Rules for emigration of peoples of the Northwestern and Central Caucasus to the Ottoman Empire in the Russian documents of the 2nd half of the 19th century

The rules intended to regulate the emigration of peoples of the Northwestern and Central Caucasus to the Ottoman Empire in the 2nd half of the 19th century are contained mainly in the office doc-umentation of Russian military and administrative bodies: the administrations of the Caucasian Military District, the Main headquarters of the Caucasian Army, the headquarters of the troops of the Kuban region, the administrations of the chiefs of the Kabardin and Natukhai districts, the administrations of the Lower Kuban cordon line, the Maykop fortification, etc. (reports, letters, prescriptions, reviews, relations, conditions). The content of the paragraphs of many documents in this group is the same. The rules established for groups and individuals preparing to move to the Ottoman Empire a time frame, points for obtaining foreign passports and departure, routes and conditions for their movement in the Caucasus, conditions for their sale of livestock, etc. A num-ber of documents contain the conditions under which Russian merchants were obliged to transport Circassians from the Caucasian to the Ottoman coast of Black Sea. A number of documents also say that military officials demanded that their subordinates speed up the emigration of the Circas-sians. The prescription of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to the envoy to the Ottoman Empire (dated July 19, 1861) contains the positions and mutual demands of the Ottoman and Rus-sian governments on the issue of the resettlement of Caucasian Muslims to the Ottoman Empire, as well as the some legal aspects of this process. The content of the rules for regulating the migration of peoples of the Northwestern Cauca-sus to the Ottoman Empire in subsequent periods, in general, coincides with the content of such rules of the late 50s – 60s XIX century.