Note 1369 — Chapter XVI · —Influences Of A Mountain Environment

The Caucasus was long a breeding place for robber tribes who made their forays into the pastures and fields of southern Russia. Robbery was part of the education of every Circassian prince, while one group of the Abassines conferred their chieftainship upon the most successful robber or the man of largest family.1369 The Kurdish hillmen of the Armenian ranges descend with their herds of horses in winter to the warmer plains, where they exhaust the pastures and subject the Armenian villages to a regular system of blackmail.1370 The wide grassy plains about Koukou Nor Lake, near the Chinese border of Tibet, attract numerous Mongol nomads with their herds; but these rich pastures are exposed to the depredation of Si Fan brigand tribes, who have their haunts in the deep, impenetrable gorges of the neighboring mountains, and carefully guard all the approaches to the same. They are Buddhists, but worship a special Divinity of Brigandage, to whom their lamas offer prayers for the success of every foray.1371 Hence, among mountain as among desert peoples, robbery tends to become a virtue; environment dictates their ethical code.