concept
Circassians
also: Черкесы
A North Caucasian people conventionally invoked in period Russian speech as a byword for warlike ferocity; the groom cites them, ironically, as more honest than his in-laws about money.
Reading notes
- Toward a Characterization of the Peoples §30 The Circassians
A North Caucasian people conventionally invoked in period Russian speech as a byword for warlike, unreflective ferocity.
- Before the Wedding §14 Circassians
A Caucasus mountain people with a nineteenth-century Russian literary reputation for fierce, warlike customs -- invoked by the groom as an exaggerated standard of bad behavior that even the bride's family, in his eyes, has managed to fall below.