Archeography

Archeography (археографія; arkheohrafiia). An auxiliary historical discipline whose function is to describe and publish ancient documents and to work out the methods of preparing and publishing literary monuments.

The first attempts to publish Ukrainian historical documents date back to the end of the 16th and the beginning of the 17th century. Such documents appeared in the works of Herasym Smotrytsky, Stepan Zyzanii, Ipatii Potii, Meletii Smotrytsky, etc, in connection with the heated polemics between the Orthodox and the Uniate camps on the question of the union with Rome (see Polemical literature). Historical documents began to be published for a scholarly purpose only in the 18th century. In 1777 Vasyl H. Ruban published Kratkaia letopis' Malyia Rossii s 1506 po 1776 g. (A Brief Chronicle of Little Russia from 1506 to 1776), which was based in part on a transcription of Kratkoe opisanie Malorossii (A Brief Description of Little Russia), written in the 1730s. In 1793 Fedir Tumansky published Bohdan Khmelnytsky’s universal of Bila Tserkva and the chronicle of Hryhorii Hrabianka in the journal Rossiiskii magazin.

During almost the entire 19th century Ukrainian historical documents were published by central Russian or local Ukrainian government bodies. The Archeographic Commission in Saint Petersburg began the important work of publishing the oldest materials (1811–22). The following publications were of particular importance: Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisei (The Complete Collection of Russian Chronicles, 1843–71, repr 1908–10 and 1962); the phototype editions of the Laurentian Chronicle (1872) and the Hypatian Chronicle (1871); the series Akty istoricheskie (1841-3), Akty, otnosiashchiesia k istorii Zapadnoi Rossii (5 vols, 1846–53), and vols 16 and 17 of Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisei containing the Lithuanian-Ruthenian chronicles of the 16th century (1889) and the 17th century (1907). In the 1860s Mykola Kostomarov began to work at the Archeographic Commission and edited vols 1–9 and 11–13 of the 15-volume series Akty, otnosiashchiesia k istorii Iuzhnoi i Zapadnoi Rossii (1863–92). Kostomarov’s volumes were particularly rich in Ukrainian materials of the 14th–17th century. Gennadii Karpov was the editor of the other volumes.

Osyp Bodiansky’s work as secretary of the Moscow Society of History and Russian Antiquities in 1845–8 and 1849–76 marked a new period in Ukrainian archeography. In the Chteniia v Imperatorskom obshchestve istorii i drevnostei rossiiskikh, which Bodiansky edited, he published Litopys samovydtsia (Samovydets Chronicle, published separately 1846); Istoriia Rusov (History of the Rus' People, published separately in 1846); a Cossack chronicle of the 18th century, Povest' o tom, chto sluchilos' na Ukraine (The Story of What Happened in Ukraine, 1848); Aleksandr Rigelman’s Letopisnoe povestvovanie o Maloi Rossii i ee narode i kazakakh voobshche (A Chronicle Account of Little Russia and Its People and the Cossacks in General, 1847); Petro Symonovsky’s Kratkoe opisanie o kazatskom malorossiiskom narode i o voennykh ego delakh (A Brief Description of the Cossack Little Russian People and Its Military Affairs [of 1765], 1847); and many other materials. Later he published Mykola Khanenko’s Diiariush (Diary [of 1722], 1858), Istochniki dlia malorossiiskoi istorii (Sources for Little Russian History, 2 vols, 1858), and Reestra vsego Voiska Zaporozhskogo (Register of the Entire Zaporozhian Host [of 1649], 1875).

