In the 1860s Aivazovsky visited the Caucasus. The splendour of its mountain landscapes made an indelible impression on him and he produced a whole series of pictures on Caucasian subjects. He had painted mountains before, usually with waves breaking on their gloomy cliffs, but the mountain theme appeared more and more frequently in later years. Once again the artist found romance and drama in the clash of the elements— mountain and sea. In a picture depicting the aul (Caucasian village) of Gunib (Mountain Village Gunib in Daghestan. View from the East) the imposing reddish mountains of Daghestan rise up like fantastical frozen waves. Everything conspires to give the picture a romantic quality: the darkness of the ravines, the misty background, the mounted tribesmen on the path. At the same time the picture is strictly documentary in that it records the actual contours of a real locality, and Aivazovsky underlined this by calling his canvas Mountain Village Gunib in Daghestan. View from the East.

         Alexander Pushkin.
                    1829.Awake, about Greece, awake.
It is not extend,
Not potryasala swearing
Olympus and Pind and Fermopily.
Under the shadow of their old peaks
Freedom of the young arose,
At the coffins Pericles,
At the marble Athens.
Country heroes and gods
Broke servile chains
When Pe?a plamennykh lyrics
Tirteya, Byron and Riga.