place
Mariupol
also: Мариуполь
A port city on the Sea of Azov in southern Russia (present-day Ukraine), named here only for the sound of a nonsense pun likening it to rosin.
Reading notes
- Tumbleweed §4 мариупольские греки
The Mariupol Greeks were an Orthodox Christian, Greek-speaking community resettled from Crimea to the Sea of Azov coast around Mariupol by Catherine the Great in 1778-1780; by the late nineteenth century many had become prosperous farmers and traders, distinct from -- and, as this passage and section 63 note, generally better off than -- their neighbors, which is why the hostel staff take care to lodge them separately.
- To N. P. and I. P. Chekhov, 28 April 1880. Moscow. §17 Mariupol
A port city on the Sea of Azov in southern Russia (now Ukraine), named here only for the sound of a nonsense pun about rubbing it on a bow like rosin.