History

Volodymyr Mezentsev, Ph. D.

CIUS, Toronto

        During the war in Ukraine, conditions for carrying out excavations in Baturyn, Chernihiv Oblast, have remained difficult. Notwithstanding, the historical and archaeological research of the town has progressed well in 2017-2018.

        These years, Baturyn excavations engaged 95 students and scholars from Chernihiv and Hlukhiv universities and the Institute of Archaeology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine in Kyiv. Archaeologist Yurii Sytyi of the Chernihiv College National University leads the Baturyn archaeological expedition. Archaeologist Dr. Volodymyr Mezentsev (Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, Toronto) is the executive director of the Canada-Ukraine Baturyn project. 

        From 1669 to 1708, Baturyn was the capital of the Cossack state, or Hetmanate. It had become known in the West as the major, prosperous, and well-fortified town in central Ukraine, as well as the seat of Hetman Ivan Mazepa (1687-1709), the Cossack ruler most respected in Europe. The Ukrainian government has declared 16 March 2019 as the 350th anniversary of the establishment of Baturyn as the capital of the Cossack realm. This event will be commemorated at the national level throughout Ukraine.

        In 1708, Mazepa concluded an alliance with Sweden and rebelled against Moscow’s growing curtailment of the Hetmanate sovereignty. That year, on order from Tsar Peter I, the Russian army attacked insurgent Baturyn and seized it, albeit with the assistance of a traitor. The Cossacks and townspeople, including clerics and women, valiantly defended Mazepa’s stronghold, but to no avail. Tsarist forces savagely executed the captive Cossack officers and slaughtered the entire civilian population, sparing neither infants nor the elderly. Up to 14,000 Baturyn residents perished in this punitive offensive. The attackers plundered and burned the town to the ground. The total merciless destruction of the hetman capital, together with its inhabitants, spread fear throughout Ukraine and doomed Mazepa’s uprising to failure.

        Baturyn was raised from the ashes and experienced its last urban upsurge under the reign of Hetman Kyrylo Rozumovsky (1750-1764, d. 1803), the outstanding reformer of the Cossack polity. He facilitated local manufacturing and trade with Western and Eastern Europe in the second half of the 18th century.

        While Ukraine was stateless, the former hetman capital declined, turning into a small provincial borough or mistechko. In independent Ukraine, the town has recovered, becoming an important centre for tourism, and historical, cultural, and patriotic education for the Ukrainians, particularly the youth. In 2018, over 172,000 tourists from Ukraine and the West visited Baturyn’s museums of antiquities and its reconstructed architectural monuments. Despite the war in Ukraine, their influx has been increasing substantially, up from 130,000 sightseers in 2014, when the war began.

        According to my research, between 1696 and 1700, Mazepa commissioned his stately three-story masonry palace in Honcharivka, the environs of Baturyn. Archaeologists believe that the polygonal ramparts with a glacis and five earthen bastions of this manor were modelled on advanced 17th-century Dutch strongholds. These bastion fortifications are the earliest-known in Left-Bank Ukraine. 

        Within the Cossack realm, the Honcharivka estate also represented the first known example of a fortified villa called palazzo e fortezza (“palace and fortress”), which appeared in Italy in the 16th century and superseded medieval masonry or wooden castles. Such complexes, like that in Honcharivka, combined early modern civil palace architecture with predominantly bastion defences. From the late 16th century, this type of Italian fortified villas spread throughout Western and Central Europe, reaching western Ukraine in the early 17th century.

        Inside the ramparts of the Honcharivka manor, occupying an area of nine hectares, besides Mazepa’s palatial court, a fruit garden, a birch grove, and an arable field were located. The graphic reconstruction of this estate, with its orderly network of straight lanes, resembles the regular layout of so-called “French parks”. The design of man-made parks with vegetation areas cultivated in geometric forms and straight or figured alleys originated in Renaissance Italy and became popular in France during the baroque era. Mazepa likely created his principal residence in Baturyn along the models of contemporaneous Western fortified palatial complexes with regular parks. He became acquainted with them while serving at the royal court in Poland and during his diplomatic missions, university studies, and travels to Germany, Holland, France, and Italy in the 1650s and 1660s.

