The article is devoted to the referential relations between the author’s text and Internet resources in modern hypertext poetry. The relevance of the research is related to the general interest of philology in intermediate phenomena, the increasing role of Internet communication in poetic discourse, and the introduction of elements of digital culture into the poetic language. The novelty is seen in the appeal to currently little-studied non-utilitarian hypertext works. Aspects of research of referential relations between a verbal text and network resources in  relation to a literary text are defined. The research material was poems, cycles of poems, books of modern poets that contain links that the reader can use to make the transition to the continuation / addition of the text on the Internet. The following aspects of the analysis are highlighted: the location and form of the hyperlink, the range of the hypertext “jump,” the type and genre of the media “target,” the state of the resource to which the link leads, the degree of immersion of the recipient in the hypertext structure. Examples of implementation of  hypertext transitions are analyzed, conclusions are drawn about the expressive possibilities of hyperlink organization of works of poetic discourse.

 The review article discusses the key problems of semantic organization of the mental lexicon. It is understood as a dynamic, cognitively organized semantic network of lexical units. The paper presents the characteristics of the main models of semantic organization of mental vocabulary, highlights the advantages and disadvantages of each approach. It is noted that currently connectionist models are developing most actively. Among them there are the following: the small world network, which considers a certain fragment of the lexicon; thesaurus models that combine all units of the lexicon; computational and distributive models that build relationships between a large number of units based on corpus data about shared usage. The author analyses the sources of information about the organization of the mental lexicon, among which the leading position is occupied by the results of associative experiments and priming. It is revealed that research is also carried out on the subjects’ intuitive assessments of word similarity, analysis of unintentional speech errors. Neuropsychological technologies are used to study the mental lexicon. The problem of semantic relations in the mental lexicon, which are described using a “spatial” metaphor, is discussed separately: semantic proximity is considered as a distance or a vector.

The article deals with precedent names (PN) from the source domain “Literature”, functioning in the UK media. The material for the study was 104 examples of precedent names used in the British print media (The Guardian, The Times, The Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph, The Independent) over the past ten years (2010–2019). Research methods were cognitive-discourse analysis, linguocultural description. It is concluded that the source domain “Literary characters” is the most demanded source of precedent names in the British media (26 % of the total body of examples, which is 400 precedent names).  It is shown that British journalists give preference to onyms related to British literature, which is natural, because PN data are well known to both journalists and British media addressees. It was revealed that British journalists regularly refer to the names of characters from the classics of English literature in their texts. At the same time, it is shown that the leading place in terms of frequency of actualization and productivity is occupied by PN, which have become popular in recent decades, which primarily refers to the characters of J. Rowling's Harry Potter novels. Thus, the analysis showed that the functioning of PN depends not only on cognitive and cultural, but also on discursive factors.

The article is devoted to the study of the media representation features of the situation of coronavirus infection spread. The material was articles published in American newspapers. It is shown that the metaphorical model "War" is widely used in media coverage of the pandemic. The relevance of the work is due to the ability of the media to influence the mass consciousness. The methodological basis of the research is formed by critical discourse analysis, which establishes the connection between language and social reality. The article provides an overview of works devoted to the study of metaphor. The theoretical foundations for the study of metaphorical modeling are given. In the course of the analysis, the linguistic means of updating the metaphorical model "War" were revealed. The authors note that this metaphorical model is represented by such frames as “War and its characteristics”, “Participants in military action”, “War zone”, “Enemy actions”, “Confronting the enemy”. It is shown that modern reality is presented in the media as martial law, the coronavirus is positioned in the media as a cruel and merciless enemy seeking to take over the world, the treatment of the disease is represented as a fight against the enemy. It is concluded that the use of the metaphorical model "War" is one of the ways to conceptualize the spread of coronavirus.

