Summary

The history of Ukraine chronologically narrates the historical events in the lands of present-day Ukraine, the Ukrainian people and other nationalities, from prehistoric times to the present. The territory of this country was one of the first where civilizations were established and urban planning appeared, it is part of the area where the domestication of the horse, the invention of the wheel and metalworking began. Different waves of Indo-European migrations to Europe and later in the opposite direction formed the basis and characteristics of the Ukrainian population. The Greek colonization of the Black Sea coast influenced the territory of Ukraine within the framework of the Greek civilization as its northern border.

The great migration of peoples in the 5th century B.C. continued and ended up forming various Slavic tribes that converged to form the medieval state of Kievan Rus in 882 on the eastern European plain. C. continued and ended up forming various Slavic tribes that converged to form the medieval state of Kievan Rus in 882, in the eastern European plain. After the invasion of Kievan Rus by the Golden Horde, the state disintegrated and fragmented into various fiefdoms such as the Ruthenian kingdom. The western lands of Rus, henceforth Ruthenia to refer to Ukraine, were reunified by the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which, seeking allies in the struggle against the Muscovites (present-day Russians) and the "ostsiedlung" (Baltic Germans), dynastically unified with the Kingdom of Poland, after which Ruthenia became part of the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth.

In order to protect Ruthenia from Tatar incursions in the south, a Ruthenian military stronghold was formed, the Cossacks, who kept the Tatar troops of the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth at bay. In 1648, Bogdan Khmelnitskyi with the support of the Ukrainian population and the Cossacks revolted against Poland demanding recognition of an independent state. Successful Ukrainian rebellion led by Khmelnitskyi, the Cossack Hetmanate was established with Zaporiyia Sich as its administrative center. For a short period of time the Ukrainian nation enjoyed autonomy but the Hetmanate found itself in a situation between three swords and the wall; the Crimean Tatars from the south, the Poles from the west and the Muscovites from the east. Unable to defend itself against three powers, the Hetmanate was forced to sign a treaty of vassalage with the Muscovite Tsarist. The Hetmanate gradually lost its autonomy until the Muscovites, henceforth Russians, completely annexed its territory in 1764 and Ukraine became divided between Poland and Russia.

Ukrainian culture developed in parallel and in different ways in the areas occupied by the Russian Empire and the Polish Kingdom, later the Austrian Empire. Despite Russification and attempts to assimilate the Ukrainian population, the Ukrainian People's Republic declared its independence from Russia in 1917 and the Western Ukrainian People's Republic declared its independence from Austria and Poland in 1918, thus starting the Ukrainian war of independence, in the course of which the two Ukrainias were unified in the Zluky Act. However, as in the past, Ukraine was between a rock and a hard place: the Polish Republic and the Bolshevik movement. Having to cede the western region and ally with Poland, Ukraine lost the war of independence, was divided again and the Russian SFSR annexed several regions of northern and eastern Ukraine, in addition to the nominally controlled territories of Kuban and Crimea, assigning the remaining territory to the Ukrainian SSR. The Soviet Union instituted Ukrainization to gain the confidence of the population skeptical towards communism, but after the so-called Great rupture the Russification of Ukraine was intensified by banning the Ukrainian language in schools, and the death of between 4 and 12 million Ukrainians during the Holodomor famine of 1932-1933.

After 70 years of Russification and independence attempts (see Carpathian Ukraine or the UPA), Ukraine was once again reborn as an independent republic on August 24, 1991. However, following the fall of the government of Viktor Yanukovych resulting from the Ukrainian revolution of February 2014, a secession crisis began in the Crimean peninsula, which has a significant number of Russophile, as well as Russophone, citizens. On March 1, 2014, Yanukovych called on Russia to use military forces "to establish legitimacy, peace, law and order, stability and defense of the people of Ukraine." On the same day, Russian President Vladimir Putin requested and received authorization from the Russian Parliament to deploy Russian troops in Ukraine and illegally seized control of the Crimean peninsula the following day. On March 18, 2014, Russia and Crimea signed the treaty on the annexation of the Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol to the Russian Federation.

Meanwhile, unrest began in the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine. In several cities in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions, local militias were organized, seizing police buildings, government buildings and special police stations in several cities in the regions. When it became clear that candidate Petro Poroshenko had won the presidential election, on the election night of May 25, 2014, Poroshenko said, "My first presidential trip will be to Dombas," where armed pro-Russian rebels had declared autonomy for the separatist republics of the Donetsk People's Republic and the Lugansk People's Republic, and seized control of a large part of the region.

