Михаил Лермонтов - A Hero of Our Time [New Translation]

dzhigits: Caucasian horsemen known for equestrian feats and trick-riding.

galloon: Braid or lace made of metal, typically used in military uniform.

chamois: A goatlike animal native to the Caucasus mountains.

abreks: A kind of freedom-fighter in the Caucasus. This word is also used to describe bandits and outcasts.

beshmet: A kind of quilted coat.

“Yakshi tkhe, chek yakshi!”: This means “A good horse, very good!”

gyaurs: Non-Muslims. The word is a Turkic version of the Persian word for infidel.

Karagyoz: A Turkic name, which literally means “black eyes,” but also refers to a Turkish shadow puppet, popular for many centuries in countries near Turkey.

Yok: This means “no” or “not.” It is said to be Tatar.

gurda: An expensive weapon made of high-quality steel.

Padishah: This was a title for the Sultan of Turkey.

There is a footnote here in Lermontov’s original: Я прошу прощения у читателей в том, что переложил в стихи песню Казбича, переданную мне, разумеется, прозой; но привычка — вторая натура. (Прим. Лермонтова.)

yashmak: A type of Turkish veil worn by women.

Urus—yaman, yaman!: This means “The Russian is bad, bad!”

peri: A term of endearment referring to fairylike creatures who are fallen angels.

muzhik: A male Russian peasant.

Russ: An older word meaning “Russian man.”

dear little: this refers to provincial Russian cities and has a slightly pejorative tone (hence the italics, which were in Lermontov’s original).

Krestovaya: This is a mountain, the name of which translates as “Mountain of the Cross.”

Nightingale-Robber: A figure from Russian folklore who wrought havoc and was able to render people immobile by whistling.

lezginka: A folk dance of the Lezgin people.

sazhen: An obsolete Russian measurement equal to seven feet.

thermalam: Fabric used for lining, usually linen or cotton.

dolman: A Hungarian jacket.

Balzac’s thirty-year-old coquette: This refers to Honoré de Balzac’s novel La Femme de Trente Ans (1834).

Rousseau’s confessions: This refers to Les Confessions by Rousseau.

izba: A traditional Russian log house.

fatera: This word means quarters.

slobodka: A settlement exempted from normal State obligations.

On that day the dumb shall cry out: A reference to the Bible, Isaiah 35:5-6: “Then shall the lame man leap as an hart and the tongue of the dumb sing.”

uryadnik: A Cossack NCO, a noncommissioned officer.

rusalka: A water nymph, frequently demonic, who lives underwater, often at the bottom of rivers.

La Jeune-France: A group of young French writers of the 1830s who are known to have exaggerated the theories of Romanticism. They looked up to Victor Hugo.

Mignon: A character in Goethe’s novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre.

The opening line of a short poem by Alexander Pushkin titled “The Cloud” (1835).

whist: A trick-taking card game played by four players. It was popular in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

fichu: A triangular scarf worn around the neck.

à la moujik: This means “in the peasant style.”

“Mon cher, je haïs les hommes pour ne pas mépriser, car autrement la vie serait une farce trop dégoutante”: “My dear friend, I hate men in order not to despise them, otherwise life would be a most repulsive farce.” (French)

“Mon cher, je méprise les femmes pour ne pas les aimer, car autrement la vie serait un mélodrame trop ridicule”: “My dear friend, I despise women in order not to love them, otherwise life would be a most ridiculous melodrama.” (French)

cherkeska: A Circassian tunic, worn over the beshmet.

Beshtau, Zmeinoi, Zheleznaya, and Lisaya: The translation, from Turkish and Russian, of these names: Five-mountains, The Snake, The Iron One, The Bare One.

“Mon dieu, un Circassien!”: “My God, a Circassian!” (French)

“Ne craignez rien, madame—je ne suis pas plus dangereux que votre cavalier.”: “Fear not, madam—I am no more dangerous than your cavalier.” (French)

Nogay wagon: The Nogays are an East Caucasian people.

C’est impayable!: “That’s priceless!” (French)

This is a reference to Pyotr Pavlovich Kaverin, a friend of Pushkin’s who served in the same regiment as Lermontov, and who is mentioned in the first chapter of Eugene Onegin.

Library for Reading: A journal of the 1830s and 1840s (Biblioteka dlya Chteniya), which published memoirs and foreign novels, among other things.

souls: Serfs in Russia were counted as “souls.”

From act 3, scene 3 of Woe from Wit by Aleksandr Griboedov. It is slightly misquoted by Lermontov here.

The cold observations… : A fragment from Eugene Onegin by Alexander Pushkin.

vampire: The vampire referred to here is the hero of a story by John Polidori called “The Vampyre,” about a young man who negotiates society by wreaking havoc on the virtuous and encouraging the sinister.

son coeur et sa fortune: His heart and his fortune. (French)

arkhaluk: A Caucasian coat.

“É finita la commedia!”: “The comedy is finished!” (Italian)

stanitsa: A large Cossack village.

Boston: A card game.

faro: A card game that was popular in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, involving an entire pack of playing cards and any number of players.

stuss: A variant of the card game faro.