The article is devoted to the study of the system of proper names in the texts of animated films with a folklore precedent basis. The relevance of the research is due to the need to study media texts that translate folklore imagery in linguocognitive and linguostylistic aspects. The material for the research is character and voice-over texts of animated films about Russian heroes: “Alyosha Popovich i Tugarin Zmey” (2004), “Dobrynya Nikitich i The Zmey Gorynych” (2006), “Ilya Muromets I Solovey Razboynik” (2007). The complex of names of geographical objects, the naming system of anthropo- and zoomorphic characters is considered, the precedent base for the formation of the onomastic space of animated films is determined, and the ways of introducing new components to the proper names system of this content are characterized. Special attention is paid to the description of intertextual links of the polycode content under study with works of epic genres of Russian folklore and with other sources. The scientific novelty of the work is seen in the fact that the verbal component of the studied animated films is currently insufficiently studied, and their proper names system becomes the subject of linguistic analysis for the first time.

The article deals with the problem of forming grammatical (syntactic) norms of the Russian national language based on the material of Siberian monuments of business writing of the 17^th century. Relevance of the work is determined by the fact that Russian syntax and the history of the Russian language in Siberia are insufficiently studied, as well as by the need to expand the source base of such research. Scientific novelty of the work consists in the study of historical syntax of the complex sentences in the texts of Siberian petitions, most of which are not published and has not previously been brought to the historical-grammatical research. The high source value and linguistic informativeness of the Siberian petitions of the 17^th century are proved. These texts analyze complex sentences with paratactic and hypotactic connections. The article traces the peculiarities of their use in monuments of local business writing in the aspect of developing syntactic norms of the Russian national language. The arsenal of compositional and subordinate conjunctions used in such sentences is defined. The changes in the structure of complex sentences are found out. They reflect live folk speech, language consciousness of the Russian people in Siberia and at the same time they are typical for the syntactic system of the Russian national language in the initial period of its formation.

The issue of taking into account the addressee factor in the text of an official document is considered. The controversial nature of this issue and the topicality of the material determined the relevance of the study. It is proved that the originality of the texts of decrees is defined by two oppositely directed tendencies. On the one hand, it is stated that the addressee factor is taken into account due to the performative nature of the legislator’s speech. It is noted that his speech activity is based primarily on prohibitions and restrictions; permissions are exceptions to the prohibition; the requirements are reduced to the obligations of the addressee and the instructions to him. It was revealed that the implicit meanings of the text become clear taking into account the pragmatic presupposition “what is appropriate is good”. It was established that the implicit assessment is formed under the influence of the addressee factor: the preambles of decrees are estimated, the temporal characteristics of the statements are detailed. It is shown that when constructing texts, the focus on the addressee becomes obvious due to the structural-rubric allocation and grouping of information. It is emphasized that the genre canons are being blurred due to the desire of the legislator for convincing reasoning of decisions. On the other hand, the analysis of texts in dynamics revealed that the historically established system of changing documents is not focused on the addressee. It is concluded that the complexity of the presentation of information or its vagueness testifies to the stereotypes of the legislator’s speech behavior.

The article presents the results of a study of value meanings of the province phenomenon in the discursive environment of the Russian mass media at the beginning of the 21^st century. The basic semantics of the Russian lexeme provintsiya is described based on the data of the explanatory dictionaries of the Russian language. The analysis is made of adjectival and verbal combinations selected by a continuous sampling method from the materials of the National Corpus of the Russian Language. The categories based on which the value semantics of the province in time and space are identified are defined. In accordance with the established categories, the selected adjectival and predicative combinations were distributed, and their estimation scaling was performed in relation to positive and negative evaluation. It is established that at the beginning of the 21^st century the texts of mass media record changes in the value layer of ideas about the province in the language consciousness of modern Russian speakers. Based on the analysis of the dynamics of the axiological component of the lexeme provintsiya, a decrease in negative ratings was recorded with a simultaneous increase in positive ratings since 2006 for adjectival combinations and since 2004 for predicative ones. Dynamic changes in the evaluative meanings accompanying the word provintsiya in the media discourse can be considered as a reflection of the changing role and status of the province in the socio-cultural space of Russia.

