Captain Edmund Spencer was a prolific British travel writer of the mid-nineteenth century. Between 1830 and 1850 he traveled widely in Eastern Europe, Middle East and Asia, publishing several travelogues. His first travel book was entitled “Sketches of Germany and the Germans, with a glance at Poland, Hungary, & Switzerland in 1834, 1835, and 1836, by an English resident of Germany” appeared in 1836. Spencer’s second great tour took him down the Danube from Vienna to Constantinople and the Black Sea where he visited the Caucasus; his travelogue “Travels in the Western Caucasus, including a tour through Imeritia, Mingrelia, Turkey, Moldavia, Galicia, Silesia, and Moravia, in 1836” appeared in London in 1838. Spencer continued to travel for the new two decades, including an extensive voyage through the southern Balkans which he described in his two-volume “Travels in European Turkey, in 1850, through Bosnia, Servia, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Thrace, Albania, and Epirus, with a visit to Greece and the Ionian Isles” (London 1851). In 1851 he revisited the Caucasus and spent several weeks traveling through North Caucasus and Western Georgia, publishing his accounts in "Turkey, Russia, the Black Sea, and Circassia (London, 1854).
The excerpt below is from Spencer's book "Travels in the Western Caucasus."
I have already said that we arrived at Kuthaissi [Kutaisi]; prettily situated on the right bank of the Phase [Rioni], and which makes rather a splendid figure when first seen in the distant landscape. But on arriving there, the illusion of its beauty entirely disappeared, for we found nothing but narrow streets and dirty bazaars, nearly blocked up by stalls of every description, from the cobler's and the tinker's to the vendors of cashmere shawls and gold embroidered muslins.
In one place, pyramids of corn and fruit were offered for sale, in another, mutton and sturgeon were being sold by greasy looking fellows to the half-starved, squalid peasants; nor were the weights and scales less noticeable for their novelty, the one being made of wood and ropes, while round stones were employed as a substitute for the others. The greater number of the buildings were nothing better than wretched huts, intermingled here with a low shed as a stable for the cattle, and there with a house, the painted exterior of which denoted that it had seen better days. The owners of these comfortless habitations, for the most part miserable in appearance, were either basking in the sun, or squatted, enjoying the tchibouque [pipe], under a sort of verandah, the shreds of whose tattered canvass awning waved like dirty banners floating in the wind. Such was the aspect of the town, the filth of the streets, and the wretchedness of the inhabitants, their apathy, idleness, slovenliness, with slave imprinted not only on their countenance, but expressed in their whole manner and bearing, that I wished myself back again in the free mountains of Circassia, where every breeze wafted health and vigour, where every man was master of his own actions, where a bag of gold would not procure a night's lodging, but where the stranger, once received as a friend, would be certain of being everywhere treated with the most unbounded hospitality.
Notwithstanding my unfavourable picture of Kuthaissi, we fared well within its dilapidated walls, having taken up our quarters at the house of an Armenian merchant, who it appears has contrived to amass a considerable fortune by means of his contraband commerce with the tribes of the Western Caucasus. Profuse in his hospitality towards his distinguished guests, he set before us a repast consisting of every delicacy the oriental cuisine could supply, the wily merchant well knowing how much it was his interest to conciliate and flatter the chiefs of a people to whom he was indebted for so large a share of wealth.
The character of hakkim which I assumed on first entering the Caucasus, with a view of obtaining an insight into the domestic manners of the inhabitants, I found extremely advantageous to me in these provinces, as it ensured me a hospitable reception, independently of my being the guest of a Circassian chief. To the women of the household of the Armenian merchant I administered a few pills, composed of rhubarb and magnesia, which was the means of introducing me into the sanctum sanctorum—the kitchen; and while my patients were mustering courage to engulph the health-giving boluses, I employed myself in taking a sketch of the interior and its multifarious articles.
The tout ensemble differed but little from that in the house of any Circassian chieftain, except that the various culinary utensils were more numerous, and of a more expensive material, being principally composed of copper, and kept remarkably clean. The great variety of dishes that constitute an oriental repast very much surprise a European, and must employ a number of hands in preparing them. Our host, besides his wife and daughters, maintained several female slaves, all of whom, during our stay, were incessantly occupied in their culinary labours.
Kid, mutton, fish, poultry, game, etc., were the principal ingredients; and these were served in every possible form; neither were they in any degree unpalatable; on the contrary, many would have satisfied even a fastidious European taste. Rice, dates, honey, clarified butter, and fruits of every kind, also entered into the composition of many of their dishes; while thin wheaten or barley cakes, toasted on the embers, or baked in little portable ovens, formed no bad substitute for the white rolls of Europe.
