armed with bow and arrow on small fast horses; on the Dnieper, Don, and Volga
Rivers and Caspian Sea, they were expert sailors, capturing and ransoming vessels in
classic pirate fashion; in Siberia they sailed the rivers and broke through forests on
foot and horse. Their paramilitary encampments offered relative security to others
escaping settled society: runaway peasantsfleeing serfdom, slavesfleeing captivity,
religious dissidentsfleeing persecution, economic migrants—all often sought pro-
tection around a Cossack fortress.
In classic“middle ground”style, Cossack communities adopted language, culture,
dress, diets, and trade patterns from their surrounding culture. On the Dnieper,
Cossack communities used Ukrainian, while to the east on the Don and in Siberia,
they used Russian. But in each case the group was ethnically diverse, drawing
Turks, Tatars, Russians, Ukrainians, Kalmyks, Nogais, and others to their hearty
bands. A sixteenth-century register of Cossacks in Ukraine, for example, lists origins
from seventy-four different towns in the Grand Duchy and seven in Poland, as well
as from Muscovy, German principalities, Serbia, and the Crimean Tatars. A group
of Siberian Cossacks in 1587 similarly included 50 Polish soldiers, 100 Polish-
Lithuanian Cossacks, 1,000 Tatar Cossacks, and 300 Bashkirs. Cossacks on the
Irtysh line in western Siberia included Germans, Swedes, and Ukrainians, along with
Russians and Kazakhs. To be a Cossack was a way of life, not an ethnic identity.
Cossack communities varied according to the military and economic circum-
stances of their location, but all shared some characteristics. One was a free-booting
economy: Guillaume de Beauplan, observing Dnieper Cossacks in mid-seventeenth
century, remarked that they worked only as much as they needed to. Not tied to the
agrarian life cycle, they enjoyed life until they needed more income, at which time
they would set off on another raid. They exhibited sheer disdain for agricultural
labor; as Cossack communities became more established, they deigned to own land
but hired labor to work it. Cossack economies reflected local resources: in some
areas Cossacks raised grain (Dnieper and Don River basins), in others they
practiced viticulture (the Terek) or horticulture and animal husbandry (the Irtysh).
Another common characteristic of Cossacks across Eurasia was rowdy self-
government by mass democratic council. They had the esprit de corps of a
Männerbund, a warrior band: they elected a leader (ataman, hetman) for each
year’s campaign and summarily dismissed him if he did not win in battle or bring in
enough booty. They distributed spoils of battle and raiding evenly among them-
selves; they fought for the honor of their name, their clan, and their band. Cossacks
across Eurasia prided themselves on independence and fraternal loyalties; their
political consciousness was personal and local.
Cossacks constituted a middle ground, interacting with peoples of the steppe and
Siberia decades before Russian sovereign power made an appearance. Approaching
the steppe, Russia and Poland-Lithuania enlisted Cossacks into military service,
recruiting them as mercenary border guards to block nomadic raids and protect
new fortified lines. Some became dependent on Russia, as they received supplies of
grain, ammunition, and weapons. But since their service was so valuable to Russia,
in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries many groups of Cossacks were able to
negotiate what Brian Boeck calls“separate deals,”usually including political and
Assembling Empire 59