the drama
Masquerade, the long poems
Mtsyri and
The Demon, and many lyric poems.
Chapter I
дьячок, sexton, a church custodian performing minor duties
Украина, the Ukraine, lying in the south-west of European Russia, was dominated from the 14th century by the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Poland. As a result of the liberation war waged by its people under Bogdan Khmelnitsky in 1648–1654, the Ukraine was reunited with Russia. Today the Ukraine is a Union republic of the USSR.
запорожцы (hist.), Cossacks of the Zaporozhye Sech, the community of Ukrainian Cossacks who lived below the Dnieper rapids (16th-l8th cent.). The Russian for rapids is поро́ги, hence the name zaporozhtsy. These Cossacks were very prominent in the national-liberation struggle waged by the Ukrainians against foreign invaders.
секунд-майор (hist.), officer’s rank in the Russian army in the 18th century, which corresponds to the rank of captain.
десятина (arch.), dessiatine, a Russian unit of land area equal to 2.7 acres (1.45 hectares).
души крестьян (arch.). Under the serf system (abrogated in Russia in 1861) the peasants were attached to the land and fully subjugated to their landlords. A landlord's standing was gauged in terms of the number of his peasants, called "peasant souls".
натуральное хозяйство (hist.), subsistence economy.
Аксаков, Sergei Timofeyevich Aksakov (1791–1859), Russian writer, author of the autobiographical Chronicles of a Russian Family and The Years of Childhood of Bagrov-Grandson. He described his impressions of Gogol in his memoirs My Acquaintance with Gogol.
хутор, in the Ukraine, a settlement outside the boundaries of a village, which could comprise several farmsteads.
храмовой праздник, feast in honour of the patron saint of a given church.
Мазепа, Ivan Stepanovich Mazepa (1644–1709), Ukrainian hetman (Cossack leader). He favoured the secession from Russia, and so defected to the Swedes, who invaded the Ukraine during the Northern War waged by Russia and Sweden.
пасичник (correct form, па́сечник), bee-keeper, someone in charge of an apiary (па́сека).
движимое имущество, movables.
министр уделов (hist.), minister of land grants; he was in charge of the immovable property owned by the Russian imperial family.
Кулиш, Panteleimon Alexandrovich Kulish (1819–1897), Ukrainian author, historian and ethnographer. He wrote a two-volume work The Life of Nikolai Gogol.
разноблюдный, consisting of several dishes.
Безбородко, Alexander Andreyevich Bezborodko (1747–1799), Russian statesman, who held the post of chancellor.