In 1843 the Kyiv Archeographic Commission was established under the name Provisional Commission for the Analysis of Ancient Documents. It was attached to the chancellery of the governor-general. Its purpose was to publish old archival materials in order to justify the anti-Polish Russification policies in Right-Bank Ukraine. Dedicated scholars such as Mykhailo Maksymovych, Mykola Ivanyshev, and V. Dombrovsky, however, immediately gained control of the commission, and Taras Shevchenko and Panteleimon Kulish worked as associates of the commission. The commission became a permanent one and made an important contribution to historical studies by publishing a wealth of source materials: Pamiatniki, izdannye Vremennoi komisiei dlia razbora drevnikh aktov (vols I–IV, 1845–59) as well as Samiilo Velychko’s chronicle (1848–64), the Hrabianka Chronicle (1852), Samovydets Chronicle (1878), and other items. In 1863 Volodymyr Antonovych joined the commission, and in the 1870s–80s he directed the work of many associates. The commission’s main publication was the 35-volume (divided into eight series, some volumes in two parts) Arkhiv Iugo-Zapadnoi Rossii, 1859–1914. Ivan Novytsky published a name (1878) and geographical (1883) index to the publications of the Kyiv Archeographic Commission. Among the commission’s other publications the following should be mentioned: Sbornik letopisei, otnosiashchikhsia k istorii Iuzhnoi i Zapadnoi Rossii (A Collection of Chronicles Related to the History of South and West Russia, 1888), edited by Antonovych; Paleograficheskii izbornik (Paleographic Compendium, 1909) compiled by Ivan Kamanin; and Materialy po istorii russkoi kartografii (Materials on the History of Russian Cartography), edited by Veniiamyn Kordt. Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu arkheograficheskoiu komissieiu (Acts Published by the Vilnius Archeographic Commission [a society founded in 1842]) were of some importance to Ukrainian historical studies.

Besides the commissions there were individual Ukrainians who edited and published historical materials: Mykola Bilozersky published Iuzhnorusskie letopisi (South Russian Chronicles, 1856), and Oleksander Markovych published a condensed and Russified version of Dnevnye zapiski ... Ia. Markovicha (The Daily Notes ... of Ya. Markovych, 2 vols, Moscow 1859).

An important place in Ukrainian archeography is held by Kievskaia starina, a scholarly journal of Ukrainian studies published in Kyiv. In the course of its existence (1882–1906) and as Ukraïna (1907), this journal published the following materials: pomianyk (Commemorative List) of the Saint Nicholas's Military Cathedral (1895), the Synodicon of the Saint Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv (1895), Mykola Khanenko’s ‘Diiariush' (1884–6), Yakiv A. Markovych’s Dnevnye zapiski (Daily Notes, 1893–7), Petro Apostol’s diary, a number of other old and recent memoirs, the correspondence of Ukrainian public figures, legal documents, etc. The Historical Society of Nestor the Chronicler, founded in 1873, published some historical documents in its Chteniia v Istoricheskom obshchestve Nestora-letopistsa, eg, the pomianyki of the Kyivan Cave Monastery and Saint Michael's Golden-Domed Monastery from the 16th–17th century.

Oleksander Lazarevsky, who was associated with Kievskaia starina for many years, prepared for publication selections from the family archives of the Sulyma, Skorupa, Voitsiekhovych, and Myloradovych families, as well as from the documents of the Pereiaslav regiment in the 17th and 18th centuries. His work was published in the 1880s–1890s in Kyiv. Then, in 1902–12, the papers of the Storozhenko family were published in eight volumes under the editorship of Mykola V. Storozhenko and Andrii V. Storozhenko. This is an important source for the history of the Hetman state in the 17th and 18th centuries. In 1908–14 Vadym Modzalevsky published four volumes of his Malorossiiskii rodoslovnik (Little Russian Genealogy).

Gradually, more and more subjects and Ukrainian territories came under archeographic study. Ivan Luchytsky published materials on the history of land ownership in Left-Bank Ukraine (1884), Oleksii Andriievsky published documents from 18th-century archives of the Hetman state, and Dmytro Bahalii published archival materials on the history of the settlement of Slobidska Ukraine in the 17th and 18th centuries in Sbornik Khar'kovskogo istoriko-filologicheskogo obshchestva in the 1880s. Dmytro Yavornytsky published documents on the Zaporozhian Sich. P. Dmytrenko published Sbornik materialov dlia istorii Kubanskogo kazach'ego voiska (Collection of Materials on the History of the Kuban Cossack Host, 1896–8). Mytrofan Dovnar-Zapolsky published the legal documents of the Lithuanian-Ruthenian state (1899). The Kyiv Theological Academy published Akty i dokumenty, otnosiashchiesia k istorii Kievskoi akademii (Acts and Documents Relating to the History of the Kyivan Academy) in 1904–15, with Mykola I. Petrov editing part two and Teodor Titov editing part three.