The article presents the results of a study of a number of Russian-language neolexemes functioning in Internet communication over the past two decades. The object of the analysis are subjects designations with the suffix –oid (Russian isteroid, oranzhoid, etc.). By their pragmatic components of meaning we consider these lexical units to be the vocabulary of enmity. They are united by the special role of the structural motivator in the formation of motivational meaning. Semantic and motivational characteristics of the nouns are described. Their partner tokens are found out. Conclusions are made about the influence of atypical combinatorics on the meaning of the word-forming component and on the transformed classification feature; about the blurring of boundaries between different language variants and styles. It is shown that in the immediate context, the properties attributed to the designated subjects are verbalized. The author analyzes the regularities of discursive disclosure of the inner form of the studied units by means of explication of motivational connections within different types of motivation. It is revealed that the most frequent way to actualize motivational models in the addressee’s speech-thinking strategies in Internet communication is the explication of lexical motivation and metatext motivation, while the explication of structural motivation and occasional author’s motivation are less frequent. It is shown that the specificity of discursive practices affects the reflecting consciousness of the addressee, and the patterns of representation of motivational models are refracted through the features of discourse.

The article is devoted to the phonological interpretation of consonants at the junction of prefix and root in borrowings such as Russian ir-ratsionalnyy, ir-realnyy, in-novatsiya, im-moralnyy, etc. The work is performed taking into account the typology of long and short consonant opposition in different languages of the world. The broad phonological context of the use of long and short consonants in the Russian language is taken into account, but due to the limited volume of the article, illustrations and interpretations of a number of phenomena are given in a generalized form. The author proceeds from the concept of multilevel phonology, developed by him in a number of works. In general, the description is based on primary phonemes that correspond to the phonemes of the Saint Petersburg Phonological School. It is shown that when identifying the morphemic structure of words such as irratsionalnyy one should proceed not from the spelling appearance, but from the accepted pronunciation. With this approach, the morphemic division of the previously cited words takes the following form: i-rationalnyy, i-realnyy, i-novatsiya, i-moralnyy, etc. Thus, the article deals with the problem of creating a phonological description in the conditions of orthoepic uncertainty and variability using a specific example.

The question of dialect differences in the use of homogeneous parts of a sentence and prepositions in business texts of the 18^th century is considered. Attention is paid to the factors that influenced the preposition repetition in such groups. The results of comparative analysis of peripheral (in particular, Chelyabinsk) and Moscow business texts of the 18^th century are presented. The question is raised whether the syntactic role of words in the group under study affected the preposition repetition. Special attention is paid to the duplication of the preposition in a number of stable expressions typical for the business usage of the 18^th century. For the first time, the task is to identify differences in the use of repeated prepositions in business texts that relate to different territories. The relevance of the research is due to the fact that it draws readers’ attention to a new aspect in the history of the formation of Russian language norms. It is proved that in the business texts of the 18^th century, which have different origins, territorial affiliation was not a decisive factor. The author points out that along with the place where the document was written, the author’s preferences, the functioning of prepositions in formula expressions, the syntactic role of homogeneous members, and the genre of the document may have influenced the duplication of the preposition.

The article deals with lexical differences between two Shtokavian Serbo-Croatian dialects: the dialect of the village Siche (Slavonia, Croatia) which belongs to archaic Slavonian dialect, and the dialect of the village of Gospodjinci (Voyvodina, Serbia) belonging to the innovative Shumadia-Voyvodina dialect. The study is actual because there are no dialect atlases of Serbo-Croatian territory and detailed descriptions of lexical features of different Shtokavian dialects.  The study uses the lexical material collected specially on the base of the questionnaire of the Serbian-Croatian dialect Atlas. The article compares the differential vocabulary of questionnaires from two named villages. The analysis shows that the main part of differential lexems in two dialects are loan words, mainly of Turkish origin, which replaced in the Voyvodina dialect the Slavic words preserved in Slavonia. Among the lexical differences there are a number of proto-Slavic synonyms, which presumably contrasted various proto-Serbo-Croatian dialects at the beginning of the second Millennium. The words of later origin based on Slavic roots are not very important in the lexical opposition of the two dialects. From geolingustic point of vew Slavonian and Voyvodina dialects present an opposition of Western and Eastern Shtokavian.

