RESEARCH DIRECTIONS OF CUSTOM AND COMMON LAW OF NORTH CAUCASUS PEOPLES IN XIX-XX

Abstract

For reconstruction of historical and legal development of Adyghes, Kabardinian, Nakh peoples, and other peoples of North Caucasia, works of F.F. Tornau and P.K. Uslar, E. Markov, V.F. Miller are very important. Many works of M.M. Kovalevsky are devoted to the problem of law and customs in the Caucasus. The author was the first person who considered antique, eastern and western influence on adats of Caucasia nations. Ethno legal theme gives serious confrontation of the state of origin and law of Indo-European, Caucasian and Turkic peoples. The work “The adats of Caucasia mountaineer” written by F.I. Leontovich is a basis for historical and legal researches. The custom in Russian law is considered as a complex of maxims of law which appeared in the course of history. A custom which has got a sanction on a state became a legal one. The scientists differentiate non-legal or legal customs and common law though there is no a common criterion for such division. In modern science the study of common law of Caucasian peoples is carried out by two directions: 1) its analysis as a source of law or a legal system of the past and the connected study of correlation between the very custom and legal one in particular as an ancient form of law; 2) the analysis of common law as a historical phenomenon developed in North Caucasian societies since ancient time and actively functioned in the Middle Ages and partially in the forms of norms which still exist in some Northern Caucasian peoples. Concerning the notion “common law” we proceed from the position that “common law is a set of customs authorized as legal regulations”. State authorization of a custom and its conversion into a legal custom (or common law) are implemented by different ways. We can see the same in Alania, Dagestan and other republics of North Caucasia.