Before the formation of the first state in relation to Ukraine, Kievan Rus, there were different peoples and cultures that laid the foundations of Ukrainian culture.

Culture of Tripilia

Located between 5500 B.C. and 2750 B.C. it extended from the Carpathian Mountains to the Dniester and Dnieper regions, centered on present-day Moldavia and covered substantial parts of western Ukraine and northeastern Romania, encompassing an area of 350,000 km², with a diameter of 500 km; roughly from Kiev in the northeast to Brașov in the southwest.

Among some of its characteristics are the high quality polychrome ceramics, of which it has been possible to follow the evolution in the shapes, in the use of colors and in the technical progress.

Currently, more than 2,000 settlements of this ancient people have been found.

Yamna Culture

Some characteristics of this culture are the burials in kurgans (burial mounds), in pit-like sepulchers in which the body was placed in the supine decubitus position with the knees bent. The bodies were covered with ochre. Multiple burials have been found in these kurgans, often with later inclusions. It has been discovered that they made offerings of animals (cattle, pigs, sheep, goats and horses), a characteristic associated with both Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Indo-Iranian peoples.

The oldest remains found in the Eastern European area of a wheeled chariot were found in the Storozheva Mohyla kurgan (Dnipro), which was made by people belonging to the Yamna culture. The recently discovered sacrificial site in Lugansk is considered to be a hill-sanctuary where human sacrifices were practiced.

Culture of the catacombs

The name derives from their burial practices. They are similar to those of the Yamna culture, but with a hollowed-out space in the main chamber, which creates the catacomb. Animal remains have been found in only a minority of the tombs. In some tombs a clay mask was modeled over the face of the deceased, creating a slight association with the famous golden funerary mask of Agamemnon (see also Tashkyt culture).

The economy was essentially livestock, although traces of grain have been found. They seem to have been skilled specialists in metalworking.

Sarmatians

Sarmatians settled in present-day central and eastern Ukraine, Sarmatia was a region of Scythia, the Scythian state reached its greatest extent in the 4th century B.C. during the reign of Ateas. Isocrates believed that the Scythians, and also the Thracians and Persians, were "the most capable of power, and are the peoples with the greatest power". In the 4th century B.C., under King Athenaeus, the tripartite structure of the state was eliminated and the ruling power became more centralized. Later sources no longer mention three basileia. Strabo says that Athenaeus ruled over most of the barbarians of northern Pontus.

The military technology of the Sarmatian people influenced the technology of their allies as much as that of their enemies. The warlike qualities of the Sarmatians, of their ancestors, the Sauromata, and of their descendants, the Alans, have often been described by ancient authors. Polybius, Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, Flavius Josephus, Tacitus, Pausanias or Dion Cassius have left very vivid testimonial pictures of these Iranian tribes that had such exotic customs for the Greeks and Romans.

Very hierarchical, the Sarmatians had several kings and at least one queen: Amagê. In fact, women had a high social position and the warriors of the ancient phase, who really existed, have contributed to keep alive the myth of the Amazons.

Initially settled between the Don and the Ural, the first Sarmatians invaded the territories of the Scythians. Later, they defeated the Parthians and the Armenians. From the end of the 1st century BC, they confronted the Romans in the south of the Danube. During the 2nd century, after several confrontations, the Romans recruited several Sarmatian spearmen. Later, they created units of cataphracts, taking from the Sarmatians the scale armor, the long spear (contus), the sword with ring cheek and even their insignia: the Draco (a kind of tubular stick whose bronze mouthpiece represents the mouth of a dragon).

Onoguros

The Onogurs were an Oghurian population of equestrian nomads from Central Asia who moved to the Pontic steppe at the end of the 5th century.

Some authors point out that these populations have their origin in the Western Tiele tribes mentioned in Chinese sources and from which the Uighurs and Oğuz also originated.12 The historian Prisco mentions that the Onoguros and Saraguros moved westward under pressure from the Sabirs and came in contact with

Kievan Rus

The Kiev region dominated the entire state for the next two centuries. The Grand Prince of Kiev (veliki knyaz) controlled the lands surrounding the city, and his relatives theoretically subordinate to him ruled in other cities and paid tribute to him. The height of his power came during the reigns of the Vladimir princes (r. 1019-1054). Both rulers continued the expansion of the principality begun by Oleg.