        I surmise that prior to the assault by the superior in number Russian army in 1708, the military personnel and servants of Mazepa’s manor in Honcharivka retreated to the larger and safer Baturyn fortress to reinforce its garrison. In fact, Muscovite troops occupied this abandoned estate without military resistance and pillaged and burned the opulent hetman palace.

        Researchers have graphically recreated the ground plan and exterior design of the timber church (before 1700) at Mazepa’s court. Its remnants were excavated in 2011-2015. This lost structure was representative of late 17th-century folk wooden ecclesiastical architecture in the Chernihiv region.

        In 2018, near the site of a well on Honcharivka’s estate, the expedition uncovered the debris of a 2 m-wide brick corridor with stairs leading down to the well’s shaft. Yu. Sytyi suggests that the corridor, extending some 7 m to the west, was a secret underground vaulted tunnel connecting the well’s shaft with the basement of the neighbouring building at Mazepa’s court. Archaeological investigation of the remnants of this extraordinary and intriguing structure will continue in order to establish conclusively its layout, size, and specific purpose.

        In Baturyn’s northern suburb, the expedition continued exploring the site of the home of Chancellor General Pylyp Orlyk, personal secretary, closest associate, and chief adviser of Mazepa. Later, he became the hetman-in-exile from 1710 to 1742 and author of the first Constitution of Ukraine (1710).

        In 2017-2018, part of the brick foundation of Orlyk’s house was excavated. Yu. Sytyi contends that it was a spacious one-story building or khata of local tradition made of logs sometime between 1700 and 1708. A comparable example of such a well-to-do dwelling is the extant mid-18th century home of Yuhym Darahan, Colonel of the Kyivan Cossack regiment in Pokorshchyna, in the vicinity of the town of Kozelets, Chernihiv Oblast. This one-floor khata was constructed of squared logs set on a brick foundation and plastered.

        Many fragments of terracotta and polychrome glazed ceramic tiles facing the heating stoves at Orlyk’s house were unearthed amidst its remnants. Some of them exhibit fire damage, indicating that his residence was burned during the sack of Baturyn by Russian soldiers. Yu. Sytyi asserts that these tiles were produced locally. He considers their high technical and artistic qualities a match to the best stove tiles at Mazepa’s palace in Honcharivka. But the ornamentations of Orlyk’s tiles are distinctive in their originality and not mere imitations of those found in the hetman’s residence. Hence, the stove tiles discovered at Orlyk’s home represent valuable pieces of local ceramic applied and heraldic arts in Mazepa’s capital. Several shards with the family coats of arms of both Orlyk and Mazepa in relief were found there.

        Using computer photo collage and graphic techniques, researchers have reconstructed a whole tile featuring Orlyk’s armorial bearings. It was covered with multicoloured glazing, damaged by fire, and measured 35 cm by 33 cm. In the compositional centre of this tile, is the image of a figured blue shield with an inscribed stylized bowed yellow cauldron holder and an unsheathed white (silver) sword with a yellow (golden) hilt in an upward position. The shield is surmounted by a golden inlaid crown. Above it, the bent leg of a knight in blue armor is depicted. Two stylized green palm fronds flank the shield. These heraldic symbols are placed against an oval white background and surrounded by a floral ornament with white and yellow flowers as a decorative cartouche in the Ukrainian baroque style set on a cobalt background. In the early modern era, blue enamel was most expensive and prestigious. Over the crown, the initials of Pylyp or Filip Orlyk (F. O.) are inscribed in Latin letters.

        This unique find is the earliest known representation of Orlyk’s family heraldic emblem, which he commissioned while serving as Chancellor General in Mazepa’s administration before the fall of Baturyn in 1708. Previously, only two wax impressions of Orlyk’s seals were known to be preserved in Sweden. They bear his coat of arms from the time when he was hetman and lived in emigration in the West since 1715. However, their heraldic and artistic designs differ and lack inscriptions. Archaeological research on the residence of this distinguished Ukrainian politicians, diplomat, and writer will resume next summer.  

        The expedition continued excavating the site of the estate of Judge General Vasyl Kochubei (1700-1708) on the town’s western outskirts. In the second part of the 18th century, it was in the possession of Rozumovsky who constructed several government office premises there. These were demolished in the following century. 

