Заворушення в Жидачівському повіті восени 1648 – на початку 1649 років у світлі жидачівських гродських актів

Abstract

The purpose of the article: based on the offi cial material of the Zhydachiv district court, to investigate the population riots in the Zhydachiv district in 1648-1649, to fi nd out the geography of coverage, the social composition of the participants, their motivation, and goals. The research methodology is based on the principles of scientifi c criticism, historicism, as well as the use of general scientifi c (analysis, synthesis, generalization, statistical) and special-histor- ical (historical-typological, historical-systemic) methods. Th e scientifi c novelty: in the processed acts of the Zhydachiv district court, it was possible to discover more than one and a half thousand names of participants in the riots of 1648-1649, which spread against the background of the events of the National Liberation War led by B. Khmelnytsky. Th e percentage ratios between diff erent social groups of riot participants were determined. Conclusions. Statistical data on riots of ordinary people obtained from the materials of the Zhydachiv district records indicate that this phenomenon does not fi t into any one model of motivation and strategy of actions of the participants but instead is a multi-layered phenomenon. Although the Cossacks did not become the organizing and directing force of the local riots in the Zhydachiv region, they nevertheless inspired the insurgents, who borrowed elements of the military organization of the Cossack army. However, the motivation, character, and scope of the rioters’ actions diff ered. Th ere were mass riots within local communities when peasants attacked neighbouring communities and nobles’ courts without spreading their actions beyond the immediate vicinity. Instead, the riots of the townspeople of Rohatyn, Knyahynich, and Kalush were more large-scale and organized, who planned and implemented marches at a distance of several tens of kilometres. Th e participants in the riots were guided by a whole range of motivations and goals in their actions. At one pole were actions aimed at enrichment through plunder, the resolution of older inter-neighbourly confl icts, and redistribution of land and resources, and at the other – the elements of state, religious, and even inter-ethnic struggle Material motives dominated the local peasant riots. Instead, the ac- tivities of the larger rebel units, the core of which was the clergy and the bourgeoisie of the towns of Halychyna, were guided by deeper ideological motives aimed at protecting and affi rming status, and religious and national interests.