The article analyzes the impact of globalization processes on the development of information and communication potential of mass media in the Republic of Mordovia. Such concepts as “globalization,” “information and communication globalization,” “content of the epoch,” “acceleration of the rhythm of time,” “glocalization” are clarified and justified. The positive and negative consequences of the impact of glocal processes on the development of the region are presented. The author summarizes the research on new media and the processes of digitalization of the information system and highlights the main factors of globalization in regional media. There is a quantitative growth of mass communication media in the Republic of Mordovia and the development of the entire system of media communications. It is proved that globalization in the media of the Republic of Mordovia, as well as in other regions, is carried out through digitalization, which is represented in all information processes, while glocalization is manifested in the preservation of regional and national characteristics. Based on the thematic analysis of the media texts of Mordovia, it is shown that the vast majority of materials are devoted to events in the region, that is, on the one hand, the audience remains highly interested in regional topics, and on the other hand, regional news reaches the federal and even global level. It is noted that the federal network media does not manage to take a significant place in the region and this gives scope for the development of the local press.

Aspects of the author’s modality manifestation and related features of didactic text perception are considered. The authors briefly describe the reflection of didactic discourse in the literary reception, argue the importance of identifying the author’s modality in the moralizing texts presented in the educational literature. Based on a specific material, the authors study the forms of expression of the author’s consciousness and the specifics of perception of the didactic text. The defining role of background knowledge in a situation when the reader and the author of a didactic work belong to different eras is shown. Expressions of modality in the present article are determined by the choice of genre and interaction between the author’s consciousness with the laws of the genre, points of view dominant in the text and the regularities of their interactions, the choice of character and characters, the degree of categoricity of the author’s “I.” Examples are given from the didactic works of A. G. Dymov (“Adab”), whose work has not yet been considered from the position of semantic expressiveness of the subject of the author’s plan involved in it. Despite the fact that the measure of subjectivity in a didactic text intended for educational purposes should be minimal, and their aesthetics can be unassuming, it is proved on a specific material that the recognition of forms of author’s modality allows not only to specify the author’s value attitudes, but also to judge in many ways the reasons that hold attention when reading such texts.

The article examines the Adyghe toponymic traditions. The relevance of the work is that it addresses one of the complex theoretical problems of modern Russian folklore — the definition of differentiating genre features of works of oral folk prose. The authors proceed from the fact that the identification of genre characteristics of Adyghe toponymic legends should contribute to the creation of a generalizing genre system of Adyghe folk non-fairy prose. The novelty of the research consists in determining the genre features of Adyghe toponymic legends and their classification. In the continuum of Adyghe toponymic traditions, two groups are distinguished: the traditions of the first group are archaic, they tell about the events of the distant past and are known throughout the entire ethnic territory. It is shown that the plot of this type of legend is expanded, complicated and includes a number of additional motives — the history of migration and settlement of the current territories by the people, genealogical excursions. It is noted that another group of toponymic legends is associated with events of the recent past and has a narrow local connectedness. The marker of historical authenticity of the described facts and events is an indication of real historical persons who act as characters in the legend. It is argued that the plot of this type of legend is not developed, they are usually one-episode, and the area of distribution of this group of legends is usually limited to one locality.

The article examines the features of magical realism as a direction of literature, as well as some of the characteristic features of American drama. The history of performances of the play “The Clean House” by the American playwright Sarah Ruhl is presented in the paper, and also a brief overview of critical articles about these theatrical performances is offered. The study proves that the play "The Clean House" can be viewed in the context of magical realism, based on a number of characteristic features, such as metaphysics, conventionality, rejection of psychological explanations of the characters’ actions, the presence of two realities, distortion of space and time, existential problems. It is noted that these features are manifested at the level of compositional construction, speech organization of the play, chronotope, content. It is shown that a metaphysically closed space is materially open, and time in the play is leveled, stopped and determined by the subjective experiences of the characters. Laughter is nominated as the key concept of the play, linking the spatio-temporal organization of the text with its ontological content since through laughter the idea of the immortality of the heroes’ love, which acquires a sacred meaning is affirmed in the play. It is emphasized that the poetics of the “magical” makes it possible to realize the ontological or existential meaning of the play, to show the coexistence of the miraculous and the ordinary.