        In 2017-2018, archaeologists partially unearthed the brick foundations of two sizeable buildings from this administrative complex. Yu. Sytyi dates both of them from the 1750s to 1770s and believes that they had one floor and a timber superstructure. An example of such state edifices from Rozumovsky’s era is the extant masonry two-storied chancellery of the Kyiv Cossack regiment in Kozelets. It was constructed and embellished in the Ukrainian baroque style with rococo elements in 1756.

        In 2017, at Kochubei’s court, a tiny but costly silver neck cross was discovered. It was cast locally in the 1740s or 1750s. This cross could have belonged to a child from a Cossack elite family. Its shape and engraved ornament on the reverse were popular in the Hetmanate at that time.

        A three-barred Orthodox Golgotha cross is featured on the front. According to my interpretation, on three cross arms, the initials of Jesus Christ, the King, are inscribed in keeping with mixed Byzantino-Slavic iconographic tradition. The Greek letters ІС and Х are the canonical abbreviation of Jesus Christ, while the Cyrillic letter Ц obviously refers to His title in Slavic: Tsar (Цар). Such a brief monogram for Christ’s name and title, with only four characters (ІС, Х, Ц), is rarely employed on modern Orthodox crosses with Greek or Cyrillic inscriptions. Longer monograms for Jesus Christ (ІС, ХC) and His title as the “King of Glory” (Цар Слави) are more common. The brevity of this particular monogram could be due to the small size of this child’s cross.

        During the 2017 excavations at the Baturyn fortress, a remarkable bronze ring with a seal on its glass insert of Mazepa’s era was found. The seal depicts a stylized masonry fortress over which an eagle is fighting a serpent or a dragon in the sky. I maintain that this composition on the seal illustrates a Byzantine legend about the combat between Christianity, symbolized by the eagle, and Islam, embodied as a serpent, in the sky above Constantinople during the reign of Emperor Constantine the Great (306-337). The reference to Islam in Constantine’s time is anachronistic in this legend.

        Early modern Ukrainian seals predominantly feature heraldic emblems. The signet ring with this unusual Byzantine motif could have belonged to an educated Cossack officer, state official, scribe, or cleric in Mazepa’s capital who lacked noble status and a related coat of arms. But its owner certainly had to be familiar with the Byzantine legend represented on his seal.

        Unearthed during the 2017 excavations at Baturyn also were: two glazed ceramic children’s toys fashioned in folk style (a rare tiny cup and a common whistle shaped as a stylized bird), three fragments of patterned terracotta Cossack tobacco pipes, two iron belt clasps, two copper buttons, three lead musket bullets, and various iron tools, all of local manufacture, nine silver Polish-Lithuanian and three copper Russian coins from the 17th-18th century, as well as two silver shillings of Queen Christina Vasa of Sweden minted in Riga, Livonia, in 1635-1654, and one 17th-century silver solidus from Swedish Livonia.

        Archaeological investigations by Yu. Sytyi have established that during the sack of Baturyn in 1708, punitive Russian forces destroyed the trade and craft suburbs in Honcharivka and Teplivka. It was only half a century later, when Rozumovsky repopulated the devastated town, that new communities of potters and brick makers reappeared there.

        Last summer, north of Mazepa’s manor, archaeologists uncovered the remnants of a wooden dwelling, possibly belonging to a potter. It was burned during this onslaught. Within the structure were found several splinters from an exploded iron cannon ball from the bombardment of Baturyn by the tsarist troops.

        To summarize, in 2017-2018, the archaeological expedition at Baturyn discovered the brick foundations of four hitherto unknown buildings of the Mazepa and Rozumovsky periods. Excavations of the remnants of Orlyk’s residence began. Stove tile fragments with the earliest-known coat of arms of Orlyk and the distinctive new heraldic emblem of Mazepa were found there. Both will be graphically reconstructed and published.

        The latest archaeological findings have reconfirmed the dynamics of masonry construction, local urban crafts, and Ukrainian baroque ceramic decorative and heraldic arts, as well as the commercial and cultural connections of the hetman capital with the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Swedish Empire, and Muscovy. For the first time, an artefact depicting a Byzantine artistic motif has been discovered at Baturyn. New archaeological evidence further revealed the destruction of the trade and craft districts of Mazepa’s capital by the Russian army. Thanks to the annual systematic excavations at Baturyn over the past two decades, this town has become the most extensively archaeologically studied settlement of the Cossack realm.

