THE SIMILE AS THE BASIC CATEGORY OF COGNITION (based on the riddles in crimean-tatar language)

The article contains a complex analysis of the category of comparison in the Crimean Tatar language, which had not been the subject of a special study earlier. The object of consideration consists of various types of linguistic units extracted from riddles, which express the idea of comparison. The subject of the analysis is the category of comparison as one of the basic categories of cognition, which reflects the linguistic worldview of native speakers. Mental contents of riddles are defined using methods of descrip-tion and linguocultural commentary. Lexical-semantic and grammatical means used for expressing the idea of comparison (complex metaphorization, post-position noun structures of different types, special syntactic models, lexemes with semantics of similarity, etc.) are described in the paper. Thematic groups of words defining reference standards and references of comparison are identified and characterized in the work. Combined discourse of riddles as universal forms of expressing comparative content reflects a broad axiologically marked linguistic worldview of Crimean Tatar people: their history, phenomena of material and spiritual culture, traditional activities formed under the influence of specific natural and climatic factors of Crimean Peninsula, and others.