The early history of the Circassians is ob scure. They have no annals; but their min strels, in their martial and genealogical strains, preserve traditional accounts of the deeds and lineage of their dead heroes and existing tribes. Between the 10th and 13th centuries this coun try formed a portion of the empire of Georgia, and it is said the Georgian queen Tamar sub jugated and for a time Christianized them. During the Middle Ages the Genoese had sev eral trading stations on the coast, of which some memorials yet exist. In 1424 the Circas sians were an independent people and at war with the Tartars of the Crimea, etc., to whose khans, however, it is understood some were occasionally tributary. In 1555 the Muscovite tsar, Ivan Vasilievitch, came to their aid against the Tartars and married a Circassian princess. But the stay of the Russian forces was short, and after their withdrawal the bellig erents kept tip a struggle with varying results till 1705, when the Tartars were finally defeated in a decisive battle. Shortly after the terri torial encroachments of Russia on the Cau casian regions began. From that time she advanced by steps slow and stealthy and in 1781 obtained a frontier line on the right bank of the Kuban, the left bank of which formed the national limit of Circassia. In 1784 the Turks founded Anapa, near the northeast corner of the Black Sea, as a place of trade for their com merce and that of the Circassians; this was the only territorial settlement they as yet had in or near the country and the place was a mere fac tory. In 1807 the Russians took Anapa from the
Turks; but in terms of the Treaty of Bucharest, in 1812, it was restored. In 1829 it was once more taken by the Russians and finally ceded to them by the Treaty of Adrianople, along with the whole of Circassia—as they inter preted the words of that cunningly ambiguous document; the fact being that not an inch of the territory of Circassia proper had ever been in the possession of either Turks or Russians. Many of the Circassians were indeed Mussul mans and all such recognized the padisha (sul tan) as their spiritual head, but nothing more. As the Muscovites" (fans Moscov) im mediately proceeded to act upon the pretended cession, a struggle commenced which was con tinued over a long series of years. The spirit of resistance to Russia became stronger than ever; and a bold leader, Schamyl, who united in his person the imputed sanctity of the hie rarch with the daring courage and prudent con duct of a great warrior, with his heroic band beat off or baffled the whole disciplined forces that Russia was able to send against him. But at length the protracted resistance of the people, extending for a period of 35 years, terminated in the triumph of the more powerful of the foes and the Circassians with their leader sur rendered. Large numbers of them, as many it is said as 500,000, were deported into the Turkish provinces in 1864 and were settled in Asia Minor and in Bulgaria and Serbia. A considerable portion of their former country was thus ruthlessly almost denuded of in habitants.'