Blood feud as a traditional public institution of Karachays and Balkarians

the great keepers of human memory, our older generation– have preserved for posterity the richest examples of oral folk art, as well as memories of the real-life events of their fathers and grandfathers, who provided valuable and sometimes the only historical and cultural information about the socio-economic life of the people and its neighbors in the distant past, about the genetic roots of those or other customs, orders and traditions, the worldview of the people at different stages of its history, interethnic contacts and relationships. In the late 18th and first half of the 19th centuries, the Karachays and Balkarians lived through the most difficult period of their history. It was at this time that they finally lost their independence, their territory and numbers were catastrophically reduced, and all branches of the economy were destroyed. Social life is falling into disrepair. However, the problem of the crisis of social life has not become the subject of special study, and for this reason, the final phase of the social and cultural history of Karachay and Balkaria remains largely unexplored. The author of this article examines the problem of blood feud between Karachays and Balkarians, while correctly noting that this was their traditional social institution. It is rightly noted that blood feud was an institution of feudal society. The paper examines the causes of blood feud, the peculiarities of its existence in the mountain society at various historical stages. The research is based on numerous historical sources and literature. The analysis of these sources allowed us to obtain the most objective understanding of this problem. The work is of considerable interest to those who study the public institutions of Karachays and Balkarians.

feudal lords, peasants, society, highlanders, relatives, duties, custom, relatives, blood relatives