Чи належав Ніжин Московському царству до 1618 р.?

Abstract

The article deals with the debatable question about the political affiliation of Nizhyn before the signing of the Truce of Deulino between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Tsardom of Muscovy in 1618. On the basis of factual and cartographic evidence, it is proved that the claim that Nizhyn at the beginning of the XVIIth century was wrong was invented belonged to the Tsardom of Muscovy and was transferred to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth under the terms of the Treaty of Deulino. The importance of this agreement for the socio-economic development of the city is revealed. Attention is drawn to the fact that under 1514 the "History of Ruthenians or Little Russia" mentions the creation of the Nizhyn Cossack Regiment by Hetman Evstafiy (Ostafiy)Ruzhinsky. Dmitry Nikolaevich Bantysh-Kamensky in his "History of Little Russia" mentions under 1579 the creation of the eldership of Nizhyn (or Starostwo of Nizhyn). Obviously, these entities could have arisen only in the administrative system of the Polish-Lithuanian state. On the maps of the XVIIth century, on which Nizhyn was marked, it is clearly visible that the city belongs to the Kyiv Voivodeship of the Commonwealth, is on the left (southern) bank of the Oster, and the border between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Chernigov principality runs along this river. The evidence of Polish historians that Nizhyn in the XVIth century was the property of the Polish kings. Thus, we can conclude that Nizhyn in the XVI – at the beginning of the XVIIth century was a small frontier fortress defending the possessions of Polish kings from the north. After the Polish-Moscow border was moved far to the north under the terms of the Truce of Deulino in 1618, this created an opportunity for rapid trade and economic development of the city, which already in 1625 received the right of Magdeburg Law from the Polish king Sigismund III.