icon An image or picture of Jesus, Mary, a saint, etc., venerated as sacred.
Holy Mother of Kazan This refers to an icon of the Virgin Mary, which was kept in the Kazan Cathedral in St. Petersburg. This is one of the most universally admired of all Russian icons.
Golgotha The place where Jesus was crucified.
Schilleresque This refers to the romantic heroes found in the writing of the German poet Schiller who wrote about beautiful sensitive souls.
Schleswig-Holstein Prussia, Denmark, and Austria were fighting a war over this land during the composition of Crime and Punishment. It implies a refusal to give up something of importance.
Vasilyevsky Ostrov This is not important except to show how grounded in reality is this novel. St. Petersburg was built on a marshy land and there are many islands in and around it.
dacha In Russia, a country house or cottage used as a vacation retreat.
Pushkin and Turgenev Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin [1799-1837] is considered the father of Russian literature, and his home was outside of St. Petersburg. Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev was a contemporary of Dostoevsky, and his novels were very popular.
