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Oriented by visual, gender and ethnographic studies, and broadening the focus from the film itself to the reviews in the cinema press of the period, this article offers a new interpretation of the Russian film Bela, a work that has been largely overlooked by critics, directed by Andrej Gromov and written by Marija Kallaš in 1913. Despite being a cinematic adaptation of a 19th century short story composed by Michail Lermontov bearing the same title, and therefore presenting itself as a paradigmatic example of classic narrative cinema, Bela challenges the typical features and conventions of the genre, reversing the standards and experimenting with the peculiarities of the documentary genre, particularly with the aesthetics of the coeval cinematic travelogues. Additionally, Kallaš’s screenplay puts the female character at the very centre of the narrative, and transforms Bela, an exotic Circassian princess depicted through ethnic and gender stereotypes, from a passive icon into an active and mobile figure, immersed in the landscape, able to observe the world around her.

The article focuses on the evolution of the image of the snake in the architectural decoration of the Christian churches in Caucasus during the medieval period. The origins of the image in the more ancient cultures of the Mesopotamia and of the Mediterranean world are studied. An attempt is made to trace the continuity in the image and meaning of the snake from ancient times up to the present day (according to ethnography and folk art). A rare iconographic type of a snake was revealed, which appears in the Middle Byzantine period in the remote mountainous regions of the Caucasus (the upper reaches of the Ksani and Liakhvi rivers, Racha, Svaneti, Upper Kartli).

The awareness of representing an ancient culture, as well as a tradition of resistance to the various powers that have invaded that space from time to time, probably constitute the main resource of the Armenian community today. An element of identity that means for the country the awareness of continuously risking for its survival in a context such as that of the Caucasus exposed to tensions that have repercussions on a very large scale. In these circumstances, Armenian territory appears as a "buffer" between great powers, former superpowers in phases of decline, and new regional powers on the rise, which often use geopolitical expedients - including the so-called "corridor approach" - to reaffirm some power positions. A situation in which the millenary survival of the country, and its extraordinary culture, appear something heroic: a fact which deserves the attention of all humanity. An even more important fact considering that the country manages to maintain a democratic system, albeit amidst various contradictions, and a policy of international integration and collaboration on wide range. The latest evolutions, with the "invasion" by the side of Azerbaijan of the Nagorno Karabakh, with the consequent exodus of the local Armenian population, however, bring back to actual reality the memory of a past of nightmares, that seemed to be overcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The contribution of Italian explorers, geographers and scholars made possible, at the dawn of the 20th century, to expand the geographical, physical, and anthropic knowledge of the territories of Asia Minor and the southern Caucasus area. Behind the scientific interests lay, as with many technical-scientific works of the time, special geopolitical concerns that aimed at extending Italian political and economic interests in strategic areas. The aim of this contribution is to highlight the contributions that responded to interests of a geo-strategic nature, which derived from Italy's pressing colonialist drive determined to confront the great powers of the time and nationalist aspirations for control of the Eastern Mediterranean. In the scientific ferment of the time, combined with the dynamism of the western powers on the colonial expansion front, the Italian Geographical Society also played an important role, within which figures from different backgrounds and institutional positions worked. The work of the scholars and explorers followed the trajectory of Italian interest, starting with Lamberto Vannutelli's missions, passing through the exploratory missions in Asia Minor of the Salesian Giuseppe Capra, up to Vittorio Novarese's contribution to the Italian missions in the Caucasus after World War I. This article aims at providing an interpretation of the work of these figures in the light of the broader context of Italian foreign policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the early 4th century, ancient Armenian authors (P‘awstos Buzand, Movsēs Xorenac‘i, Agat‘angełos, Movsēs Dasxuranc‘i, the Ašxarac‘oyc) begin to mention the Land of the Mazk‘ut‘ (Arm. ašharh Mazk‘t‘acʻ), located in the East Caucasus. The Sarmato-Alan burial mounds of plain Daghestan of the 3rd–5th centuries (Lvov, Palasa-Syrt, etc.) are attributed to this ethnic community. In 216 AD these tribes invaded Armenia through the Derbent pass (Arm. durn Čoray) (Khorenatsi 2,65), and took part in the Armenian-Iranian war in the middle of the 3rd century. At the beginning of the 4th century the post of “bdeašx from the Mazk‘ut‘s” (Agatangełos. 874) appears in administrative apparatus of Armenia, which shows the military and strategic value of the Land of Mazk‘ut‘s. At the same time, the family dynastic ties are apparently established between the ruling houses of Armenia and the kingdom of the Mazk‘ut‘ (Ašxen, Ašxadar, Trdat, Sanesan, Xosrow). The importance of this kingdom can be seen by the events of the 330s’—the struggle for the Armenian throne after the king Trdat’s death in c. 330 AD, in which the different tribes led by Sanesan, the King of the Mazk‘ut‘, took active part. The discontinuance of the Mazk‘ut‘ burial mounds in the middle of the 5th century might be explained, on the one hand, by the possible annexation of the Mazk‘ut‘ by the Huns during the invasion of Transcaucasia and the seizure of the Derbent pass in circa 440 AD; on the other hand, by the subsequent forceful displacement of the Mazk‘ut‘s and the Huns from the territory to the south of Derbent along with the strengthening of Sasanian Iran in the East Caucasus in the 440s’ and regain of control over the Derbent pass, which can be traced both in written sources (Ełishe, History of Karka de Beth Selok) and fortification monuments (mud-brick fortifications of Derbent and Torpakh-kala).

