Ukraine

The Ruin

Khmelnytsky’s successor, Hetman Ivan Vyhovsky, broke with Moscow and in 1658 concluded the new Treaty of Hadyach with Poland. By its terms, central Ukraine (attempts to include Volhynia and Galicia were unsuccessful) was to constitute—under the hetman and a ruling elite of nobles and officers—the self-governing grand duchy of Rus, joined with Poland and Lithuania as an equal member of a tripartite commonwealth. Distasteful to the Polish magnates for its concessions to the hated Cossacks, repugnant to the Cossacks and the peasant masses for its conservative social cast and Polish connection, and a provocation to Moscow, the Treaty of Hadyach was never implemented. Faced with mounting opposition, Vyhovsky resigned the hetmancy and fled to Poland.

After Vyhovsky, Ukraine began a rapid descent into a prolonged state of chaos that contemporaries called “the Ruin.” Tensions increased between the Cossack officers, who were undergoing a transformation into a hereditary landowning class, and rank-and-file Cossacks and the peasantry, who were the expected supply of labour. From 1663, rival hetmans rose and fell in the competing Polish and Russian spheres of influence. In 1667, by the Truce of Andrusovo, Ukraine was partitioned along the Dnieper River: the west, known as the Right Bank, reverted to Poland, while Russia was confirmed in its possession of the east, known as the Left Bank, together with Kiev (which actually was located west of the river); the arrangement was confirmed in 1686 by the Treaty of Eternal Peace between Poland and Russia.

The partition of Ukraine caused a patriotic reaction. The hetman of the Right Bank, Petro Doroshenko, briefly occupied the Left Bank and sought to re-create a unified Ukrainian state under the vassalage of the Ottoman Empire. A massive Ottoman military intervention in 1672 had as its primary effect the outright annexation of Podolia as an Ottoman province for a quarter century. Doroshenko’s hopes—and popularity—evaporated as further Ottoman operations failed to establish his rule and led to devastation, especially after Russia was drawn into the war. Mass flight of the populace to the Left Bank, and even beyond, depopulated large tracts of Right Bank Ukraine. Two large-scale Ottoman campaigns followed Doroshenko’s abdication, but a truce in 1681 put an end to further direct Turkish military involvement. Ottoman power was soon on the wane in Europe, and in 1699 the province of Podolia reverted to Polish rule.