Culture of the Don Land. Учебное пособие
.pdfcontributed much to the development of the Don Land and we are proud of this.
Vocabulary notes: to appreciate – ценить, оценивать motto – девиз
to display courage – проявлять мужество to capture – захватывать силой
to conquer – завоевывать, покорять to raise a siege – снимать осаду
to stand a siege – выдерживать осаду
to persuade smb to do smth – убеждать к.-л. сделать ч.-л. negotiation – переговоры
seal – печать
public merry-making – народное гуляние to spare one’s life – щадить ч.-л. жизнь to contribute to – делать вклад
to exterminate – истреблять
in commemoration of – в память о ...
to grant – предоставлять, жаловать ultimate end – конечная цель
to enhance – усиливать, увеличивать
Activities:
1. Agree or disagree with the following statements:
1)Peter I didn’t take part in the campaign of 1695-1696;
2)The young Tsar didn’t spare his life for the Motherland and shared all the difficulties and hardships of the campaign with ordinary soldiers and Cossacks;
3)The Don Cossacks were the first who burst into the Turkish fortress of Azov;
4)They arranged a feast and fired a salute and fireworks in the fortress of Dimitry Rostovsky;
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5)Peter I wanted to make our native city a new capital of
Russia;
6)It was Peter the Great who ordered the Don Cossacks to grow orchards and crops.
2. Discuss the following topics in the form of a dialogue: a) Peter the Great’s campaign in 1695-1696;
b) Peter I – a brave and courageous man;
c) The influence of the victory over the Turks on home and foreign policy of Russia;
d) The role of the Tsar Peter I in the development of the Don Lands.
3. Debating Club. You are members of the History Club. You are present at the party devoted to the past of Rostov Region. Take part in the discussion:
1)The first people on the Don;
2)The legends about the Don Land;
3)«The song of Igor’s Campaign»;
4)Famous writers and poets about the beauties of the Quiet Don Land.
DON COSSACKS (RETROSPECT)
Find the answers to the following questions:
1.Who inhabited the Don-land steppes?
2.What do you know about the Cossacks?
3.When were the Don Cossacks officially recognized by Muscovy?
In old times the Don-land steppes were called Dikoye Polye (Wild Field). Nomads replaced each other here for millenniums. In most cases they did not know anything of their predecessors, believing that the «true» history of these places had started with the settlement of their own tribe. This was
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due to the fact that the periods when this vast land remained deserted, were long indeed.
The Cimmerians, Khazars, Greeks, Tartars and other peoples named the main local river in different ways. Yet traditional became an old Alanic word Don meaning water.
For the last 6–7 centuries the Don Land history has been closely connected with the Cossacks. As a phenomenon, the Cossacks are quite unique: these people, though referring themselves to the Slav Russian culture and Orthodoxy, had for centuries lived separately from Muscovy, amid the alien Turkic tribes. A life full of hazards made skilful warriors out of the Cossacks. A Cossack boy who had just learnt to walk was taught to ride a horse, and a little bit later was given lessons in swordsmanship and fire-arms handling, as well as man-to-man encounter.
Some researchers compare the Cossacks to the knightly orders of Medieval Europe... Perhaps they are right in a way, yet the above analogue cannot be complete as the Cossacks, say, unlike those knights, were not monks and stole wives for themselves from the harems of shereef Moslems during their anabases. While knightly orders were established with the aim of strengthening the military discipline of their governors, the emergence of the Cossacks did not aim at anything definite at all.
According to one hypothesis, the Cossacks are the descendants of those citizens of the old Novgorod and Pskov democratic republics who, after their territories had been annexed to Muscovy, fled to the south, to Dikoye Polye. They retained their democratic way of life on the Don Land. Only the veche at which the Prince was elected, was now called krug, and the prince was named ataman (the latter word by the way coming from Turkic).
However, in accordance with the theory most popular in the world of science, the Cossacks are the offsprings of the
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praedial Russian serfs who had escaped from their excessively atrocious masters.
Anyway as time went on, the Cossack country lying far beyond the southern boundaries of Russia became stronger and larger, and it gradually began to be mentioned at the palaces of Europe and Near East.
