Hamid Bulatov Biography

The attitude to the elders and long -lived in the Caucasus of the GAMID Bulatov, moreover, there are different peoples in the Caucasus, differing in their origin, language, religion, customs, in their traditional culture there are a number of common features. And the most important of them, along with the hospitality, significance and development of related and earthly ties, is the veneration of the elders.

Prior to the establishment of the Russian administration, the management of the rural community among various peoples of the Caucasus was carried out by the Council of Elders, which included the most respectful representatives of the surnames of the rural community. They were chosen at a rural gathering in which all adult men of the village participated.

They were in charge of everyday life, requiring decisions of administrative and partially, a judicial nature: the distribution of public lands, the arrangement of roads, determination of the start of field work and the amount of a fine for its violation, the analysis of minor misconduct and crimes that did not entail bloodshed, and resolve disputes. The proceedings were carried out on the basis of the norms of customary law, and among the peoples who professed Islam, also taking into account the Sharia norms.

If blood spilled, then the rural community was interested in the prevention of blood feud. And the task of reconciling bloodshes was also assigned to the most respected representatives of the older generation. The main criterion when choosing elders, as A. Bulatov notes, on the example of the Rutulians inhabiting the highland part of South Dagestan, was an impeccable reputation [1].

This is also indicated by the name of the Council of Elders with the other people of Dagestan - Laktsev: “Marts Aramtale” literally - “Honest men” [2]. Researchers of Ossetian life noted the special authority that venerable old people who solved public issues on the "Vsihas" - the ancient body of the Ossetian rural self -government [3]. Unquestioned authority was enjoyed by old people among the Vainakh peoples.

In addition to the fact that in every village there were elders who solved controversial issues that determined the type of punishment for misconduct, there was also the General Council of Elders - Mehk Khel, which included the most respected representatives from the nine main intra -ethnic units of Chechens - Tukhumov. They gathered for a collective solution to the most important issues related to the whole people.

A characteristic feature of Abkhaz etiquette, as Y. Smirnov points out, was emphasized respect for the elders. At the oldest, they did not lie, did not sit, did not talk on frivolous topics and generally did not say loudly, did not appear carelessly dressed. The elders were respected by such signs of attention as help when washing hands and legs, when going to bed, etc. I will give an example from my own experience.

In the time of student youth, it happened to me to work in an archaeological expedition, digging the mound in the steppe near Makhachkala. The expedition consisted of Moscow and Ukrainian researchers and students. I was the only Dagestan in her. One of the first days of my stay there, the chairman of the village council entered the camp, a man of about fifty - fifty -five. He had to talk with the head of the camp in some case.

The same at that time drove to the city, but was about to return, and the person who came to him decided to wait for him. There was a dinner time, and practical students, stirring along the long table standing in the yard, were going to start food. The table was set so that the shadow from the trees and the bars entwined with grapes protected the people sitting behind him from the scorching summer sun.

The guest stood moving from foot to foot, on the sun itself, since he had nowhere to sit down. No one paid any attention to him. Although I was a new person there and had not yet mastered it properly, nevertheless, I could not sit calmly and, standing from my seat at the table, invited the guest to have lunch with us. He thanked and politely refused, which was quite predictable, because, being a local resident, he probably had already had lunch at home.

But it was necessary to offer him this, since it is impossible to eat in the presence of a person without inviting him to the table. Having received a refusal to join dinner, I invited him to sit in my place at the table, it was extreme, and the person who was sitting there could not prevent the rest, so as not to stand in the sun. He smiled, thanked and refused.

Then I just stayed next to him. For some time he sternly looked at me, and then said: “You are probably local. They are all visitors, and you are ours, Dagestan guy. ” To my question about how he defined it and I do not possess the pronounced Caucasian features outwardly, he replied that he understood this by behavior. A special attitude towards the elders, to the elderly was associated with the role that they played in family life.

The explorers recorded the existence of large families in various peoples of the Caucasus, in which three or four generations of blood relatives lived and held a joint economy under one roof-parents and adults with their families, grandchildren.The leadership of such a family community was carried out by the oldest man. He distributed duties between the younger brothers and sons, followed their proper performance, and disposed of all income.

In the event of his death, the place of the head of the family community was supposed to take the next man in seniority. The same thing happened on the female half of the house. There, the distribution of women's work and control over their implementation was carried out by the oldest of women, the wife of the founder of the original family cell. The nature of the power of the head of the family community was ranging from the despotic, when his right to dispose of all the property of the family and the results of the labor activity of its members were not limited and his instructions were to be implicitly carried out by all households, to democratic management forms, when the authoritarianism of the head of the family was limited to the family council.

Moreover, both options could coexist in the framework of one ethnic group. So it was, for example, with Ossetians. Despite the fact that most of them were built on a democratic basis, one of the groups of Ossetian migrants of the Mozdok region-the “Tsaita” power of the head of the family community was a despotic nature [5]. Large families cease their existence among the highlanders of the Caucasus mainly by the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th century, which is associated with a change in economic conditions and the emergence of the possibility of independent existence and housekeeping by small families [6].

Changing the forms of the family did not result in changes in relation to the elders. The old people also retained authority and influence in resolving important issues both in the circle of relatives and beyond, within the framework of their rural community. In the village of any person of respectable age, he had the right to make a remark to a teenager or young man, who something violated the public order, the adopted norms of behavior, could give a younger man some kind of assignment, and would try the latter to somehow snap, not fulfill the request.

