Zaporozhian Sich

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Zaporozhian Sich

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Zaporozhian Sich (Zaporizka Sich). The name

of several Cossack keeps on the Dnieper
River that were the centers of the Zaporizhia.
The first Sich was established ca 1552 by

Prince Dmytro Vyshnevetsky on Mala

Khortytsia Island in the Dnieper River, near
present-day Zaporizhia. It was besieged and
destroyed by Crimean Tatars in 1558. The
new Tomakivka Sich was built 60 km to the south on a now-inundated island

near present-day Marhanets. It was also razed by Tatars, in 1593, and the
Bazavluk Sich was built on Bazavluk Island, now also inundated, farther
south near the mouths of the Chortomlyk River and the Pidpilna River. A

fourth Sich was built at nearby Mykytyn Rih, the site of present-day Nykopil;
it is first mentioned in 1628 and was captured by Hetman Bohdan
Khmelnytsky in 1648. The Chortomlyk Sich was also built nearby, at the
mouth of the Chortomlyk River, in 1652. It was destroyed by a Russian force
on 25 May 1709, after Otaman Kost Hordiienko and his Zaporozhian Host
allied with Hetman Ivan Mazepa and Charles XII of Sweden against Peter I. The
Zaporozhians then built a Sich at the mouth of the Kamianets River, but it was destroyed in
1711. Zaporozhian Cossacks who escaped from Russian persecution to lands controlled by
the Crimean Khanate built the Oleshky Sich on the lower Dnieper River in 1711. In 1734
they returned to Russian-controlled Ukraine and built the New Sich on the Pidpilna River.
That last Sich was destroyed by a Russian army on 15–16 June 1775.

Five of the eight Siches, including the most historically important ones, were located on or
near floodplains of the Dnieper River. All of them were protected by ramparts topped by a
palisade with towers and openings for cannons. Inside was a square bounded by the
barracklike Cossacks' quarters (see Kurin). A church, a school, officers' residences, and other
administrative and military buildings stood in the middle of the square. The church and its
clergymen were under the authority of the archimandrite of Kyiv's Mezhyhiria
Transfiguration Monastery. The area in front of the church was the center of social and

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Zaporozhian Sich

political life and the place where the Sich councils (see Sich Council) were held. A bazaar
situated outside the ramparts attracted Zaporozhian traders and merchants from other parts
of Ukraine, Poland, and Russia. The kish, or garrison, at the Sich numbered in the thousands,
at times even tens of thousands.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Evarnitskii, D. ‘Zhizn’ zaporozhskikh kozakov po razskazu sovremennika ochevidtsa,’ KS,
1883, no. 11
———. ‘Chislo i poriadok zaporozhskikh Sechei,’ KS, 1884, no. 4
Holobuts’kyi, V. ‘Vynyknennia Zaporiz’koï Sichi,’ Knyha dlia chytannia z istoriï URSR, 1 (Kyiv
1960)
Kytsenko, M. ‘Pro mistse i rol’ Khortytsi v istoriï zaporiz’koho kozatstva,’ UIZh, 1968, no. 8
Pukha, I. ‘Pro shkoly v Zaporiz’kii Sichi,’ UIZh, 1969, no. 3
March, G.P. Cossacks of the Brotherhood: The Zaporog Kosh of the Dniepr River (New York 1990)
Apanovych, O. Chortomlyts’ka Zaporoz’ka Sich: Do 345-ii richnytsi zruinuvannia (Kyiv 1998)

Arkadii Zhukovsky

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]

List of related links from Encyclopedia of Ukraine pointing to Zaporozhian Sich entry:

1 Andrusovo, Treaty of
2 Arms
3 Autonomy
4 Azov Cossack Host
5 Azov, Sea of
6 Bandura

7 Barabash, Yakiv
8 Bazavluk Sich
9 Bessarabia
10 Black Sea
11 Black Sea Cossacks

12 Bohemia
13 Briukhovetsky, Ivan
14 Bulavin, Kondratii
15 Bursas and student residences

16 Catherine II
17 Ceramics
18 Chaly, Sava
19 Chernihiv region
20 Chorna rada

+ 20 Records >>

A referral to this page is found in 92 entries.

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Zaporozhian Sich

©2001 All Rights Reserved. Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies.
 

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