Rise of the Cossacks - Origins of the Ukrainians DOCUMENTARY

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Poland-Lithuania: "So, are you Cossacks fighting for us, or against us?" Cossacks: "Yes"

Regarding the origin of the Cossacs, it is also worth mentioning that in 1528 there was a nation-wide nobility census in the Grand duchy of Lithuania (Popys Zemskyi). As a result, some nobility, who could not prove their origin, or (more commonly) made wrong enemies at the court, were stripped of their rank and land. Those guys also joined the cossacks and they certainly held no love for the government of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

As you noticed, the biggest problem for Ukraine as democratic state was, that it was always surrounded by empires…

Nice to quote "Hey Sokoli" in the beginning! It is one of the most beautiful folk songs as well in Ukrainian as in Polish.

Hey, hey, hey, Falcons. Fly past the mountains, forests and valleys...

My hometown, Kremenchuk, actually was founded as one of those forts against tatars in 1571

There is a big oversimplification in calling the magnates of Ukraine 'polish aristocrats', yes they were the rulling class in a state entity that today is quite misleadingly called 'Poland' but they were predominantly of ruthenian origin. Most of them adopted polish language and catholic faith in the seventeenth century. What made them polish by those days standards was being the citizens of the Commonwealth but even after they 'fully' polonised they still described themselves as 'gente ruthenus natione polonus' that can be translated to 'of ruthenian origin nationality polish', the main thing is that your ethnicity was far less important for the people of this region than your class. For example in the XVI century a calvin noble from western Poland would feel much more fraternity with his ruthenian speaking orthodox counterpart from today Ukraine than with a peasant or a burgher from his surroundings. Fast forwarding to the XIX century we can see that when your ethinicty becomes much larger factor in your national identification there are examples of many families in which brothers and sisters are choosing different nationalities (polish and ukraninian, polish and belarussian or polish and lithuanian). It is also worth mentioning that polonisation of the eastern nobility wasn't aggresive at all and it would be best to describe the process as: 'ruthenian nobility polonised itself' rather than 'ruthenian nobility was polonised'. I know this comment is also a big oversimplification but any has to be as there have been tens of books written about the topic.

Маючи історичну освіту мушу сказати що дяка вам ща переклад нашої історії на англійську, відео чудове

I had long known about the Cossacks even though I was raised in America. I was named after a fictional Cossack, and my parents knew one who settled in St. Louis where they were living. They have always fascinated me, and it pleases me Ukrainians today still celebrate Cossack traditions, customers and culture.

Otaman and Hetman were two different things. Otaman(Ataman) was the elected ruler of Zaporozhian Sich. Sich itself was a military camp where Cossacks gathered e.g. before planned military campaigns. Sich was located in different places throughout the history. Hetman title meant simply the leader of the army - there were hetmans in Polish and Lithuanian armies as well. Khmelnytskyi never was an Otaman. He fled to the Sich and was proclaimed as a Hetman - the military leader for the upcoming new military campaign. The state formed by Khmelnyskyi - the Hetmanate (the real name of the state was Zaporozhian Host). But there was still another state - the original Zaporozhian Host (led by Otaman). And the relation between Hetmanate and original Zaporozhian Host were not always good.

That reference to hej Sokoly at the beginning makes my cossack blood happy

These kind of videos really make you realize just HOW MUCH happens geopolitically in 100 years, even in a little area not often on the world stage. Day to day things seem so stable and unmoving, but you just zoom out a bit and see how untrue that is.

I see what you did at the beginning. ;-) Of course, it's just scratching the surface of an immensely complex and complicated topic (several topics, really). You could make an entire episode about the Church Union of Brest (1596) and how it contributed to the rise of tensions in Ukraine, or create a whole series taking a closer look at the Grand Duchy of Lithuania from its origins. One thing that I would really like to add was in the part when you discussed the various likely roots of the egalitarian, "democratic" culture of the Cossacks. I'd say that, paradoxically, the political culture of the Polish-Lithuanian nobility was among these roots. The members of szlachta not only enjoyed great privileges but were also very numerous (the lowest of the very varied estimates put them at least at 5% of the whole population, way above the European average) and were all legally equal (no additional "tiers" among the aristocracy, with different rights and privileges). That meant (among other things) that tens of thousands of nobles, many of them simple farmers, took a direct part in electing their kings (who in turn could do very little without the approval of the Sejm - the parliament of the Commonwealth). Many Cossacks found this system attractive and wanted to participate in it, but were harshly denied access. In 1632 a delegation of Cossacks showed up at the special session of the Sejm (known as the convocation), which was preparing for the next royal election, and demanded to take part in it, as they were "the members of the Commonwealth" too. The Grand Chancellor of Lithuania, Albrycht Stanisław Radziwiłł supposedly told them that they may be "members" of the Commonwealth but are to it like fingernails and hair to the human body - need to be cut from time to time, once they grew too much. Well, as we can see that attitude backfired a bit...

Those catholic lords, magnates from Ukraine were actually Ukrainians/Ruthenians too. They just converted to Catholicism and polonized. Many of them were far descendants of Rurik. Most of them used old Rus title knaz (prince).

I’m Polish but I think Ruthenia should’ve been granted more power during our commonwealth. Something akin to a Polish-Lithuanian-Ruthenian commonwealth

love the way of elaborating the true life of being a Cossack

Cossack history is so extraordinary.

So you're telling me Mandalorians were straight up just space cossacks?

Timothy Snyder also has an excellent series of books on European History, Bloodlands is about essentially Ukraine and it's relationships with Europe and Russia and the Mongol Empire. He is currently doing a series of lectures on Ukraine and up to lesson 22. An excellent intro is "Post Colonial Ukraine "