Objectively speaking, the Cossacks were a powerful rearguard covering Russia from numerous conquerors coming from Turkey, Persia, the North Caucasus and the Volga steppes.
In the middle of the 16 century Tsar John IV expanding the frontiers of Russia, waged endless wars with the Swedes and Livonians in the west and the Tartars in the south-west and east. In that difficult situation the Tsar needed peace with the Turkish Sultan and alliance with the Don-land Cossacks.
January 3, 1570, the day when an embassy headed by Tsar's Ambassador Novosiltsev appeared here, is considered the date of the official recognition of the Don Cossacks by Muscovy. From this time on, the Cossacks were under the Russian Tsar's arms.
The Cossacks' service was paid by lead, gunpowder, saltpetre, etc. In return, they were to guard the Russian territory from incursions and had no right to farm in order not to lose their combat skill.
Vocabulary notes:
nomad – кочевник Cimmerian – киммериец khazar – хазар
slav – славянский
orthodoxy – ортодоксальность, православиеalien – иностранный, чуждый
hazard – опасность, риск warrior – воин
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swordsmanship – искусство фехтования
fire-arms handling – обращение с огнестрельным оружием
man-to-man encounter – борьба один на один offspring – отпрыск, потомок
serf – крепостной atrocious – жестокий rearguard – арьергард saltpetre – селитра
incursion – вторжение, внезапное нападение
Activities:
1.Read the text and discuss the given information.
2.Say what interesting facts you have learned about Don Cossacks.
3.Exchange this information with your group-mates.
4.What do you know about contemporary Don Cossacks? What is their role in the society?
THE COSSACKS TODAY
Find the answers to the following questions:
1.What traditions do the Cossacks want to restore?
2.Was the call-up to the army manned last year?
3.How can the situation be changed?
4.Who is ready to protect Russia from the local wars?
5.What are the Cossacks now?
Nowadays the Cossacks want to restore their tradition which is based on three pillars: military service, land ownership and self-government. Last year the call-up to the army was manned only by 50 per cent. Surely the situation can be changed only by a call-up to the Cossack units. The Cossacks
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are ready to protect Russia from the local wars waged in the Caucasus.
The Cossacks are part and parcel of Russia's spiritual revival. Boris Yeltsin signed the Decree «On Reforming Military Structure of the Frontier and Internal Troops on the Territory of the North-Caucasian Region of the Russian Federation and State Support for the Cossacks», which proved to be controversial. Practically all local authorities and power structures of the Russian South gave warm welcome to the decree.
The non-Russian population regarded the decree with suspicion, but the Russian-speaking population hailed it with euphoria.
The President's decree instructs Cossacks organization with the training of youth for military service to ensure law and order.
But there are no moves in the direction of its realization because the decree was sent to the Constitutional Court for the consideration. Now the opponents of the movement think that it is very dangerous to trust them. They are against giving the Cossacks land in exchange for serving the state.
There is a trend to restore the Cossacks as a class and the president gives them class privileges in his decree. Thus the ownership and use of land among the Cossacks may differ sharply from the forms of land use in Russia. The traditional forms of self-government can be instituted on the territory where Cossacks live and they are based on class principles. Thus they lay the foundation for discrimination against the non-Cossack minority.
The opponents say that the Cossacks are a militarized class and can become the basis for imperial Russia composed of different classes.
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Today the Cossack organizations are trying to arm themselves. Their members openly travel to various «trouble» spots of the former SU as well as Yugoslavia and bring weapons from there to Russia. The carrying of swords by Cossacks has been legalized.
Vocabulary notes: cossack unit – казацкие части
call-up – призыв
to restore – восстанавливать to arm – вооружать
pillar – столб, столп, опора
to wage local wars – вести, вступать в локальные войны military service – военная служба
part and parcel – неотъемлемая часть spiritual revival – духовное возрождение land ownership – землевладелец self-government – самоуправление
to sign the decree on frontier – подписать указ о границах
state support – государственная поддержка privileges – привилегии
minority – меньшинство weapon – оружие sword – сабля
to be legalized – легализовать
Activities:
1. Agree or disagree with the following statements using the following expressions: The way I look at it... I think... In my opinion... What's more... Besides ... More over... I agree...