In its Second Golden Age Byzantine art spread to Armenia. In 1017 the construction of the Cathedral of St. Sophia in Kiev began. Faithfully following the influences of the architecture of Constantinople, it was structured in the form of a basilica with five naves ending in apses. In Novgorod, the churches of St. George and St. Sophia, both with a central plan, were built.

Kievan Rus was unable to maintain its status as a prosperous and dominant power, in part because of the agglomeration of disparate domains ruled by one clan. As the members of this clan grew in number, they became identified with regional interests rather than a larger common heritage. Thus, the princes were pitted against each other, eventually forming alliances with outside groups such as the Poles or Magyars. During the period 1054-1224, no less than 64 principalities had an ephemeral existence, 293 princes claimed succession rights and their disputes provoked 83 civil wars. In 1097, the Council of Liubech, the first known federal council of Kievan Rus, took place amidst the constant regional rivalries between the princes.

The Crusades led to a shift in European trade routes that accelerated the decline of Kiev. In 1204, the forces of the Fourth Crusade sacked Constantinople, precipitating the decline of the Dnieper trade route. With the decline, Kievan Rus split into several principalities and some large regional centers: Novgorod, Vladimir-Suzdal, Ruthenia, Polatsk, Smolensk, Chernigov and Pereyaslavl. The inhabitants of these centers would eventually give rise to three nationalities: Ukrainian in the southeast and southwest, Belarusian in the northwest and Russian in the north and northeast.

The consequences of the Mongol invasion in Kievan Rus was not the same for all its regions, cities like Kiev never recovered from the devastation of the attack, because of this there was approximately 200 years of delay in introducing important social, political and economic reforms and scientific innovations in the region of the former Kievan Rus in comparison with Western Europe. Some claim that the yoke had a severe destructive influence on the system of unwritten laws regulating the daily life of the society; for example, Valeriya Novodvórskaya mentions that the death penalty, long-term imprisonment and torture had not existed in Kiev before the Mongols invaded the country. Moreover, half of the population died during the invasion.

Historians have discussed the long-term influence of the Mongol regime on Kievan Rus' society. They have blamed the Mongols for the destruction of Kievan Rus and its disintegration.

Kingdom of Ruthenia

The kingdom of Ruthenia before existing as such was a principality within Kievan Rus, known as the principality of Galicia and Volhynia, was the result of the unification of the principality of Galicia with the principality of Volhynia in 1199. Shortly after the breakup of Kievan Rus in 1256, the principality became a kingdom.

The Kingdom of Ruthenia or Kingdom of Rus was a medieval monarchical state in Eastern Europe, which ruled the regions of Galicia and Volhynia between 1199-1349. Together with the Republic of Novgorod and the Principality of Vladimir-Suzdal, it was one of the three most important powers that emerged from the fall of Kievan Rus. After the enormous destruction caused by the Mongol invasion of Kievan Rus in 1239-41, Danilo Romanovich was forced to swear allegiance in 1246 to Batu Khan of the Golden Horde. He strove, however, to rid his kingdom of the Mongol yoke, trying unsuccessfully to establish military alliances with other European rulers.

Cossack Hetmanate

For the Russian Empire, Ukrainians were considered as Little Russians and had the support of the Russian-speaking community among the Ukrainian population in the region of Galicia. Austria, on the other hand, supported the rise of Ukrainian nationalism in the late 19th century. Western Ukraine was a major confrontation for the Balkans and the Orthodox Slavic population it was home to.

A Balkan war between Austria-Hungary and Serbia was inevitable, as Austria-Hungary's influence waned and the pro-Slav movement grew. The rise of ethnic nationalism coincided with the growth of Serbia, where anti-Austrian sentiment was perhaps strongest. Austria-Hungary had occupied the former Ottoman province of Bosnia-Herzegovina, which had a large Serb population in 1878. It was formally annexed by Austria-Hungary in 1908. Growing nationalist sentiment also coincided with the decline of the Ottoman Empire. Russia supported the pro-Slav movement, motivated by ethnic and religious loyalties and a rivalry with Austria dating back to the Crimean War. Recent events such as the failed Russo-Austrian treaty and the century-old dream of a warm water port also motivated tensions.

Religion also played a key role in the confrontation. When Russia, Prussia and Austria partitioned Poland in the late 18th century, they inherited largely Eastern Rite Catholic populations. Russia did everything possible to revert the population to Orthodox Christianity, often peacefully, but sometimes by force as happened in Chełm.