Before the founding of the Shevchenko Scientific Society, archeographic publications in Galicia were of an occasional nature. Among them were Galitskii istoricheskii sbornik (Galician Historical Collection), the Lviv Chronicle of the 17th century (1867), the Galician-Volhynian Chronicle (1871) edited by Antin Petrushevych, and the Iubileinoe izdanie (Jubilee Edition) of the Lviv Dormition Brotherhood (1886), which contained its legal documents and correspondence. In 1868 the series Akta grodzkie i ziemskie, which published much material on Western Ukraine, began to appear in Lviv; it continued to do so until 1935. In the 1890s, when the Shevchenko Scientific Society increased its activities, Mykhailo Hrushevsky helped to initiate a wide publishing program of historical materials, in which the series Zherela do istoriï Ukraïny-Rusy played a key role; in 1895–1919, 11 volumes of documents from the 16th–18th century were published. The series was edited by the Archeographic Commission of the Shevchenko Scientific Society, which numbered among its members Ivan Dzhydzhora, Mykhailo Vozniak, Vasyl Herasymchuk, Oleksander Kolessa, Myron Korduba, Ivan Krypiakevych, Kyrylo Studynsky, and Stepan Tomashivsky. The commission also published Pam’iatky ukraïns'ko-rus'koï movy i literatury (8 vols, 1896–1930). The historical-philosophical section of the society published Ukraïns'ko-rus'kyi arkhiv, which contained collections of short documents, descriptions of manuscripts, and the like.

At the turn of the century archival commissions were organized: in Simferopol in 1887, Chernihiv in 1897, Poltava in 1903, Katerynoslav in 1903. One of their tasks was to publish archival materials, and they managed to produce such publications as Aktovye knigi poltavskogo gorodovogo uriada 17 v. (The Statute Books of the Poltava Town Government in the 17th Century, 3 issues, 1912–14) and Aktovaia kniga starodubskogo gorodovogo uriada 1693 g. (The Statute Books of the Starodub Town Government in 1693, 1914). The Ukrainian Scientific Society in Kyiv published a collection of materials on the Cyril and Methodius Brotherhood in Zbirnyk pam’iati T. Shevchenka (Collection in Memory of Taras Shevchenko, 1915). The Kyiv Archeographic Commission, which continued to work on Arkhiv Iugo-Zapadnoi Rossii, published at this time Sbornik materialov po istorii Iugo-Zapadnoi Rossii (Collection of Materials on the History of Southwest Russia, 2 vols, 1911–16).

