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P o rtrait o f Roxalana, wife o f Suleim an the M ag nificent, as a European artist im agined her. C redit: A. Krymsky, Istoriia Tu- rechchyny (K, 1924). Roxolana also converted to Islam and had such a powerful hold over Suleyman that she eventually con vinced him to free and legally marry her. This was an event unheard of in the annals of the Ottoman Empire, since for many generations it had been normal for the sultans to be the sons of slave-girls in the royal harem. The wedding celebrations filled all Istanbul and foreign ers remarked upon their significance. Later on, Roxo lana built a great mosque on the square where there had once been a slave market. She is buried on a tomb next to her renowned husband, another unusual occur rence in Ottoman history. The fascinating story of Roxolana did not go with out notice in Europe and historians and writers in many lands were soon paying suitable tribute to her. In Ukraine, D.V. Sichynsky wrote an opera about her (1909) and Osyp Nazaruk wrote a historical novel based on her life (1930). More recently both Mykola Lazorsky in the West and Pavlo Zahrebelny in Soviet Ukraine have writ ten lengthy novels about her. Thus Roxolana continues to attract attention centuries after her death. In general, it can be said that Cossack women were a somewhat unusual phenomenon in the Europe of their day. Born into a fluid frontier society, they endured many dangers and many hardships and had many re sponsibilities that the women of other lands did not have to bear. In the absence of their menfolk, they had to raise and educate their children on their own. They sometimes suffered the ravages of war or were carried off by Turks and Tatars into captivity in far-off lands. But they suffered their fate with steadfastness and dig nity and remain an inspiration to their menfolk to the present day. The legends of Marusia Churai and Roxo lana have still not passed away. B ib lio g ra p h ic a l note: There is very little on Cossack women available in English. But in Ukrainian see the relevant chapters of Iu. Mytsyk, S. Plokhii, and I.S. Storozhenko, la k K o zak y voiuvaly (Dnipropetrovsk, 1990), and Oles Kozulia, Z h in - ky v is to rii U k ra in y (Kiev, 1993). The d um a about Maru sia Bohuslavka may be read in Ukrainian with parallel English translation in U k ra in ia n D u m y (Toronto, 1979), pp. 36-41. Almost any good history of the Ottoman Empire will contain information on Roxolana. See, for example, Lord Kinross, The O tto m a n C e n tu rie s (New York, 1977), which is very well written and thoroughly researched, and also the more popular-style book by Noel Barber entitled The S u lta n s (New York, 1973). A delightful section on Roxolana can also be found in Ahatanhel Krymsky’s Ukrainian language H is to ry o f T u rk e y found in Volume IV of his T vo ry v p ’ia ty tom akh (Kiev, 1974). ’’НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ”, БЕРЕЗЕНЬ 1995 21
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