The final factor was that by 1914, Ukrainian nationalism had matured to a point where it could significantly influence the future of the region. As a result of this nationalism and the other major sources of Russo-Austrian confrontations, including Polish and Romanian lands, both empires eventually lost these disputed territories when these territories formed new independent states.

The Russian advance into Galicia began in August 1914. During the offensive, the Russian army successfully pushed the Austrians to the Carpathian ridge, occupying all the lowland territory and fulfilling their long-standing aspirations to annex the territory.

The Ukrainians were divided into two separate and opposing armies. 3.5 million fought with the Imperial Russian Army, while 250,000 fought for the Austro-Hungarian Army. Many Ukrainians ended up fighting each other. In addition, many Ukrainian civilians suffered when the armies shot and killed them after accusing them of collaborating with the opposing armies.

During World War I, the western Ukrainian village was located between Austria-Hungary and Russia. Ukrainian villages were regularly destroyed in the crossfire. Ukrainians can be found participating on both sides of the conflict. In Galicia, more than twenty thousand Ukrainians suspected of sympathizing with Russian interests were arrested and placed in Austrian concentration camps, both in Talergof and Styria.

Ukrainian war of independence

In April 1945, a delegation of the Ukrainian SSR headed by Dmytro Manuilsky in New York became one of the founding members of the United Nations. In the same year, an agreement was signed on the Soviet-Polish border and on the annexation of Transcarpathia. A population exchange was carried out on the border with Poland until 1946, in 1947 the Polish authorities deported border Ukrainians to the newly acquired German lands in the west - Operation Vistula, and the Soviets deported 78,000 "unreliable" Ukrainians to Siberia. In the same year, under the Soviet-Romanian treaty, northern Bukovina and southern Bessarabia were officially annexed, but the left bank of the Dniester remained part of the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic. In the postwar period, a total of 43,000 people under the age of 25 were arrested for anti-Soviet political crimes, including 36,300 in the western regions, and about 500,000 Ukrainians from the western regions were sent into exile. As a result of numerous relocations, migrations and deportations of the first half of the 20th century, the ethnic spectrum of Ukraine's population has changed significantly in the direction of reducing the proportion of national minorities and at the same time increasing the proportion of Russians. Gathering the majority of ethnic lands within the USSR, northern Bessarabia, Lemkovina, Nadsiania, Jolm, Podlaskie, Brest, Starodub, Podonia and Kuban remained outside the borders of Ukraine and then their population was severely assimilated. In 1945, Metropolitan Joseph "the Blind" was sent to the camp and in March of the following year, the Greek Catholic Church went underground and became a "catacomb". Between 1947 and 1949, Nikita Khrushchev carried out a rapid Sovietization of the western regions, the cities were industrialized, collective farms were established in the villages, and dissidents moved to eastern Siberia. The UPA fighters, waiting in vain for the West's Cold War with the USSR to enter a heated phase, continued to resist the Soviet government, resorting to the tactic of fighting small units against the overwhelming forces of the NKVD. At the same time, the Soviet government tried to discredit the insurgents in the eyes of the population through mass deportations, provocations and propaganda. In 1950, the commander-in-chief of the UPA, Roman Shukhovych, was assassinated and the fighting ceased.

After World War II, which caused severe damage to the country's economy and population, Ukraine received territories that had belonged to Czechoslovakia, Romania and Poland.

In 1964, a group of opposition party members led by Leonid Brezhnev removed Khrushchev from office and sent him into retirement. In 1965, reforms began in agriculture and industry, which restored strict centralization and enterprises adopted self-financing. In the countryside, this led to the consolidation of collective farms and the disappearance of a large number of small towns and villages. In general, the social welfare of the population improved, but from the 1970s onwards a systemic crisis of the long trajectory of economic development began. Attempts to overcome the ideological and economic crisis of state development led to the idea of building a developed socialism instead of the central basis of communism until 1980 and stagnation in economic and social life. In the international arena, the mid-1970s were marked by an attempt to establish relations between the ideological camps of the West and the East and to alleviate the tension of a nuclear war.

In 1972, Volodimyr Shcherbitski, was appointed secretary of the communist party central committee and launched a new wave of arrests of intellectuals, some were convicted, some were sent to psychiatric hospitals and many were simply dismissed from the party. In 1976, the Ukrainian Helsinki Group was formed to monitor the USSR's compliance with the terms of the 1975 Helsinki Accords, consisting of Mykola Rudenko, Petro Grigorenko, Levko Lukianenko, Ivan Kandyba, Vasil Stus, Vyacheslav Chornovil, etc. The following year, most of its participants were deported to the camps and Russification is spreading in public life.