The author analyses the visual metaphors of K. N. Batyushkov’s poetry, in which he acts as the creative heir to the artistic style of G. R. Derzhavin. The urgency of the problem is connected with the need to clarify the features of the creative method of K. N. Batyushkov in the aspect of his assimilation of the Derzhavin tradition. The novelty of the research is connected with the expansion of ideas about the poetics of the visual in Russian poetry of the early 19^th century, in particular, in the work of K. N. Batyushkov. It is proved that K. N. Batyushkov represents vision as a process of cognition of the world. The mechanisms of K. N. Batyushkov’s transformation of visually perceived world in an artistic image are considered, the artistic thinking of the poet is reconstructed. It is revealed that the model of creating a visual verbal image in K. N. Batyushkov’s work is based on the poetic formula “I see.” It is shown that K. N. Batyushkov emphasizes the position of the observer, reflecting at the same time on the diversity and greatness of God’s world, on the cause-and-effect relationship of reality phenomena. It is established that a special place is given to the representation of historical events in the work of the poet: through the poetic formula “I see” K. N. Batyushkov places himself inside the picture, which corresponds to the emerging aesthetics of romanticism with its cult of personal perception of reality.

The article is devoted to the reconstruction of the Russian recruitment rite that existed in the territory of modern Udmurtia in the early and mid-20^th century. The source base for the reconstruction was ethnographic stories recorded by the author in the 1990s in folklore and ethnographic expeditions of the Udmurt Institute of History, Language and Literature of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. As a result of preliminary analysis and systematization of the material, the functioning of a single, general structure of the ritual in this region is proved. The article demonstrates the tendency of the Russian traditional culture of the region to unite into two large ethno-cultural areas. The relevance of the work is due to the fact that the recruitment rites of Russian residents of Udmurtia were first considered in the context of traditional recruitment rites of other peoples of the Ural-Volga region. The results of a comparative analysis of Russian recruitment rituals in Udmurtia and traditional recruitment rituals of Bashkirs, Besermyans, Komi-Permyaks, Mari, Tatars, Chuvash, Udmurts living in the Ural-Volga region are presented. The typological similarity of recruitment rites of these peoples is proved. The analysis revealed numerous ethnographic parallels in the conduct of traditional recruitment rites among the peoples of the Ural-Volga region and the Russian population of modern Udmurtia.

The article considers the evolution and suggests the periodization of the activities of local judicial and administrative control institutions in the North Caucasus in the last third of the 18^th — first half of the 19^th centuries on the example of bailiffs’ offices. Four stages are highlighted: 1) the establishment of the first private bailiff in Kabarda (1769) and the formation of the Main Caucasian bailiff’s office (1800); 2) its separation from the Main Kalmyk bailiff’s office structure (1801); 3) adoption of an Institution for the administration of the Caucasus region (1827); 4) reorganization of the Chechen bailiff (1852) and replacement of bailiffs by institutions of military popular administration (1858). The functions of the main and local bailiffs’ offices within the framework of the proposed periodization are considered. The features of administrative subordination of local and main bailiff offices and their staff structure are studied. Attention is drawn to the difficulties of organizing the activities of bailiffs’ offices related to their subordination, on the one hand, to the Board (Ministry) of Foreign Affairs, on the other — to the provincial or linear authorities. It is concluded that the proposed periodization allows to present the dynamics of the activity of the bailiffs in the North Caucasus in the last third of the 18^th — first half of the 19^th centuries as a complex phenomenon aimed at finding optimal forms of governance of the peoples included in the political and legal space of the Russian Empire.

The article considers the problem of national self-determination among the autochthonous peoples of Russia as a component of the ethnopolitical processes of the late 1980s and early 1990s. The relevance is determined by the need to study the manifested ethnic interests, inter-ethnic tension and separatist tendencies that have passed from a latent state to an open form among a number of autochthonous peoples. On the basis of comparative analysis, research of archival documents of state, departmental, personal archives and historiographical data, general trends and regional specifics of Khakas, Adygs, Shapsugs, Shors, and Teleuts are revealed. The ethno-political processes on which the ideas of national self-determination were based include the growth of ethnic consciousness, “the politicization” of ethnicity, the change of ideological paradigms, the institutional activity of national elites, the formation of national revival programs, and myth-making. The author reveals the significant commonality of myths (“search for the enemy,” “loss” of national culture and other theses) and differences based on the historical and ethnic memory of each nation. Special attention is paid to the problem of autonomy. It was seen as an emerging component in attempts to implement the idea of national self-determination. The experience of normalization of social relations was considered in the analysis of the tactics used by national elites in achieving political goals, decisions made by regional authorities, and the reaction of various segments of society.