The Journey to the East of the Viking Ingvar the Far-Traveled is one of the events that fit into the history of medieval relations of the Scandinavians with the world of Byzantium. It was a fateful expedition taking place between 1036 and 1041, and to this day it is a source of many controversies and speculations of researchers. The findings of the present paper suggest that the journey did not necessarily proceed to the lands of the Saracens or Byzantium but may have been part of the game played by Constantinople with its ally Tmutarkan, which opposed Jaroslav the Wise, these events unfolding in the north-eastern waters of the Black Sea.

Nearly seven million Turkish citizens are fully or partly descendants of refugees coming from Northern and South-Western Caucasus and more than two million of them keep and vigorously affirm a strong commitment to their roots. The public expression of their identity was totally forbidden from 1923 to 1946, but has been more or less tolerated since then. After a discussion of some meaningful events of the republican age, a survey of the current situation of this community is provided. Traditionally present in the Ottoman and later republican state apparatus much more than the Kurds, perceived as a privileged rather than a victimized minority, the Caucasian diaspora looks increasingly less inclined to blend in. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Luigi Villari's book Fire and Sword in the Caucasus, published in London in 1906, is widely quoted by scholars working on the history of Transcaucasia, in particular in respect to the Armenian- Tatar war. Yet neither this text nor its author have been so far studied in detail. The Italian Luigi Villari (1876-1959) is a figure of considerable interest; he was a diplomat, traveler, and journalist. His father, Pasquale Villari (1827-1917), was an accomplished historian and politician who played an important role in nineteenth-century Italy; Villari's mother was the British writer Linda White (1836-1915). It is remarkable that the author wrote a book an English at a time when this was not a popular language in Italy. He wrote extensively both in English and Italian about different topics, mainly related to history and international politics. It has been shown that, after the First World War, Villari joined Fascism and contributed actively to the regime's propaganda in Great Britain. The present paper examines Luigi Villari's book on the Caucasus, especially the author's attitude towards the Armenians. I shall demonstrate that in his work, he handles negative stereotypes of the Armenians ("one of the most unpopular races of the East"), which were common in the Russian empire at the beginning of the twentieth century, in a rather interesting way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The essay deals with the literature production of three great Russian writers who travelled in the Caucasus, namely Mikhail Lermontov (1814-41), Osip Mandelstam (1891-1938) and Vasily Grossman (1905-64). In particular, I will consider Lermontov’s poems set in the Caucasus, together with his novel Герой нашего времени (A Hero of Our Time), Mandelstam’s prose Путешествие в Армению (Journey to Armenia) and Grossman's Добро вам (An Armenian Sketchbook), the two latter being written after the writers’ journeys. My analysis concentrates on the occurrences of two extensively used words, пыль (dust) and камень (stone). Apart from the factual description of the Caucasus, which is actually dusty and stony, these two antithetical although both chthonic elements acquire symbolic overtones of meaning in the Russian literary production.

