized life that took place in the region for a rather long period and left as a legacy and edification to posterity.