Novels, Tales, Journeys

3. Nekrasovists: A group of Don Cossacks, led by Ignat Nekrasov (d. 1737). They were Old Believers, condemned as heretics by the Russian Orthodox Church, and fled Russia in 1708.

4. Klephtes: Greek for “bandits.” The name was given to Greek mountaineers who preserved their independence after the Turkish conquest of the Byzantine empire in the fifteenth century.

5. A man…important post: Mikhail Ivanovich Leks (1793–1856), whom Pushkin had served under in Kishinev, was by then the director of the chancellery of the Ministry of Interior in Petersburg.

EGYPTIAN NIGHTS (1835)

1. an album: A whole culture developed around the personal albums kept by upper-class Russian girls, in which they would ask friends and new acquaintances to write verses or personal messages.

2. ragged abbés: Abbé, or “abbot,” was a title of lower-ranking clergymen in France. Abbés were appointed by the king and received a small income without necessarily serving in an abbey. They sometimes took to writing (see note 8 to The History of the Village of Goryukhino). The Abbé Prévost, author of Manon Lescaut (1731), is perhaps the most well-known example.

3. Derzhavin: See note 10 to The Moor of Peter the Great. The line is from Derzhavin’s famous ode “God” (1784).

4. Signora Catalani: Angelica Catalani (1780–1849) was one of the greatest sopranos in the history of opera, renowned for her three-octave range. She sang in Petersburg in 1820.

5. Tancredi: An opera by Gioachino Rossini (1792–1868), based on Voltaire’s tragedy Tancrède (1760).

6. Aurelius Victor: Sextus Aurelius Victor (ca. 320–390 AD), a Roman statesman and historian, wrote a short history of the Roman Empire.

THE CAPTAIN’S DAUGHTER (1836)

1. Knyazhnin: See note 4 to “The Coffin-Maker.” The quotation is from his comedy The Braggart (1786).

2. Count Münnich: Burkhard Christoph von Münnich (1683–1767), a German-born military officer and engineer, came to Russia in 1721, was taken into the Russian army by Peter the Great, and rose to become a field marshal and count. He played a major role in Russian military and political affairs under several monarchs.

3. the Semyonovsky regiment: Founded in 1683 by Peter the Great, it was one of the two oldest and most distinguished guards regiments in Russia.

4. passport: Russians were required to carry an “internal passport” when they traveled within Russia.

5. Orenburg: A city in the southern Ural region, over nine hundred miles east of Moscow. It was founded in 1743 as a frontier outpost, bordering on the territory of the nomadic Kazakhs.

6. “the keeper…my affairs”: A quotation from the poem “Epistle to my Servants Shumilov, Vanka, and Petrushka” (1769), by Denis Fonvizin (see note 1 to The Tales of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin).

7. a Yaik Cossack: Yaik was the old name of the Ural River. The Cossacks of the Yaik and the Don served as frontier guards for Russia, in exchange for certain freedoms. After their support for Pugachev’s rebellion, Yaik Cossacks lost those privileges and, like the river itself, were renamed Ural Cossacks.

8. above the stove: Russian stoves were large and elaborate structures, used for cooking, laundry, bathing, and sleeping, as well as for heating.

9. the revolt of 1772: In 1772, just prior to Pugachev’s rebellion, there was a revolt of the Yaik Cossacks over forced conscription and low pay, which led to the killing of the Russian military commander of the Orenburg region, the harsh Major General Mikhail Mikhailovich Traubenberg (1719–1772).

10. the time of Anna Ioannovna: Anna Ioannovna (1693–1740) was the daughter of Peter the Great’s physically and mentally handicapped brother Ivan V, who ruled jointly with Peter until his death in 1696. In 1730 she became empress of Russia.

11. The Dunce: See note 1 to The Tales of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin.

12. Küstrin and Ochakov: The Turkish fortress of Ochakov fell to the Russians in 1737, during the Austro-Russian-Turkish War; the Prussian fortress of Küstrin was besieged by the Russians in 1758, during the Seven Years’ War, but not actually taken.

13. Bashkirs: A Turkic people who inhabited territory to the north of Orenburg on both sides of the Urals. They fought the Russians over the building of the fortress in Orenburg and later supported Pugachev’s rebellion.

14. Knyazhnin: See note 4 to “The Coffin-Maker.” The quotation is from his comedy The Odd Birds (1790).

15. Sumarokov: See note 11 to The History of the Village of Goryukhino.