The article deals with the problem of interpretation of the scene where one person pulls the beard of another one or two persons pull the beard each other. These scenes are relatively widespread (Western Europe, Caucasus, Transcaucasia, Albania), their date is between VI and XII centuries. In result of the research some scenes are identified (“Joseph’s dream”, illustration to one of the apocryphal episodes of “Acts of John”). The possible meanings of the scenes in question are also specified.

The purpose of this article is to present the genesis of the Chechen-Russian conflict, including the genocide of Chechens. The analysis explains how the aggressive actions of the Russian authorities were supposed to deal with “the strongest and most dangerous nation” of the Caucasus, in order to subjugate this region. Russian behaviour proves that their priority over the centuries was not an assimilation of Chechens and the peaceful solution of the conflict, but rather an “imperial” dimension of the strife, or to be exact, the ultimate conquest of the Caucasus, even if it would mean the extermination of the Chechen nation.

Thirty years ago, the Russian historian L. S. Klejn proposed that the legendary Chechen and Ingush character Pira or Pirow was borrowed during the Middle Ages by the local population from the Russian mythology, through a contingent of Eastern Slavs deported there by the caliph Mervan II. Thus, Pira or Pirow would be the old Slavic god Perun. I will propose here an alternative source to this legendary figure, an Iranian source. A hero named Piran indeed appears in the Shahnameh, Ferdowsi’s epic dating from the tenth century. That hero, like Pira or Pirow, is able, through an intermediary, to make rain and lightning. In fact, the name Piran seems to have an etymology close to that of the god Perun.

After the dissolution of the Tsarist Empire in 1917 and the Bolshevik coup staged in November, the Southern Caucasus faced both independence and turmoil. The short-living Transcaucasian federation split in three national and ethnic-based independent States: Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. The three democratic republics were ill-fated as the Red Army invaded Caucasus and communist parties seized power in 1920-1921. The Russian threat, from the Reds as well as from the With armies of General Denikin, constantly affected the short existence of the three independent States. Instead of seeking a unity of intents, the Three Caucasian republics often clashed among themselves over boundaries and disputed lands (Zangezur, Karabakh). Their international recognition was delayed until early 1920 when the Entente powers acknowledged the inevitability of Soviet invasion and switched, after years of ambiguity, to the Caucasian States. After England in spring 1919 decided to withdraw its troops from Caucasus due to the financial burden of occupation, the Entente power decided to assign a mandate to Italy as a peacekeeping power in the region. An Italian military mission was dispatched to Caucasus visiting Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan and successfully paving the way to an occupation of the whole area by the Italian troops. The sudden change of government in Italy (with the resignation of PM Orlando and the takeover of Nitti) produced a change of priorities in the Italian foreign policy. Days before the landing of the Italian troops the mission was repealed. The Italian delegation, lead by colonel Gabba, turned into a diplomatic mission in charge by the new government of establishing economic relations. The rich and almost unsearched papers of the Gabba mission - which have been recently published by Daniel Pommier and Andrea Carteny - shade a light on independent Caucasus, its political landscape and economic aspects. The twenty months mission of colonel Gabba. Back to Italy in summer 1920 - was important for the building of Italian relations with the Caucasians. The seizure of power by Soviets interrupted a pro-western stance of Georgia and Azerbaigian which resurfaced after the second independence in 1991. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]