Review of “History of Ukraine-Rus’: Volume 6, Economic, Cultural, and National Life in the 14th to 17th Centuries” by Hrushevsky, Mykhailo. Trans. Leonid Heretz, Eds. Myron M. Kapral and Frank E. Sysyn. East/West: Journal of Ukrainian Studies. Vol. IX, no. 1 (2022): 249-252. (original) (raw)
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East/West: Journal of Ukrainian Studies
Volume 6 of Mykhailo Hrushevs'kyi's (Hrushevsky's) monumental History of Ukraine-Rus' is the concluding tome of a three-volume series (volumes 4, 5, and 6) dedicated to the Lithuanian-Polish epoch of the history of the Ukrainian people. Volumes 1 to 3 of Hrushevs'kyi's History, together, address the period ending with the fall of Kyivan Rus' and the Principality of Galicia-Volhynia, while the tomes after volume 6 deal with the early stages of the Cossack period and the (re-)establishment of Ukrainian sovereignty in the form of the Cossack Hetmanate. Hrushevs'kyi's conceptualization of the "history of the Ukrainian people" can be seen as one of his most important contributions to Eastern European historiography. In his work, we encounter the study of the Ukrainian people as a whole-as opposed to the study of various distinct entities located within a number of neighbouring states (Poland; the Grand Duchy of Lithuania; Hungary and then Austria-Hungary; Muscovy and then Russia; and so on). Hrushevs'kyi conceived of a fundamental unity permeating the history of the Ukrainian people from the time of Rus' all the way to the goal and apogee of the historian-cumpolitician-the re-establishment of a unified and independent Ukraine in the twentieth century (a project that Hrushevs'kyi himself took part in, both in its glorious beginnings and in its heartbreaking failures). In setting down a thesis on the continuity of the history of the Ukrainian people, Hrushevs'kyi provided subsequent generations of students of Ukrainian history with an essentially anti-statist methodological framework that allowed them to explore a subject area not merely reduced to a political history of a state with precisely delineated political borders. Such theoretical innovation and foresight have secured Hrushevs'kyi's high stature in the field of history-and especially in the study of Ukrainian cultural history. Mention should also be made of Hrushevs'kyi's importance in the study of the history of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (PLC) as a whole. By creating a model that includes the dwellers of the Brest and Pinsk regions of what is now Belarus within a definition of the Ukrainian people and that thoroughly documents them, Hrushevs'kyi has indirectly given us a paradigm for conducting cross-cultural and cross-national research that aims to
In this fifth volume of Mykhailo Hrushevsky’s History, the eminent historian focuses on the social, political, and ecclesiastical structures and relations of the Ukrainian lands during the fourteenth to seventeenth centuries. Here the main topics are the evolution of the social order, the functioning of civil administration, church organization, and the circumstances that led to a split in the Ruthenian-Ukrainian Church. Hrushevsky’s narrative draws from an exhaustive examination of scholarly literature on the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland as it relates to the Ukrainian territories. His careful examination of sources, especially legal codes and taxation records (many of which had been published under his editorship), and discussion of historical terms explore the complex relations of diverse strata of the population. Although he focuses on the Ruthenian-Ukrainian population, he also deals with other ethnic groups (Poles, Jews, Armenians, and Lithuanians). In comparing developments in the Ukrainian lands under Lithuania with those under Poland, the historian highlights differences in governance and society, which remained even after the Union of Lublin (1569). He is especially critical of the consequences of adopting the model of Polish nobiliary society, including the subjugation of the peasantry and the decline of cities. After tracing the evolution of the structures of the Orthodox Church, he examines the genesis of the Uniate Church at the Union of Brest (1596), an event that shook the foundations of Ukrainian society. In sum this volume, together with volumes 4 and 6, gives the first complete academic examination of Ukraine between what Hrushevsky saw as the fall of princely Rus' and the rebirth of the Cossack age. Hrushevsky’s dedication to the study of the popular masses allowed him to trace the continuities of Ukrainian history in a time of statelessness and the alienation of elites.
Hrushevsky M. History of Ukraine-Rus’ (Edmonton; Toronto, 2012), vol. 6: Economic, Cultural, and National Life in the Fourteenth to Seventeenth Centuries. Edmonton, Toronto, 2012
The transitional Lithuanian-Polish period in Ukrainian history, in comparison to the period of statehood in the Cossack era and the Cossack Hetmanate’s autonomous life as a state, was probably the most difficult for Hrushevsky to conceptualize. The historian found it difficult to divide the sociopolitical and economic history of the Lithuanian and Polish states into Ukrainian (Ruthenian), Polish, and Lithuanian components; similarly difficult was distinguishing the Belarusian from the Ukrainian component in the joint cultural heritage of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Commonwealth. To this day historians strive to evaluate this common heritage that cannot be regarded as belonging to one side or the other. Hrushevsky wrote the History during a time when, as Miroslav Hroch put it, Ukrainian national awareness was in the cultural phase of its development. Ideas about the continuity of the historical process and the integral unity of all the Ukrainian lands that Hrushevsky presented as scholarly postulates and that formed part of the research paradigms of his work became focal points of scholarly discourse. Subsequent Ukrainian historians have utilized and modified these ideas, and they continue to rework them in creative ways.126 In central and eastern Europe, the era of ‘national’ historiography during which the History was written has passed. Nonetheless, for historians the work of Hrushevsky, especially the sixth volume published here, has remained not only an accomplishment of distinguished erudition and professional scholarship but also a source of intellectual inspiration, structure, and hypotheses, as well as a master narrative of social, cultural, religious, and national history. One cannot imagine the intellectual underpinnings of scholars today studying the late medieval and early modern history of Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, and Poland without the History of Ukraine-Rus'. Both the reception and the critique of Hrushevsky’s conceptions have been of great and continuing importance in fostering deeper and broader analysis of the critical, transitional period in Ukrainian history that was the Lithuanian and Polish era.
Origin Stories: The Kyivan Rus in Ukrainian Historiography
2021
The Russians and the Ukrainians, and indeed the Belarusians too, share an origin myth which reaches back to the legendary Rurik’s founding of the kingdom of the Kyivan Rus However, rather than reaching fruition in the early 20th century, as was the case in much of Central Europe, the origin story was subsumed into the Soviet experiment, and only remerged after 1991. It is still very much a work in progress. Here we will look at how the founding myth of the Rus has been used in the Ukrainian nation building project, which will unavoidably lead to comparisons with Russia and, to a lesser extent, other neighbouring countries such as Poland, Belarus and Lithuania. From the Normanist debate of the mid-18th century to the rise of nationalism in the 19th century and the use of the Rus in the the Soviet Union, we turn to the present with its all its historical complexity and political ramifications regarding the relationship between Ukraine and Russia.