Sea of Azov

The Sea of Azov, called Palus Méotides in the Old Woman’s account, is the setting for a siege that turns a stage in her forced passage between masters into a stark encounter with wartime deprivation. The fort on its shore offers precarious refuge; when the Russian forces arrive, confinement, hunger, and capture determine what happens next.

Setting and Route

By the time the Old Woman reaches the Sea of Azov, she has been sold and transferred through Tunis, Tripoli, Alexandria, Smyrna, and Constantinople. An Aga of the Janissaries acquires her and takes his household with him when he is ordered to defend Azof, then under Russian siege. The group is lodged in a small fort on the Palus Méotides, guarded by two black eunuchs and twenty soldiers.

The Siege

The surrounding campaign devastates Azof: the account says the town is burned and its inhabitants killed, while the small fort remains isolated. The Russian forces attempt to starve out its defenders. The twenty Janissaries have vowed not to surrender, and as provisions fail they first kill the eunuchs for food. They then consider killing the women. An imam persuades them instead to inflict a severe injury on each woman, an intervention that the Old Woman says leaves the women close to death. The episode presents the fort not as secure shelter but as a place where siege conditions strip away the possibility of safety.

Capture and Aftermath

Soon after the Janissaries have resorted to eating the women’s provisions, Russian troops arrive in flat-bottomed boats. None of the Janissaries escapes. The newcomers do not take account of the women’s condition; a French surgeon treats them and they survive. Once her companions can walk, they are sent toward Moscow. The Sea of Azov thus marks a passage from one form of captivity to another, rather than a return to freedom.

Narrative Significance

The Sea of Azov episode belongs to the Old Woman’s retrospective account of successive displacements. Its geography is practical and perilous: the Aga’s military assignment brings the group to the fort, the siege traps them there, and the Russian arrival determines their next transfer. By locating the episode within a campaign over Azof, the narrative shows how military conflict reaches beyond armies to those carried along with them, whose survival depends on the changing fortunes of a besieged stronghold.