concept
Vodyanaya melnitsa (water mill)
water mill
also: мельница, водяная мельница
A water-powered grain mill built on a dammed river; owning the only such mill in a district gave its owner effective monopoly leverage over every peasant and monastery needing grain ground, the economic basis of Alexey Biryukov's petty tyranny.
Reading notes
- At the Mill §1 мельницы
A water-powered grain mill built on a dammed river, the setting of the whole sketch; owning the only mill in a district (as Biryukov does, loc 20) gave the miller effective monopoly leverage over every peasant and monastery needing grain ground.
- At the Mill §20 немолотое зерно кушай
Kliopa's exaggeration -- eating grain unground rather than as flour or bread -- illustrates concretely just how dependent the whole district is on this single mill, reinforcing the miller's monopoly power that underlies his petty tyranny.