        The recent detailed examination of the town’s history and antiquities is presented in the richly illustrated booklet Розкопки у Батурині 2017 року. Реконструкції герба Пилипа Орлика (Excavations at Baturyn in 2017. Reconstructions of the Coat of Arms of Pylyp Orlyk), Toronto: “Homin Ukrainy”, 2018, 32 pp. in Ukrainian, 62 colour illustrations. This publication is available for purchase for $10 from the office of the National Executive of the League of Ukrainian Canadians in Toronto (tel.: 416-516-8223, email: luc@lucorg.com) and through the CIUS Press in Edmonton (tel.: 780-492-2973, email: cius@ualberta.ca, web: http://www.ciuspress.com/catalogue/history/372/rozkopki-u-baturini-2017).

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        For 18 years, the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies (CIUS) at the University of Alberta, the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies at the University of Toronto, and the Ucrainica Research Institute in Toronto have sponsored the historical and archaeological research of Baturyn during the Cossack era. Prof. Zenon Kohut, a former director of CIUS and eminent historian of the Hetmanate, is the founder and academic adviser of this project. Orest Steciw, M.A., the managing director of the National Executive of the League of Ukrainian Canadians (LUC), is the president of the Ucrainica Research Institute.

        In 2016-2018, the W. K. Lypynsky East European Research Institute in Philadelphia and the Ukrainian Studies Fund at Harvard University, provided generous grants for the archaeological investigations of Baturyn. The Chernihiv Oblast State Administration also contributed annual subsidies for the excavations in this town in 2005-2017.

        The most generous patrons of the Baturyn study are the late poetess Volodymyra Wasylyszyn and her husband, artist Roman J. Wasylyszyn (Philadelphia), and the writer Lydia C. Palij, as well as Dr. George J. Iwanchyshyn in Toronto. In 2017-2018, the historical and archaeological exploration of the hetman capital and the preparation of associated publications were supported with donations from the National Executive of LUC (Roman Medyk, president), LUC – Toronto Branch (Mykola Lytvyn, president), the National Executive of the League of Ukrainian Women in Canada (LUWC, Oksana Kuzyshyn, president), LUWC – Toronto Branch (Halyna Vynnyk, president), the Kniahynia Olha Branch of the Ukrainian Women’s Association of Canada (Vera Melnyk, president), the Buduchnist Credit Union (Oksana Prociuk, CEO and Chrystyna Bidiak, personnel manager), the BCU Foundation (Roman Medyk, chair), the Prometheus Foundation (Maria Szkambara, president), the Ukrainian Credit Union (Taras Pidzamecky, CEO), the Golden Lion Restaurant (Anna Kisil, owner), and the Healing Source Integrative Pharmacy (Omelan and Zenia Chabursky, owners) in Toronto.

        Next summer, archaeologists will resume their field investigations at Baturyn. Regrettably, due to heavy budget cuts, the Chernihiv Oblast State Administration has discontinued its previous annual funding of the excavations there from 2018. Thus this year, it is the continued benevolent support by Ukrainian organizations, foundations, companies, and private benefactors in North America that will sustain the project’s further archaeological research of Mazepa’s capital and the publication of its results. Canadian citizens are kindly invited to send their cheques with donations to: Mr. Orest Steciw, President, Ucrainica Research Institute, 9 Plastics Ave., Toronto, ON, Canada M8Z 4B6. Please make your cheques payable to: Ucrainica Research Institute (memo: Baturyn Project).

        American residents are advised to send their donations to: Mr. Stan Kamski, Treasurer, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 59 Queen’s Park Cr. E., Toronto, ON, Canada M5S 2C4. Please make your cheques payable to: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies (memo: Baturyn Project). These institutes will issue official tax receipts to all donors in Canada and the United States. U.S. residents will receive them from the American branch of the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies. Those who support this undertaking will be gratefully acknowledged in related publications and public lectures. 

        For more information or questions about the Baturyn project, readers can contact Dr. Volodymyr Mezentsev in Toronto via telephone (416) 766-1408 or email: v.mezentsev@utoronto.ca. I kindly thank the Ukrainian communities in North America for their generous ongoing support of the historical and archaeological research of the Cossack capital. You have made it possible for scholars to continue working on this project even at a time of war in Ukraine.