Idon't agree... I want to contradict..., etc.
1)Nowadays the Cossacks' tradition is based on military
service;
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2)The Cossacks are part and parcel of Russia's spiritual
revival;
3)The non-Russian population regarded the decree on Cossacks with euphoria;
4)There are no moves in the direction of the decree reali-
zation;
5)There is a trend to restore the Cossacks as a class;
6)The Cossacks can become the basis for an imperial Rus-
sia.
2. Exchange your opinion on the Cossacks with your friend, using the words and expressions of the text.
3. Write a letter to your foreign friend in which you tell about your attitude to the Cossacks' problems.
THE COSSACKS ARE COMING BACK
Imagine the steppe of Russia with its virginal grassland looking like an ocean of green and gold sprinkling with millions of different flowers.
The quiet Don is flowing dreamily at the sunrise under a diaphanous mist. Wild geese waddle down banking joyously. A bouquet of beautiful domes rises over the Don – it crowns the Orthodox Church standing nearby.
This is the land of Cossacks – people who were savagely repressed after communists seized power in 1917 and now they yearn to create Russia anew, strong and righteous, with law prevailing against the anarchy that affects Russia today.
Ardent devotion to the Russian Orthodox Church is an old tradition among the Cossacks. Now they guard monasteries and churches, their priceless icons, they prevent rowdiness.
Some people call them «play soldiers», others don't like to see them going with their whips.
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You can see Cossacks marching from St. Petersburg on the Gulf of Finland to Vladivostok on the Sea of Japan. Most of them wear the traditional uniform – an olive tunic and blue trousers with red stripes down the legs. On their flags you can see crosses, saber and double-headed Russian eagle. Some of them wear uniforms of World War II.
Some Cossacks have taken up arms in the war in Chechnya. Some aided the Serbs in the former Yugoslavia.
All the Cossacks demand now is the freedom to revive their old way of living. Some of them were granted the land. But the land has produced more woe than wealth. Everything the farmer needs – a tractor, fertilizer, pesticide – is dauntingly expensive.
The Cossacks strongly believe that God will bring a new Tsar to them and all the problems economic disorder as well as lawlessness could be solved – in Russia. Cossacks wish order to come back to their lives. They are very sorry for children taking drugs, abusing alcohol. So they did everything in order to reopen the Royal Cossack Cadet Academy in Novochercassk, which was closed by Stalin in 1933. The Academy was established by Tsar Alexander II in 1883 and now there are 260 cadets – growing boys who rise at dawn and they are Cossacks 24 hours a day.
Although there are some dark pages in the history of Cossacks most of the people consider them to be handsome, industrious, brave, hospitable and good-natured people.
Activities:
1.Make up a plan of the text in the form of questions.
2.Read the text and tell what facts you have already known and what facts are new for you.
3.Do you agree with the author that the Cossacks are hospitable and good-natured people?
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4.Find the sentences to illustrate that Christianity is a part of Cossacks' life.
5.Develop the idea:
•Cossacks love their Motherland;
•Not all people understand Cossacks;
•Cossacks stand for law and order.
6.Do you know any cadets of the Royal Cossack Cadet Academy in Novochercassk? If so, tell your group-mates what kind of person he is.
7.Situations:
1)You exchange your opinions on the Cossacks today;
2)You know nothing about the Cossacks. Ask your relative about the aims of the Cossacks movement;
3)You discuss deeds (actions) of the Cossacks;
4)You discuss the importance to restore the Cossack tra-
ditions.
8. Group project «Defence». The students are divided into four groups. Two groups prepare the reports in the defence of contemporary Cossacks. The third group makes up questions. The fourth group decides whose reports are better or worse, gives the reasons.
Notes for teachers:
The Report of the First Group
In 1928 the last chieftain of the Don Army general Bogaevsky wrote in exile: «No matter what the future power in Russia is like, Cossack troops will exist. The state needs such a sound and cheerful population accustomed to order. Cossacks will obey any new power, which spells order and an opportunity to work in peace».
We appreciate his words and want to add that the Cossacks are part and parcel of Russia's spiritual revival. Cossacks
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