Bohdan Khmelnytsky is a Ukrainian military, politician and statesman, the creator of the Ukrainian Cossack state, hetman of the Zaporozhian Army.
Place of Birth, Education
The exact date and place of birth of Khmelnytskyi remain unknown. According to one version, he was born on January 6, 1596 (December 27, 1595 according to the old style) in the village of Subotiv in the Cherkasy region in the family of the Chyhyryn centurion Mykhailo Khmelnytsky.
He received his primary education at the Kyiv Brotherhood School, later studied at the Jesuit Collegium in Yaroslav and continued his studies in Lviv.
Career
In 1620-1621, together with his father , he took part in the Polish-Turkish war, during which he was captured. He managed to be released only two years later – according to some reports, he escaped, according to others, he was ransomed by relatives.
Returning to Subotiv, he joined the registered Cossacks and, together with the Zaporozhian Cossacks, took part in campaigns against Turkish cities.
During the Cossack uprisings of 1630 – 1638, he held the position of general clerk. He joined the actions against the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, in particular the Battle of Kumeykiv, and on December 24, 1637, as a military clerk, he signed the surrender of the enemy near Borovitsa.
In 1644 – 1646, he took part in the war between France and Spain, commanding a detachment of Cossacks numbering more than two thousand fighters.
During Khmelnytskyi’s absence, the Polish sub-headman Chaplinsky attacked his farm. Attempts to achieve justice through the courts did not yield results, which was the reason why in 1647 Khmelnytsky began preparations for a nationwide uprising against Polish rule in Ukraine.
Khmelnytskyi region
On February 9, 1648, Khmelnytskyi was elected the first hetman of the Zaporozhian Sich. Having gathered about four thousand Cossacks, he went on a campaign against Polish troops. It was with this that a new Cossack action began, which quickly grew into the National Liberation War of the Ukrainian people.
In the battles near Zhovti Vody and Korsun, the insurgent detachments, together with the Crimean Tatar allies, inflicted a crushing defeat on the Polish army. By September 1648, the noble army actually ceased to exist. But Khmelnytsky, having reached the ethnic Ukrainian lands, stopped the further offensive, hoping for the possibility of agreements with the Polish king. On December 27, 1648, he solemnly entered Kyiv.
Khmelnytsky was greeted in Kyiv as “the most holy ruler and prince of Rus.” He was greeted by the senior Orthodox clergy, the Kyiv intelligentsia and the Patriarch of Jerusalem Paisiy Velychkovsky.
After the resumption of hostilities, Khmelnytsky’s troops inflicted a heavy defeat on the Poles. However, due to the betrayal of the Crimean Khan, the hetman was forced to agree to the Zboriv Peace, which did not last long.
In June 1651, a battle took place near Berestechko, which ended in the defeat of the Cossack army. The Crimean Khan fled from the battlefield, and when Khmelnytsky tried to stop him, he captured the hetman and held him captive for about a month. In the fall, the Treaty of Bila Tserkva was signed, which actually leveled most of the achievements of Ukrainians. A year later, Khmelnytskyi won another victory at Batogo.
After that, the hetman turned to the Moscow tsar with a proposal for unification.
In 1654, a military alliance between the Hetmanate and Muscovy was concluded in Pereyaslav, as a result of which the Ukrainian lands became part of the tsarist state.
At the end of his life, Khmelnytsky tried to change his political course and leaned towards an alliance with Sweden and the Ottoman Empire, seeing Moscow as a threat to Cossack sovereignty.
Death/Fatalities
Khmelnytskyi died on July 27, 1657 from a stroke. He was buried in the village of Subotiv in a stone church erected by his own order, which has survived to this day.
Bohdan Khmelnytsky: interesting facts
Among the interesting facts about the hetman:
- at birth he was named Zinoviy, and he received the name Bohdan already in adulthood;
- Khmelnytskyi was a polyglot: he was fluent in Polish, French, Turkish and Latin, and during his stay in Turkish captivity he was even an interpreter.
- in the war with Moscow, he saved the Polish prince Vladislav IV, the future king, for which he received a golden saber as a gift;
- during his hetmanship, Ukraine declared itself at the international level, establishing diplomatic relations from the Crimean Khanate to the Ottoman Empire.
- he had three wives in his life: his first wife Anna bore him six children, the second was executed on suspicion of treason, and the third remained with him until the end of his life;
- Khmelnytskyi loved coffee, the taste of which he discovered in Turkish captivity, and later made this drink part of the treats in his yard.
- The place of his burial is not known for certain, there is a version that his friends reburied the body in order to protect it from the abuse of enemies.