The problem of studying the activities of the French Communist Group (FCG), created in Russia in 1918 on the initiative of the Russian Communist Party, is examined. In domestic and foreign historiography, there are works devoted to the history of the formation of this organization and the composition of the group. An analysis of the works shows that the work of the French group in several cities of Russia is presented as the activity of one organization. In this article, special attention is paid to studying the work of the main bureau of the FCG, located in Moscow in the 1918—1920s, as the key core of the organization. The source base of the study is archival documents and sources of personal origin. The appearance, activity and dissolution of the Moscow bureau of the Federal Financial Group are analyzed, the quantitative and professional composition of the participants, the structure of subordination and the distribution of responsibilities are revealed. The main task facing the bureau members was determined — propaganda activities. The main lines of propaganda activity of the Moscow bureau among compatriots are systematized: publication and distribution of print media, holding meetings and rallies, personal meetings and conversations, participation in the First and Second Congresses of the Comintern, work with the parliamentary opposition in France to end the intervention and spread of world revolution ideas. It is proved that, in addition to campaigning, there was also active assistance of the bureau members to French citizens residing or arrested in Russia.

On the basis of archival materials, the issue of the construction of oil refineries set up in the USSR under lend-lease in accordance with the agreement signed with the United States in 1942 is examined, which is very relevant in the context of heightened discussions about the problems related to the history of World War II. The novelty of the research is determined not only by the introduction of new archival documents into scientific circulation, but also by an attempt to determine more precisely the reasons for the failure of the planned dates of commissioning of oil refineries. The results of the analysis of reports by American specialists are presented, which allowed to objectively consider the problems that arose during construction. Special attention is paid to the attempts of the authors of these documents to determine the main reasons for the construction slowdown. The changes in the attitude of Americans to construction managers, the management system during 1944 are commented. It is shown that their dissatisfaction with the position of consultants was expressed in the reports. It is concluded that our own production of fuel for the active army in our country was constantly growing and largely provided the front. It is proved that the commissioning of oil refineries supplied by the United States after the end of the war could not influence its outcome, but later became the basis for the creation of the refining industry in the lower Volga region.

The article analyzes the first years of “the cultural revolution” in China (1966—1967), characterized by high revolutionary activity of students and school youth, organized into groups of “red guards”, who were distinguished in their actions by extreme cruelty and fanaticism. From this point of view, the destructive actions of the red guards, which were of a terrorist and mass nature, highlight the main direction of their revolutionary strike, which was inflicted on the party and state apparatus of China. Mao Zedong is presented as the initiator of a mass movement of red guards who used monstrous terrorist methods to fight his opposition and all, from their point of view, not enough politically conscious elements. The hongweibing movement, considered as an instrument of Mao Zedong’s struggle with the opposition, allows to reveal in the course of research the personal qualities of a leader who, in the name of establishing his own cult, was not afraid to deliberately plunge the entire country into mass and deeply disorderly turmoil. The detailed description of Mao Zedong’s personal attitude to what is happening, based on documentary sources, reveals the deeply dictatorial and anti-democratic nature of his power, which was asserted in the first years of “the cultural revolution” with the help of the red guards movement.

The article deals with the transformation of the Slovak state regime in the period of changes in the system of socialist governance in the mid-1980s — 1992. It is determined that the historical period of liberalization of the Communist regime had a significant impact on the further success of democratic transformations. The subject of the analysis was the public and Church opposition in socialist Slovakia. The fact of the ideological evolution of the opposition movement “Public against violence” has been established. It is noted that the movement for independence in Slovakia in 1989—1992, which was initiated by the Slovak elite led by Vladimir Mechiyar, significantly reduced the intensity of the democratic transition. It is claimed that in the first half of the 1990s Vladimir Mechiyar built a strong vertical of Executive power, supported by the dominance of the Movement for a democratic Slovakia in the Parliament. It is emphasized that the first competitive parliamentary elections in Slovakia in 1990 and 1992 failed to stabilize the socio-political situation in the country, despite the intensive development of multiparty systems.

