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Zelimkhan (also spelled Zelim-Khan) (January 1872, Kharachoy, Terek Oblast - 26 September 1913) is a Chechen and Ingush hero, which is viewed today as a version of a Chechen Robin Hood. Today the name is given to Chechen and Ingush children. Zelimkhan was an abrek, a raider of the Cossacks and Russian colonists. He stole mainly to feed Chechens, and because the Cossacks were living on what the Chechens perceived to be their land, which was extremely fertile. Without control of these fertile lands, the Chechens became impoverished. To solve this problem, abreks, such as Zelimkhan and his Ingush comrade-in-arms Sulom-Beck Sagopshinski, raided the Cossacks, Russian banks, Vladikavkaz mint, Czar's post which was transported on the Georgian military highway, in order to restore the justice and help the poor. ==Historical Context== The Cossacks were serfs who ran away from Russian Czar and found refuge amongst free peoples of the North Caucasus. Initially they lived side by side with the North Caucasians, adopted their uniform - cherkesska, burka, Caucasian dagger, and papakha. When Russian Empire expanded the Russians made a secret pact with the ethnically close to them Cossacks: for betraying the North Caucasians they will be granted land from Czar. The deal was accepted. Many Chechen and Ingush settlements were burned to stake, the populations butchered by Russian armies. The territories were resettled by Russian Cossacks. They settled in the Northern Chechen plains only, because the Caucasian mountains were a natural fortress which allowed a small garrison to defend against larger Russian forces. This historical narrative, however, ignores the large amounts of poverty and suffering the Chechens have had to endure during periods where they lack control of the Terek and even Sunzha rivers. In Medieval and Ancient times, the rivers' fertile valleys were necessary to support the populations living in the mountains, meaning that if a foreign people (like the Cossacks) managed to push the Chechens out of the area, it would cause frequent famines. There was, perhaps an option, to allow the population to decrease dramatically and return to a subsistence lifestyle, but not only would this probably result in the extinction of Chechendom, the Chechens had been civilized people for at least 7000 years (much longer than the Russians), as had all their neighbors, so a subsistence lifestyle would be unthinkable. The Chechens would still be dependent on the northern plains for food, but they would require the food by a long cultural established tradition of raiding Cossack stanitsas, and taking all the grain storage as well as other useful supplies, bringing it to the highlands (or to the Sunzha). Abreks were avengers and were viewed as great heroes. They delivered justice and killed Russian troops in non-stopping skirmishes. The avengers brought the loot back from their raids: food, gold, weapons. They managed to stand up strong against the perceived oppressor; and most importantly, the survival of the Chechen people was at least partially dependent on them, until the northern plains could be retaken. In reality of course, with the case of the Cossacks, there was no immediate threat to the Chechens' survival because the garrisons of North Caucasian warriors were able to defeat them in many battles, including the one in the plains of Ingushetia where general Ermolov lost 18,000 Cossacks to Ingush clans. However, there was still massive famines, and the Chechens needed to stay strong and healthy to prevent a loss of the Sunzha. Despite the desperate position of the Chechen people, abreks were supposed to abide by a system of honor, refraining from killing women and children, etc. The scholar Rebecca Gould argues that the character of the abrek usually takes the form of the lone warrior, the social reject who takes it upon as his role to rescue the society despite its rejection of him.〔http://abrek.at.ua/publ/22-1-0-621〕 Many of these elements may have increased the popularity of abrek stories, as many people feel at some point of their life that they are rejected by society. Zelimkhan was the most celebrated of these abreks, and is largely symbolic of the values of the stories and the memory of the abreks. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Zelimxan」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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