This would be a shame for his family, parents, closest relatives. Public condemnation and damage to the honor of the genus were guaranteed. The phenomenon of longevity is closely connected with a special attitude to the elders, the veneration of the elderly in the Caucasus. His special studies were conducted in the late 70s of the XX century among Abkhazians and Azerbaijanis.

As a result of the examination of long -livers, the following factors contributing to the formation of this phenomenon were revealed in Abkhazians: - the gerontocratic nature of the traditional ethnic culture of customs; Social institutions such as the Council of Elders, etc. The most related density of family-rod relations is closely connected with this compared to extra-mercenary social communications, the existence of “anti-stress behavior skills” in the Abkhaz traditional culture, etc.

The combination of all these factors can actually affect the increase in life expectancy. According to the researchers, the direct involvement of the elderly, including centenarians, in the system of informal communication of the village, the development of their social ties and the personal-emotional nature of the latter are distinguished by the way of life of Abkhaz long-livers from the lifestyle of older people in the modern city, whose inhabitants are more characteristic of depersonalis and role-range type of relations [7].

Pension for citizens is often associated with a deterioration in health, a decrease in family authority, dependence on relatives and forced inactivity. The active participation of the Abkhaz long -livers in the affairs of their family, their inclusion in the social network and after the cessation of labor activity in social production is an important psychological factor in Herohigena.

In Abkhaz culture, there are many forms of behavior developed by centuries that help to overcome the influence of stressful factors. Of great importance is to participate in the rituals of the life path and generally in significant events for humans of a significant number of people - relatives, neighbors, acquaintances [9]. Similar forms of behavior exist among other peoples of the Caucasus.

But in Abkhazia, the scale of moral and material support, mutual assistance of relatives and neighbors in situations of vital changes - weddings or funerals attract attention. Folk customs include “psychotherapeutic” methods established by long -term experience, removal or weakening of super -lover negative emotions. Tradition prescribes a certain differentiation of the forms of behavior of the closest relatives of the deceased and other people who knew him.

Their restrained public behavior allows them to, as it were, to shift part of emotional severity to those around them. Comparative psychosocial studies of the elderly and long -livers conducted at the end of the 10th - early years of the XX century in the Kostroma region and in the Caucasus show that the Caucasian old people are people living in the family. The most common option is to live with children and spouse.

The option of living a respondent is less common only with the spouse.The practical absence of lonely old people is noteworthy. The respondents living in the research of rural areas of Abkhazia and Azerbaijan have usually usually changed their place of residence or the nature of the work. The prospect of a possible or forced change in residence was not relevant for them. Only women changed their place of residence, in connection with marriage and usually within the same area.

He did not undergo changes to old age and the usual food diet. The old -age pension was only an additional article of a common -piece income, and the “retirement” did not lead to a significant change in lifestyle and the usual amount of work. The elderly residents of the Kostroma region were significantly different from the Caucasians in all these characteristics.

The most massive group of lonely turned out to be the most massive. A group of “single, but having relatives living separately” was adjacent to them, which practically also meant a lonely lifestyle. Their direct connection with their relatives was irregular in nature and was often limited to obtaining material assistance from them. The prospect of a possible change in residence was relevant for all respondents of the Kostroma region, which was associated with the threat of entering the elderly house, which is not typical for the Caucasus or moving to relatives to the city or other district.

All respondents were disturbed by the question of their future fate in connection with loneliness, illnesses and physical weakness. Similar experiences did not arise among respondents of the Caucasian group. The pension for old-house old people was one of the main articles of income, and the circle of communication was limited to the closest neighbors-agents, from which, as a rule, could only be expected by physical and moral support.

The main conclusion made as a result of this study was that the inhabitants of the Caucasus almost completely lack the feelings of uncertainty and anxiety associated with the expectation of unwanted changes in the social status of the old man as his age increases. A aging and related possible negative changes in a physical nature do not lead to depressive states of the psyche of the elderly, which, apparently, has a direct connection with the phenomenon of longevity [10].

With all historical changes and social shocks, changes in the way of life, which brought with it the 20th century, respectful attitude to the elders in the Caucasus was invariably preserved. The situation partly began to change at the end of the X -XX century. The destruction of previous economic ties, deepening social differentiation, mass relocation of highlanders to the plain, mass unemployment, criminalization of society - all this led to the erosion of the traditional system of values ​​to a certain extent, narrowing of the sphere of their application.

For a significant part of the “new” Dagestanis, Azerbaijanis, Chechens that formed in the years, one of the symptoms gained strength in Chechnya in the early X in the years of negative trends, according to eyewitnesses, was that young Chechens ceased to give way to public transport to the old-fashioned men. According to the traditional norms of the etiquette of Chechens, as well as other peoples of the Caucasus, respect for a person older than himself, especially the old man, is regardless of his nationality.

Anyone who does not respect other people's old people will not respect his own. And with all the difficulties and dramatic ups and downs of Chechen history, this attitude to the elders, including the odds, remained. The coming to the power of Dudaev and the politician pursued by his entourage put forward a marginal layer that exists in any society and which was present in Chechen.