Posted on 02/24/2023 6:43:27 AM PST by CheshireTheCat
On an uncertain date in February (perhaps) 1613 — so says a cherished Russian national legend — a villager met a Polish army intent on deposing the Russian tsar, offered to guide it on a “shortcut,” and proceeded to lead it into a forest or fen where it succumbed to the elements.
That peasant, Ivan Susanin, is supposed to have been put to death as the army realized its folly and imminent doom — the fate one would expect, although also not the sort that would leave a lot of corroborating witnesses.
Though the particulars are of doubtful veracity, Susanin’s son-in-law was awarded estates for the man’s tortures by enemy armies seeking the tsar — so the story is not completely baseless.
It was tsarist public relations, however, that gave us Susanin in his dramatic, familiar* form with the trackless wilderness.....
(Excerpt) Read more at executedtoday.com ...
Possibly the world’s first pollack joke...
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