Between Exoticism and Imperial Politics: European Diplomatic Sources About Circassia in the 19th Century

• In Event: The (Re-)Discovery of Circassia, Then and Now

Abstract

Based on a large body of archival foreign policy sources, this paper discusses the ways in which European diplomats became exposed to and concerned with Circassia and the North Caucasus in the 19th century and how they attempted to use Circassians as potential allies against the Russian Empire. A particular focus will be on the complex combination of power politics and ethnographic assumptions, political expectations, and cultural misunderstandings with regard to the people on the Eastern shore of the Black Sea and in the North Caucasus.

Author

• Khatuna Gvaradze, Independent Scholar