Ukraine: the history of origin. The lands of Ukraine: history

The territory of Ukraine has been inhabited by people for at least 44 thousand years. The Pontic-Caspian steppe was the arena of important historical events of the Bronze Age. Here there was a migration of Indo-European peoples. People in the same Black Sea and Caspian steppes tamed a horse.

Later, the Scythians and Sarmatians lived on the territory of the Crimea and the Dnieper. Finally, these lands were inhabited by the Slavs. They founded the medieval state of Kievan Rus, which disintegrated in the XII century. By the middle of the 14th century, the current Ukrainian lands were under the rule of three forces: the Golden Horde, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland. Later the territory was divided by such powers as the Crimean Khanate, Rzeczpospolita, the Russian Empire and Austria-Hungary.

In the 20th century an independent Ukraine appeared. The history of the country begins with attempts to create the states of the UPR and ZUNR. Then the USSR was formed in the Soviet Union. And, finally, in 1991, Ukraine's independence was proclaimed, confirmed in a nationwide referendum and recognized by the international community.

Ancient History of Ukraine

Archaeological excavations show that the Neanderthals lived in the Northern Black Sea coast already in the 43-45 millennium BC. In the Crimea, objects belonging to the Cro-Magnolians were found. They date from the 32nd millennium BC.

At the end of the Neolithic on the Ukrainian lands Tripoli culture arose. Its heyday it reached in 4500-3000 BC.

With the advent of the Iron Age through the steppes of the Northern Black Sea region tribes of the ancestors of modern Romanians passed. Then nomadic peoples (Cimmerians, Scythians and Sarmatians) settled the lands of Ukraine. The history of these tribes is known not only due to archaeological monuments, but also from written sources. About the Scythians mentions in his writings Herodotus. The Greeks founded their colonies in the Crimea in the 6th century BC.

Then the Goths and Huns came to the territory of Ukraine . This happened in the III-V centuries of our era. In the fifth century, Slavic tribes appeared here.

In the 7th century, the state of the Bulgars appeared in the Ukrainian steppes. But soon it disintegrated and was absorbed by the Khazars. This nomadic people from Central Asia founded a country that included huge territories - western Kazakhstan, the Caucasus, the Crimea, the Don steppes and eastern Ukraine. The history of the rise and flowering of the Khazar Kaganate is closely connected with the process of the formation of the statehood of the Eastern Slavs. It is known that the title of kagan was worn by the first princes of Kiev.

Kievan Rus

The history of Ukraine as a state, according to many researchers, begins in 882. It was then that Kiev was won by Prince Oleg of the Khazars and became a center of extensive territory of the country. In a single state were merged glades, drevlyane, ulichi, white Croats and other Slavic tribes. Oleg himself, according to the dominant concept in historiography, was a Varangian.

In the 11th century, Kievan Rus became the largest state in Europe. In the western sources of that time, her lands were most often designated as Ruthenia. The name Ukraine is first encountered in the documents of the 12th century. It means "edge", "country".

In the 16th century the first map of Ukraine appeared. Under this name are designated Kiev, Chernigov and Pereyaslavl lands.

The adoption of Christianity and the fragmentation of Russia

The first followers of Christ appeared in the Crimea at least in the IV century. Christianity became the official religion of Kievan Rus in 988 on the initiative of Vladimir the Great. The first baptized ruler of the state was his grandmother, Princess Olga.

During the reign of Yaroslav the Wise, a code of laws was adopted, known as the "Russian Truth". This was the time of the highest political power of the Kiev state. After the death of Yaroslav, the era of the fragmentation of Rus' into separate, principally often hostile to each other, princedoms.

Vladimir Monomakh tried to revive a single centralized state, but in the 12th century Rus finally disintegrates. Kiev and the Galicia-Volyn principality became the territories where Ukraine later emerged. The history of the emergence of Russia begins with the rise of the city of Suzdal, which was the political and cultural center of the northeastern Russian lands. Later Moscow became the capital of these territories. In the north-west Polotsk principality became the center around which the Belarusian nation was formed.

In 1240, Kiev was plundered by the Mongols and for a long time lost any political influence.

Galicia-Volyn principality

The history of the emergence of the state of Ukraine, according to a number of scientists, begins in the XII century. While the northern principalities fall under the rule of the Golden Horde, in the west there are two independent Russian powers with capitals in the cities of Galich and Lodomir (now Vladimir-Volynsky). After their unification, the Galicia-Volyn principality was formed. At the peak of its power it included Wallachia and Bessarabia and had access to the Black Sea.

In 1245, Pope Innocent IV crowned Prince Daniel of Galich and granted him the title of King of All Russia. At this time, the principality waged a complex war against the Mongols. After the death of Daniel of Galich in 1264, his son Leo changed his name, who moved the capital to the city of Lviv. Unlike his father, who adhered to the pro-Western political vector, he went to cooperate with the Mongols, in particular, he made an alliance with the Nogai khan. Together with his Tartar allies, Leo invaded Poland. In 1280 he defeated the Hungarians and captured part of Transcarpathia.

