102 Orientalism and EmpireOmar of Kaitak-Tabasaran okrug shot himself “after his mother
scolded him for laziness.”^78 Sixteen-year-old Gurdzhinat Omar-kizy of
Dargin hanged herself after her older sister slapped her for failing to
respond to her command to prepare dinner.^79
Zaza Gasan died with child, pelted by stones and bricks around her
mid-section. Women were frequently the victims of crimes or stood in
one way or another at the centre of mountaineer conflicts. Gender
and sexuality as problematic aspects of mountaineer culture were
thus central to the way in which Russians justified their colonial rule
in the Caucasus. On 19 October 1868, in the village of Gogaz in
Dagestan, Selim Dervish stabbed Aga-Sultan Agaz to death after she
refused his request that they elope together from the village. Selim
explained his case to the Russian authorities: he had been having a re-
lationship with Aga-Sultan Agaz, he said, and had given her 100 ru-
bles and other presents in expectation that she would break with her
husband, Ibragim. Upon meeting him, however, Aga-Sultan Agaz re-
jected Selim, “saying that many times she had deceived fools such as
he.” He stabbed her and fled, fearful of the wrath of her family. Selim
Dervish expected to be exonerated by the court. In fact a different
story surfaced, one that illustrated the powerlessness of women such
as Aga-Sultan Agaz. She had been raped by Selim a year earlier and
then divorced by her husband, Ibragim, because everyone in the vil-
lage was aware of the event. Selim offered marriage, but Aga-Sultan
and the family refused his proposal, and Selim killed her.^80
The cycle of violence portrayed by the Russians as endemic to the
mountaineer character often originated around women’s sexuality.
Gitino Magoma, of Gintlia in Gunib okrug (Dagestan), with the help
of two relatives, murdered the man who had impregnated his daugh-
ter. Gitino-Gadzhi, the suspect youth, believed that he had done
proper penance according to the traditions of customary law in this
region. He had removed himself from the village, paid a sum to the
family, and planned to marry Gitino Magoma’s daughter. Her father,
however, thought otherwise.^81 When Aktemir Choriev, of the Ingush
village of Srednyi Achaluk, was rejected in his marriage proposal to
Asharpi, the daughter of Beisultan Baichiev, he and several of his
friends followed her late at night, attacked her, and dragged her to
the dwelling of one of his relatives. Asharpi’s family responded by
surrounding the hut. In the pitched family battle eleven people were
wounded.^82 Patima Iusup was murdered by her husband for using
foul language and refusing to answer his queries about her recent
whereabouts.^83 A twenty-two-year-old male in Dagestan responded
to evidence produced by his close friend concerning his wife (she had
supposedly received a mirror and some candy from her alleged