In 1977 a new Constitution of the USSR was adopted, in order to obtain foreign currency for the sale of natural resources, oil and gas fields in Siberia were actively developed, and socialist countries installed a network of pipelines across the territory of Ukraine. The centralization of economic flows depleted Ukraine's resources, without even giving itself the opportunity to renew production capacity. Urbanization accelerated, with 4.6 million Ukrainian peasants moving to the cities. At the same time, the birth rate slowed, and there was a general aging of the population. In late 1979, the Soviet Union sent troops to Afghanistan in support of pro-Soviet forces and found itself isolated internationally amid falling world hydrocarbon prices, the profits from which helped cover the problems of an inefficient economy.

After Brezhnev's death in 1982, a parade of general secretaries took place, dying year after year until the young reformer Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in 1985. He strengthened ties with capitalist countries to try to save the USSR economy, reduced the arms race, withdrew troops from Afghanistan and allowed the unification of the GDR and Germany. In domestic politics, he began to implement a program of economic reform and liberalization of public life, these processes were called Perestroika. On April 26, 1986, an accident occurred at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, which with its invisible radioactive flame seemed to shed light on all the accumulated problems in Soviet society. As a result, more than 50 000 km of Ukrainian territory was affected, hundreds of settlements and 100 000 local inhabitants were completely resettled. On the other hand, freedom of speech quickly filled the gaps in people's historical consciousness and awakened national feelings, the intelligentsia began to unite around various societies. In 1988, the Ukrainian Helsinki Association was formed, headed by Levko Lukyanenko, in 1989 the People's Movement for Perestroika was formed, miners' strikes broke out in the country and Shcherbytsky was replaced by Volodymir Ivashko. On October 28, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine restored the status of the Ukrainian language to official.

Independent Ukraine

The exact origin and meaning of the Ukrainian "Tryzub" or trident has not yet been determined, although it is believed it may be associated with a paronomasia between the old word for freedom and the word for trident, so the most widely accepted belief is that the Ukrainian coat of arms and the trident signify Freedom. It has been the oldest of the coats of arms used by the Ukrainian nation as numerous changes have been introduced since the 13th century. It was the national symbol of the Ukrainian People's Republic since January 22, 1918, when it proclaimed its independence. It is officially the coat of arms of Ukraine since February 19, 1992.

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7. a b c John Channon & Robert Hudson, Penguin Historical Atlas of Russia (Penguin, 1995), p.16.
8. Согласно греческим источникам произошло в 860 году, см. Первое крещение Руси
9. кроме Западной Украины, территория которой была разделена между Польшей, Чехословакией и Румынией
10. Етнічна історія давньої України, 2000, с. 8—9.
11. Piдyш Б., Степанчук В. Непоротове VI, нове місцезнаходження домустьєрського часу на Дністрі (попереднє повідомлення) // Археологічні Студії. 2003.
12. 1 2 3 4 5 Етнічна історія давньої України, 2000, с. 9.
13. A halicsi politika ellentmondásos helyzetét mutatja, hogy Romanovics Dániel halicsi fejedelem 1253-ban a pápától kapott koronát, miközben a mongoloknak adót kellett fizetnie és utóda az Arany Horda vazallusának számított; ugyanakkor Magyarország az 1280-as évekig (házassági kapcsolat révén is) ütközőterületként használta Halicsot a mongolok ellen.
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15. Gebei Sándor: A kozákság mint a lengyel végek határőrsége (1569-1648). In: Magyarország védelme – Európa védelme. Studia Agriensa 24. (2006) 299. o.
16. Historia jako obraz przeszłości uwarunkowana jest warunkami politycznymi. Narody posiadające własne niezależne państwa tworzą ten obraz samodzielnie. Narodom pozbawionym własnego państwa narzucana jest narracja państwa dominującego. Jest to przypadek Ukrainy, której władze carskiej Rosji, a następnie Rosji sowieckiej usiłowały narzucić interpretację przeszłości. Uzyskanie niepodległości w roku 1991 otwierało więc ukraińsko-rosyjski „konflikt narracji”, który łączy się z konfliktem politycznym. Wyrazistym sygnałem tego konfliktu była książka Łeonida Kuczmy, Ukraina to nie Rosja z roku 2004.
17. Po raz pierwszy Iwan IV Groźny.