Among the different utensils of the kitchen, my attention was attracted to the hand-mills by means of which they generally reduce their corn to meal, particularly the millet and other light grain. This most primitive mill, found in the house of every inhabitant of the Caucasus, was perhaps the first machine invented by the ingenuity of man at the commencement of the world. It consists of two circular stones, from two to three feet in diameter; the upper one, which has a handle, and an aperture to receive the wheat, is convex in shape, while the lower is concave. Of course the operation of reducing corn to meal by the agency of such a machine is tedious and tiresome, for, as the upper stone must be briskly turned round, the employment is heartily disliked by the women, the most industrious efforts of one strong damsel being insufficient to grind such a supply as will serve for the consumption of a large family in one day. The female slaves, however, take the mill in turn, otherwise the patience of the most patient would be exhausted; as it is, they generally carol as gaily to the monotonous sound of the mill as our own domestics do to the equally monotonous music of their spinning wheels.
The Armenians are in Asia what the Jews are in Europe—dealers in silver and gold, and are engaged in every branch of trade which does not require manual labour; and, like them, they form an entirely distinct race from the nations among whom they dwell, differing from them in religion, manners, and customs; and also, like the tribes of Israel, their individuality as a people is marked in their physical conformation in characters which cannot be mistaken. In every commercial transaction they exhibit a degree of cunning, shrewdness, tact, and it must be added, selfishness, unapproached by any other people; for if a farthing of profit is to be extracted from a bargain, an Armenian is certain to make it. In these propensities they completely exemplify the Turkish proverb, which says, “A Greek can cheat a Turk; a Jew will dozen a Greek; but an Armenian will trick not only a Jew, but Schaitan (the devil) himself; and where an Armenian is, a Jew must starve.”
During the various invasions of Persia and Turkey by Russia, the Armenians rendered that power, as guides, spies, and agents, the most important services; in return for which, they enjoy many privileges as settlers in the empire, and, as merchants and pedlers, are fettered with few restrictions.
Notwithstanding the ruling passion of the Armenians is avarice, they can be faithful, as they are engaged in preference to any other people by the Circassians as ambassadors to Turkey and Persia, and as guides when they pass through the dominions of the Autocrat. This servile submission to the will of the Circassian knights, I am inclined to think, arises more from fear than attachment or respect, as they well know that, if they break their faith with the inexorable sons of the Caucasus, their whole family would probably be exterminated; for of every other crime in the eyes of that people, not excepting murder, treachery is the most abhorred, and the most severely punished.
[...]
The wife of my host, the fair Kinsha (happiness), who was the daughter of an Abasian usden, had indeed made him happy in a numerous and healthy family; and the merchant might well exclaim, with the Psalmist, “Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them !”
The girls were tall for their age, and well made, their figures being sufficiently round without approaching embonpoint; their fine eyes, large and sparkling, gave an intellectual expression to their countenances, while their pearly teeth, and the smile of good humour that played about a mouth regular in its lines as that of Canova's Venus, much improved their personal attractions. Their complexion was much darker than that of the mountaineer of the Caucasus, and might resemble that of a Spanish brunette. Like all orientals, they manifested a decided predilection for finery, in the number of gold ornaments which decorated their hands, fingers, and ears. Their dress was similar to that of the women of the Caucasus, the Circassian princesses being the standard of feminine taste in this part of the east, — full trousers, of bright-coloured Indian cotton, and a large silk wrapper, confined by a girdle studded with gold or silver ornaments, which exhibited their forms to great advantage.
Although the Armenian women in Turkey generally appear in public closely veiled, and in their houses are seldom visible to strangers, those of our merchant were by no means rigidly excluded from society; they were also more familiar, talkative, and curious, than the Caucasian women in general, while their manners seemed a mixture of the Russian and oriental, and they only wore the veil when taking a promenade.
The slaves of the household appeared to be treated with as much kindness and consideration as the domestic servants in a well-ordered family in Europe; for an interesting young girl, who was in the last stage of a consumption, was brought to me for my opinion, and as much anxiety was manifested with respect to her recovery as if she had been the only child of the family, for, when I informed them that no earthly power could save her life, the whole of the women burst into tears, and exhibited the most violent demonstrations of sorrow.
The house of our Armenian was furnished with a greater regard to show than neatness; the sofas and divans of the principal room were covered with rich silks, the floor with Persian carpets, and the walls were hung with purple velvet. Instead of the paintings of saints and angels, such as we see in the houses of those professing the Greek and Roman-catholic form of worship, sentences from the Bible, wrought in gold characters (in the Armenian language), on a ground of the same coloured velvet, were suspended round the room. At table we were furnished with chairs, knives, forks, and spoons,—an arrangement which sadly annoyed my friends the Circassians, who had never before made use of them, and were not a little astonished on observing my adroitness in handling these, in their opinion, very unnecessary appendages to a meal. There was a still greater degree of pomp observed in serving the coffee, which was poured into the finest porcelain cups, resting on gold filigree stands, and then placed upon a massive tray, richly gilt and ornamented.
All this splendour, however, made no impression upon the sturdy mountaineers, who despised it as useless parade and ostentation, fit only for an effeminate Turk or Persian, or a contemptible money-getting merchant. My friend, the grave austere Inal, denounced it as the origin of every crime, as the certain indication of a state of slavery ...
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