The article is devoted to the image of a wonderful three-legged horse belonging, according to the religious views of Ossetians, to Uastyrdzhi — the heavenly patron of men, warriors and travellers. The relevance of the research is due to the fact that Uastyrdzhi is one of the main actors of the Ossetian saga and mythology, so a thorough study of all the stories and characters associated with Uastyrdzhi contributes to a more complete reconstruction of traditional religious and mythological representations of Ossetians. In addition, this study is a response to the increased public interest in this issue in Ossetia, which has recently acquired a debatable character. The common interpretation of the three-legged motif of the miraculous horse as its transformed “fire-legged” is criticized. An extensive comparative material is presented, showing the prevalence of the image of a three-legged horse in folklore and mythological systems of different peoples of the world. The author comes to the conclusion that three-legged motif is one of the manifestations of solar symbolism of a horse in mythology. Attention is paid to the psychopompic function inherent in the image of a three-legged horse. The novelty of the research is seen in attracting new arguments for the interpretation of three-legged motif (primarily data from Indo-Iranian mythology), which previously remained outside the researchers’ attention.

The article is devoted to the policy of France towards Italy and Ethiopia at the initial stage of the Italo-Ethiopian war of 1935—1936. It is shown that in the autumn of 1935, the French government took a position aimed at a peaceful settlement of the Italian-Ethiopian conflict at the expense of Ethiopia, since relations with Italy were much more important for France than relations with Ethiopia, and “real policy” required France to reach an agreement primarily with Italy. It is noted that a similar position was taken by the United Kingdom. It is indicated that this resulted in the formation of a plan for the settlement of the conflict, put forward in December 1935 by the head of the French government, Pierre Laval, and the British foreign Minister, Samuel Hoare. It is proved that the Hoare–Laval plan was an early form of the policy of “appeasement of the aggressor,” which became the leading direction of French and British foreign policy during the collapse of the Versailles system of international relations in 1938—1939. The research is based on publications of Soviet, French, Italian and Canadian diplomatic documents, League of Nations documents, memoirs of political figures of that era, as well as unpublished documents from the Archive of Publicistic Activity (Germany).

The author of the article assumes that the interstate relations between Russia and Great Britain in the late 18^th — early 19^th centuries largely determined the area of private contacts between Russians and the British. English-Russian marriages have a special place in the history of English-Russian relations. Attention is paid to one of such unions — the marriage of the outstanding statesman M. M. Speransky with an Englishwoman Elizabeth Stephens. It is claimed that a significant role in Speransky’s fate was played by A. A. Samborsky, also married to an Englishwoman, in whose house Speransky’s fateful meeting with his future wife took place. It is reported that the Speransky Fund of the Russian national library preserved letters of Elizabeth Stephens to Speransky, previously not widely attracted by researchers, but not all of these letters actually belong to Elizabeth, some of them belong to her sister — Marianne. This study provides the first translation of these letters for the analysis of Speransky’s private life. The author concludes that the preserved correspondence meets the standards and methods of expression of feelings in the era of “sentimentalism.” The problem of how much Speransky was immersed in the cultural context of British reality due to this marriage is also considered. Despite the fact that the marriage was quite short, Speransky’s relations with the Stephens family were quite strong.

On the example of the insurrectionary movement of the Cossacks and peasants of the Don and Kuban in the early 1920s, one of the most difficult issues in the history of the transition from the policy of war communism to the new economic policy is considered. The reasons and manifestations of the insurrection in the South of Russia in 1920—1924, its influence on the content of reforms in the region are revealed. The features of the “white-green” movement in the southern Russian stanitsas, conditioned by the historically established order of land use, the forms of stanitsa self-government, the estate and class composition of the population, are established. It is noted that the relevance of the study increases in the context of rethinking the reforms of Russian society, the need to strengthen the social base of reforms and conflict resolution. The novelty of the study is seen in the fact that for the first time we consider the insurrectionary movement not as a class confrontation, but as a confrontation between the authorities and the South Russian community, represented by various estate, class groups and socio-political movements. The factors for regulating the conflict during the transition to NEP have been established. The author comes to the conclusion that the “pacification” of the Cossack regions of the South of Russia took place not only through the active use of the regular units of the Red Army and security forces, but also through compromise decisions that became the basis for the start of economic reforms.