Vasyl Kononenko

Unlike their parents, the generations of Cossack intellectuals of the late 1720s through the late 1750s lived in a new political situation and different intellectual atmosphere. They remembered Hetman Mazepa’s “betrayal,” the “unfortunate Swedish year,” the Battle of Poltava, and the proclaiming of...

(Conclusion. For beginning see The Day No. 13) It should be stressed that Pyotr Rumiantsev was trying to draw up an imperial project to reform the Hetman state. The Little Russian Collegium, as a Hetmanate institution, also elected its own delegate, D. Natalyin, and gave him a set of...

History especially reveals itself when people are facing an unexpected challenge. What really amounted to this kind of an unexpected and crucial task for the 18th-century Ukrainian elite was participation of its delegates in the Legislative Commission which was drafting a new legislation for the...

The question of how history is written in our politicized society is of interest for not only ex­perts but also ordinary citizens. This especially applies to the “so­re” points of the Uk­rainian past. The Mazepa era in the history of the Hetmanate and the Ukrai­ni­an hetman’s siding with Swedish...

The events took place in the Ukrainian Hetman State in September-December 1763 were significant for Ukrainian statehood in the 18th century, marking the boldest self-assertion efforts on the part of the Ukrainian elite (after Ivan Mazepa’s time). Among these events was a universal (decree) signed...

1. KHAZAR MYTH VS. EMPIRE Ivan Mazepa’s siding with Charles XII remains a thrilling topic for both professional historians and the Ukrainian public. Why did Ivan Mazepa and his associates do so in 1708? At the dawn of the 21st century Ukrainians are starting to take an interest not in...