The historical novel concerns events that occurred at the beginning of the 19th century. in the Teryushevskaya volost of the Nizhny Novgorod province and associated with the forced Christianization of peasants. It is known that baptism from the very beginning resulted in a unique form of economic and socio-political enslavement of the Mordovian peasantry. At the same time as the priests, landowners and representatives of the autocratic-serf power came to the Mordovian villages. Land dispossession and taxes increased, spiritual and administrative oppression intensified, various extortions, bribery and gross tyranny became established. As a result, all this resulted in peasant protests. The riot was led by a pagan priest, who proclaimed the coming of a new, Erzya god, who would replace the dilapidated Russian Christ.