DEPICTION OF THE EVENTS OF THE POLISH-UKRAINIAN WAR OF 1649 IN THE POLISH HISTORIOGRAPHY OF THE FIRST HALF OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Abstract

Summary. The purpose of the research is to study the peculiarities of depicting the events of the military campaign of 1649 in Polish historiography of the first half of the twentieth century, and in particular the siege of Zbarazh by the Cossack troops and the Battle of Zborow; isolate various stereotypes, patterns and historical myths; analyze the approaches of Polish scholars to the image of various historical figures, the creation of educational ideals of heroes of the homeland or anti-heroes for the younger generation of Poles; study the diversity of historians’ approaches to the analysis of the circumstances of the conclusion and conditions of the Zboriv Peace Treaty; consider the visions of Polish scholars on the international context of the events of 1649, on the vision of the influences on the Cossacks of various foreign policy forces.The research methodology is based on the scientific principles of historical science, namely the principles of historicism, objectivism, systematization and verification, scientific constructivism, as well as the general scientific principles of analysis, synthesis and generalization. Special historical methods are used, such as historical-genetic, historical-comparative and historical-typological.The scientific novelty of the study lies in the coverage of a whole range of problems raised by Polish scholars in the first half of the twentieth century while constructing an image of the events of the Polish-Ukrainian confrontation in 1649. Great attention is paid to the ideological approaches of historians and their political beliefs through the prism of which they considered historical events. The research investigates historical mythologies, stereotypes and patterns that influenced the representation of the past in Polish historiography and received their response in the historical consciousness of Poles and all further development of studies on the history of Polish-Ukrainian relations in the Polish science.Conclusions. The events of the Polish-Ukrainian war of 1649 became significant in the presentation of the image of Khmelnytsky region by Polish researchers. The main accents on them were laid at the end of the XIX century by the Polish historian L. Kubala and the writer G. Sinkevych and continued to develop actively in the historiography of the first half of the XX century. Their images were significantly influenced by the educational ideals of the Polish society in its stateless period, which served to «strengthen the hearts» of the people. After World War I, scholarsʼ approaches to historical material were superimposed on their ideological attitudes due to their commitment to one or another political camp of the Second Polish Republic, and in particular the ideology of the National Democrats or the camp of Marshal J. Pilsudski. Through their prism, the international context of the event was considered, in particular the influences of the Crimean Khanate, the Ottoman Empire or the Moscow Empire. Researchersʼ political visions also influenced their views on internal processes among the Ukrainian people, in particular the formation of a political nation and state-building processes.Layering of mythological archetypes in the presentation of various facts of the military campaign is of particular interest, which had an impact on the formation of anti-Ukrainian stereotypes and phobias. Polish researchers and artists paid a lot of attention to the creation of the ideal of a hero-defender of the fatherland and an exemplary representative of the noble «Sarmatian people» from the figure of Prince Jeremia Vyshnevetskyi. In the context of the analysis of the significance and consequences of the Zboriv Peace Treaty, historians considered the very circumstances and processes of transformation of the Polish-Ukrainian conflict, its internal social and cultural incentives.