After the death of Leo, the sunset of the Galicia-Volyn principality began. In 1323, the last representatives of this branch of the Rurikovich family perished in the battle with the Mongols. After that, Volyn passed under the control of Lithuanian princes Gedeminovich, and Galicia fell under the power of the Polish crown.

Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

After the Lublin Union, the Ruthenian lands became part of the Polish kingdom. During this period, the history of Ukraine as a state is interrupted, but it is at this time that the Ukrainian nation is being formed. The contradictions between the Catholic Poles and the Orthodox Ruthenians gradually turned into inter-ethnic tensions.

Cossacks

Poles were interested in protecting their eastern borders from the Ottoman Empire and its vassals. For these purposes, the Cossacks were best suited. They not only reflected the raids of the Crimean khans, but also participated in the wars of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth with the Moscow kingdom.

Despite the military merits of the Cossacks, the Polish gentry refused to grant them any significant autonomy, trying instead to turn most of the Ukrainian population into serfs. This led to conflicts and insurrections.

In the end, in 1648, the liberation war began under the leadership of Bogdan Khmelnitsky. The history of the creation of Ukraine entered a new phase. The Hetman State, which arose as a result of the uprising, was surrounded by three forces: the Ottoman Empire, the Commonwealth and Muscovy. A period of political maneuvering began.

In 1654 the Zaporozhye Cossacks concluded an agreement with the Moscow Tsar. Poland tried to regain control over the lost territories, having concluded a contract with Hetman Ivan Vygovsky. This caused the war between the Rzeczpospolita and Muscovy. It ended with the signing of the Andrusov Treaty, according to which the Hetmanate went to Moscow.

Under the rule of the Russian Empire and Austria-Hungary

The further history of Ukraine, the territory of which was divided between two states, was characterized by the rise of national self-consciousness among writers and intellectuals.

During this period, the Russian empire finally breaks the Crimean Khanate and annexes its territories to itself. There are also three sections of Poland. As a result, most of its lands inhabited by Ukrainians are part of Russia. Galicia departs to the Austrian emperor.

Many Russian writers, artists and statesmen of the XVIII-XIX century had Ukrainian roots. Among the most famous are Nikolai Gogol and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Unlike in Russia, in Galicia almost all the elite consisted of Austrians and Poles, and Rusyns were mostly peasants.

National Revival

In the XIX century in Eastern Europe, the process of cultural revival of peoples, under the rule of large empires - the Austrian, Russian and Ottoman - began. Ukraine did not stay away from these trends either. The history of the movement for national independence begins in 1846 with the founding of the Cyril and Methodius brotherhood. The participant of this organization was, among other things, the poet Taras Shevchenko. Later, Social-Democratic and revolutionary parties appeared, advocating the autonomy of Ukrainian lands.

Approximately at the same time, in 1848, in Lviv began the activity of "Head of the Ruska Rada" - the first political organization of Western Ukrainians. At that time among the Galician intelligentsia Russophile and pro-Russian sentiments predominated.

Thus, the history of the creation of Ukraine in its modern borders begins with the birth of nationally oriented parties in the middle of the XIX century. They formed the ideology of the future unified state.

The First World War and the collapse of empires

The armed conflict that began in 1914 led to the fall of the largest monarchies in Europe. People who have lived under the rule of powerful empires for many centuries have a chance to determine their future destinies themselves.

November 20, 1917 the Ukrainian People's Republic was established. And on January 25, 1918, she proclaimed her complete independence from Russia. A little later, the Austro-Hungarian Empire collapsed. As a result, on November 13, 1918, the Western Ukrainian People's Republic was proclaimed. January 22, 1919 reunion of the UPR and ZUNR. However, the history of the emergence of the state of Ukraine was far from over. The new power was in the epicenter of the civil, and then Soviet-Polish war, and as a result lost its independence.

Ukraine

In 1922 the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was created, which became part of the USSR. From the time of its appearance to the collapse of the Soviet Union, it occupied the second place among the republics in terms of economic power and political influence.

The map of Ukraine during this period has changed several times. In 1939, Galicia and Volhynia were returned. In 1940 - some areas, before that belonged to Romania, and in 1945 - Transcarpathia. Finally, in 1954 Crimea was joined to Ukraine. On the other hand, Shakhtinsky and Taganrog districts were transferred to Russia in 1924, and in 1940 the Moldavian SSR moved away from Transnistria.

After the Second World War, the Ukrainian SSR became one of the founding countries of the United Nations. According to the results of the 1989 census, the population of the republic was almost 52 million people.

Independence

With the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Ukraine became an independent state. This was preceded by the rise of patriotic sentiments. January 21, 1990, three hundred thousand Ukrainians organized a live chain from Kiev to Lviv in support of independence. Parties based on national-patriotic positions were founded. Ukraine became the successor of the Ukrainian SSR and the UPR. The government of the UPR in exile officially transferred its powers to the first president Leonid Kravchuk.

As you can see, the history of Ukraine since ancient times was filled with great victories, unsurpassed defeats, noble disasters, terrible and fascinating plots.