The Cossacks traditionally settled on the borders of the great Russian Empire and were a very motley class in their ethnic composition. Their clothes have absorbed all the diversity of national traditions of the Cossack regions and over time acquired their own bright distinctive features.
Don Cossack clothes
The first mention of the Don Cossacks dates back to 1552 in connection with their campaign to the walls of Kazan. Later, having conquered the Kazan and Astrakhan khanates, they settled throughout the Don and in the lower reaches of the Volga, forming the famous Don Host.
The traditional clothes of the Don Cossacks consisted of a papakha, wide trousers with stripes, boots, beshmet, belt and harness, and a woolen hood. A papakha was a high cylindrical fur hat made of astrakhan or sheepskin and having a cloth bottom. The beshmet was a rather elegant caftan with a low straight standing collar of a fitted cut, at the waist it was intercepted by a wide belt. It was worn both at home and on the street.
Until 1907, the summer headdress of the Cossack was a peakless cap, then a blue-purple or blue cap with a bright colored band, and after 1914 - a khaki. Cossack officers wore ordinary tunics, frock coats, greatcoats, tunics; from the Cossack uniforms, only blue trousers or breeches with stripes were present in their uniforms.
The usual everyday uniform of the Cossack was a tunic, white until 1907, then a khaki, as well as blue trousers with red stripes and a belt with a buckle. The Cossack uniform, or chekmen, was without buttons and was fastened with hooks. The cuffs and gates of the chekmen were trimmed with edging, on the collar there were buttonholes made of braid on each side.
The Cossacks wore general-army cavalry overcoats, high boots with a straight cut tops. The Cossack costume was traditionally complemented by a hood trimmed with white braid. In wartime, in the winter months, the uniform of the Cossacks had bare-coat sheepskin coats, which had a side fastener with hooks and welt pockets.
Clothes of the Kuban Cossacks
The clothes of the Don and Kuban Cossacks have a lot in common, but there are also some differences. The Kuban Cossacks trace their origins to the Zaporozhye Cossacks and natives of the Don who moved to the Kuban, which explains the similarity in clothing. At the same time, the clothing of the highlanders had a strong influence on the uniforms of the Kuban Cossacks. If the Don Cossacks usually wore chekmeni, then the Kuban preferred Circassians, widespread among the peoples of the Caucasus.
Since 1860, a unified uniform of clothing for the Kuban Cossack army was approved by a special decree, which included wide trousers, a uniform in the form of a chekmen or Circassian coat, beshmet, a headscarf, as well as a burka, a hat and boots or leggings.
The Kuban Cossacks wore red beshmets and dark gray Circassians with gazyry. Shoulder straps and bottoms on hats were red, like beshmet. Caucasian belts were used - narrow, with a set. An almost obligatory accessory was a dagger hanging from a belt. Since 1914, the Kuban Cossacks began to wear protective or brown Circassians.
