in the first half of the 19th Century living Russian writer Mikhail Lermontov and officer had desöfteren I mention on this blog (see here and here ). The "Singer of the Caucasus" was sufficiently while serving in this wild mountain region opportunity to familiarize themselves with the people living there. I recently I came across another short text written by him titled "The Caucasian" . This should be understood but not the actual inhabitants of the Caucasus, the Christian and Muslim clans and tribes, but those from the Russian mainland coming officers who had been obliged to serve in the simmering trouble spot. (Please note: We also Lermontov weapons cultural submissions ;-).) "[...]
First, what is a Caucasian and maintain as Caucasians to be
A Caucasian is a semi-Russian, half-Asian affairs;? The tendency to Oriental manners prevails with him, but in the presence of strangers, that is, in the presence of traveler from Russia, he is ashamed of this tendency. He's usually thirty to forty-five, his face tanned and slightly pockmarked, he is not a staff captain, then certainly major. Real Caucasians see the line, beyond the mountains, in Georgia, they have a different gradation; civilian Caucasians are rare, they usually represent a clumsy imitation, and meet once a true amongst them, then more than at the regimental doctors.
A real Caucasians is an admirable man, worthy of any respect and participation. Up to his eighteenth birthday he is educated in the cadet corps and dismissed as an excellent officer, secretly, he has in the classroom read the "prisoner of the Caucasus" [of Pushkin , EK], and is inflamed with passion for the Caucasus. With ten comrades, he is sent at public expense there - with high hopes and a small suitcase. Even in St. Petersburg, he can be a Achaluchi sew and can buy a cap and a shaggy Tscherkessenpeitsche for coaching. Once in Stavropol, he paid a measly dagger too expensive and places it in the first days or day off or night, to which he is tired. Finally he found one in his regiment, which has moved in any Staniza his winter quarters, where he falls in love, as it should be, in a Cossack girl for the time being until the expedition, all beautiful and so poetic! Then we moved out to the expedition, our youth is everywhere, even where a bullet whizzes. He sets out to catch two dozen mountain people with their own hands, he dreams of terrible battles, rivers of blood and Generalsepauletten. In the dream he accomplishes true heroism - perhaps wishful thinking, nonsense, the enemy is far and wide to see anything, skirmishes are rare, and keep the mountain people, much to his chagrin, the bayonets not stand to let prisoners do not take themselves, but bring your own skin to safety. Moreover, in summer the heat unbearable in the fall of rain and snow and Cold. Boring! Five, six years elapse: a constant monotony. He is gaining experience, is cold-blooded and fun of the newcomers who are risking their lives unnecessarily.
Meanwhile, although many crosses adorn his chest, but the transport can be delayed. He became gloomy and taciturn, he does want to settle in and smokes his pipe, and in leisure hours, he also reads Marlinski and declares that he is very good, on expeditions, he is not crazy: An old wound hurts! The Cossack girls do not irritate him, for a time he dreamed of a Circassian prisoners, but now forget that almost unattainable dream. Instead, he has a new passion, and just makes him a real Caucasian. The result
this passion is this: the last time he made friends with a serene ride and Circassians now often exploits him in the Aul. Alien to the sophistication of life in the genteel world and in the city, he found pleasure in the wild life in the history of Russia and European politics, he knows nothing, but he developed a fondness for the poetic traditions of the military people. The manners and customs of the mountaineers are familiar to him, he knows by their hero's name and has memorized the pedigrees of the most important families. He know which prince reliable and what a crook who is friends with whom and between whom there is blood enmity. He understands a little Tatar, and he has a sword, a real Gurda, purchased, a dagger, an old Basalai a gun from beyond the Kuban, an excellent Krimgewehr he even lubricates, a horse, a thoroughbred sound hole, and a full Tscherkessentracht that it imposes only on big occasions and has sewn to it with any crazy princess and made a gift. His fondness for all Circassian it borders on the incredible. He is ready all day with a dirty Usden a horse and a rusty old ragged speaking gun, and he likes it very dedicate to others the secrets of Asian customs. It are different, the most amazing things happened, you think! Buy a newcomer to his friend, the Usden, a weapon or a horse, he just smiles secretly. About the mountaineers he expressed thus: "A good man once, but very terrible Asians! The Chechens, however, are scoundrels, but the Kabardins are simply good fellows, even under the Schapsugen there are capable people, but they can not compete with the Kabardins, neither understand they are to dress so as to ride an extent. . . If they live pure, very pure, "
Man the bias must have a Caucasian, to find something in a Tscherkessensaklja Immaculate.
The experience of long campaigns it has not learned the resourcefulness, the army officers is otherwise self, he flirts with his carelessness and habit, to accept the inconveniences of military life, he only leads a teapot with it, and rarely cooked in his bivouac fire cabbage soup . With heat like cold he wears under the frock coat a padded Achaluchi and on his head a sheepskin hat, and he has a strong aversion to coats and prefer the burka, the burqa is his toga, in which he wraps himself, and the rain drops him in the collar, the wind beats the burqa apart - not so bad! By Pushkin, and Marlinski Jermolows famous portrait burqa comes from his shoulder, he sleeps on it and covers his horse so he resorts to the various lists and wiles to get hold of a real Andijer burqa, including a white bottom with black border, and then he sees already with a certain disdain on the others down. The also said that his horse is amazingly fast - on long drives. Ridiculous about ten miles, he may not ride with you. If the service is sometimes difficult to him, he has made it his maxim to praise the life in the Caucasus, to anyone who wants to hear it said, he, the service in the Caucasus is very pleasant.
pass away But the years of Caucasians has been forty, it drags him home, and when he is not wounded, he moves sometimes as follows: During the exchange of fire, he puts his head behind a rock, his legs but he stretches the purpose of obtaining board before, this expression is then sanctified by custom. The charity ball hits him in the leg, and he is happy. The parting board pops out of it, he buys a small car, a few stretches before and does nag slowly on the way home, at post stations he keeps always use to chat with people passing through. If you meet him, realize It immediately as a true Caucasians, because even in the government of Voronezh, he strapped a dagger or sword not stop him because they do not work against it. The station supervisor listens to him respectfully, and only here to allow the retired hero who brag and make up stories, the Caucasus, he is modest - but at long last, whoever it was to prove in Russia, that a horse not a ride two hundred miles can cover and a rifle in the world four hundred Sashen the finish correct? But alas, most of his bones rot in Moslem world. He marries rare, and imposes it on his fate but a wife, he is ready to be put in a garrison, and decides his days in some fortress, where he keeps his wife in front of the Russians so fatal habit.
Now two words about the other Caucasians, are not real. The Georgian Caucasian differs from the real fact that he has a strong preference for Kachetinerwein and wide silk trousers. The civilian Caucasians sets rarely Asian clothes, he is more with the soul with the body of Caucasians: It deals with archaeological discoveries, is spreading like on the benefits of trade with the mountain people and on ways to make those and form. He has been there is some more years, he usually returns with a rank and red Nose back to Russia.
[...]"
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