Originally published in 1898 and long out of print, Havelock's account of the wars of the Cossacks in the early seventeenth century features a cast of kings, warlords, and mercenaries. Mostly landless, the Cossacks waged war almost as a way of life, using their prowess to extract money from whoever they could on land and sea. Extract: "The Ukraine, or Border, was almost as fruitful a soil for adventure and disorder in the seventeenth century as the home of our own Armstrongs and Scotts. The very word 'Kazak' can hardly ...
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Originally published in 1898 and long out of print, Havelock's account of the wars of the Cossacks in the early seventeenth century features a cast of kings, warlords, and mercenaries. Mostly landless, the Cossacks waged war almost as a way of life, using their prowess to extract money from whoever they could on land and sea. Extract: "The Ukraine, or Border, was almost as fruitful a soil for adventure and disorder in the seventeenth century as the home of our own Armstrongs and Scotts. The very word 'Kazak' can hardly be better expressed than in the Scotch phrase 'landlouper, ' an Ishmael whose hand is against every man, and every man's against him. The Cossack's opponents were mainly Russians, but he included in the term of contempt Lyakhi (generally accompanied by the epithet 'devilish') not only those who had remained true to the old faith, and those who had been forced by the Polish sovereignty into the adoption of Romanism, but also those who as protestants had an equal hatred for the papacy and the Greek church alike. They also frequently qualified this name of abuse with the word Panỳ, which we may parallel with 'landgrabbers.' There lay the sting. The Kazak was a landless man, while his opponent had much to lose."
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