Sosuruk is the stone-born hero of the Karachay-Balkar Narts, cognate with the Ossetian Soslan and the Circassian Sosruquo. Sprung from a rock and tempered in the smith's forge, he is made invulnerable except at the knees or hips, a flaw that seals his fate. His most celebrated deed is the winning of fire: he wrests it from a giant to carry it back to the freezing Narts, a fire-bringing exploit shared across the whole Caucasian epic. Cunning as well as strong, he outwits monsters and rivals through many episodes before he is killed by the rolling wheel of Jan-Sharh that severs him at his vulnerable joints.