The film is set around the 1860s when the Russian tsarist government is rushing to Russify the territories conquered from Turkey by transplanting, most often by force, Circassians.
But a quiet village, Verdi, refuses to let this happen. The inhabitants put up passive resistance against which it is difficult to use weapons. Then the provocateurs come into play: they propose to the inhabitants of the village to write a petition to the general, asking not to transplant the village. But they translate this petition of the Circassian into Russian and transform it into a petition for transplantation. And they transplant "according to desire, of their own free will". But Elisso, the daughter of the dean, sets fire to the village which from then on belongs to no one.