After the formation of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences in 1918, the Archeographic Commission of the academy, with which the Kyiv Archeographic Commission merged in 1921, became the principal center for Ukrainian archeography. Its first chairman was Vladimir Ikonnikov (1920–3), followed by Mykola Vasylenko (1923–4) and Mykhailo Hrushevsky (1924–31). Under Hrushevsky its activities expanded greatly. Among its members and associates were the following scholars: Vasylenko, Vasyl Herasymchuk, Yosyf Hermaize, Oleksander Hrushevsky, Pylyp Klymenko, Veniiamyn Kordt, Kateryna Lazarevska, Viktor Romanovsky, Mykola Tkachenko, Pavlo Fedorenko, and Volodymyr Shcherbyna. The commission published three volumes of Ukraïns’kyi arkhiv (Ukrainian Archive, 1929–31), which contained Heneral'ne slidstvo pro maietnosti 1729–31 rr. (General Survey of Landholdings in 1729–31) of the Starodub regiment (vol 1, 1929) and the Lubny regiment (vol 3, 1931) and Kodens'ka knyha sudovykh sprav (The Koden Register of Court Cases, vol 2, 1931); the first volume of Samiilo Velychko’s chronicle (1926); Opys Novhorod-Sivers'koho namisnytstva 1779–81 rr. (An Account of the Vicegerency of Novhorod-Siverskyi in 1779–81, 1931); Perepysni knyhy 1666 roku (The Census Books of 1666, 1933); Tsekhova knyha ... Kam’iantsia Podil's'koho vid 1601 do 1803 r. (The Guild Book ... of Kamianets-Podilskyi from 1601 to 1803, 1932). Some of the commission’s publications had already been printed but then were confiscated when Mykhailo Hrushevsky was exiled to Moscow in 1931. The All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences was forcibly reorganized at the beginning of the 1930s. Several publications that were planned by the commission were never completed. Only the text of Ruskaia Pravda, which was prepared by Serafim Yushkov for the commission, was published by the Institute of the History of Material Culture in 1935.

In the 1920s and early 1930s documentary materials were also published in publications other than those of the Archeographic Commission: between 1924 and 1930 in the journal Ukraïna (1914–30); the collections Za sto lit: Materialy z hromads'koho i literaturnoho zhyttia Ukraïny XIX i pochatku XX stolittia and Dekabrysty na Ukraïni (The Decembrists in Ukraine, 2 vols, 1926–30); in Zapysky Istorychno-filolohichnoho viddilu VUAN; and other publications of the All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences. The following collections were published separately: Ukraïns'ki hramoty 14–15 vv. (Ukrainian Legal Documents of the 14th–15th Centuries, Kyiv 1928), prepared by Volodymyr Rozov; Materiialy do istoriï ukraïns'koho prava (Materials on the History of Ukrainian Law, vol 1, Kyiv 1929), compiled by Mykola Vasylenko; and a number of historical-literary materials, particularly Slovo o polku Ihorevi (The Tale of Ihor’s Campaign, Kyiv 1926), edited by Volodymyr Peretts; Kyievo-pechers'kyi pateryk (The Patericon of the Kyivan Cave Monastery, Kyiv 1930); Taras Shevchenko’s diary and correspondence (Kyiv 1927), edited by Serhii Yefremov; Materiialy dlia kul'turnoï i hromads'koï istoriï Zakhidn'oï Ukraïny (Materials in the Culture and Civic History of Western Ukraine), the first volume of which was devoted to the correspondence between Ivan Franko and Mykhailo Drahomanov (Kyiv 1928); and Halychyna i Ukraïna v lystuvanni 1862–84 rr. (Galicia and Ukraine in the Correspondence of 1862–84, Kyiv–Kharkiv 1931), by Kyrylo Studynsky.

In 1930 an archeographic commission was set up at the Central Archives Administration (TsAU) of the Ukrainian SSR (then in Kharkiv). The commission provided work for scholars-archivists and financial resources for publishing collections of documents such as Arkhiv Zaporoz'koï Sichi (Archive of the Zaporozhian Sich). The intention was to have the commission of the TsAU concentrate on publishing documents of modern and recent Ukrainian history (19th–20th century), while the archeographic commission of the All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences continued to publish older materials (up to the 19th century). The Archeographic Commission of the TsAU specialized for the most part in the history of the revolutionary movement, industry and labor, peasant movements, etc. It published the journal Arkhiv Radians'koï Ukraïny, of which eight issues appeared. It managed to publish the collection Povstannia selian u seli Turbaiakh (1789–93 rr.) (The Peasant Revolt in the Village of Turbai [1789–93], Kharkiv 1932) and a description of the archives of the Zaporozhian Sich prepared by the Kyiv Central Archive of Old Documents and edited by Mykola Tyshchenko (Kyiv 1930), but other collections that were ready for publication did not appear. During the Stalinist terror and repression of Ukrainian scholars in 1933–4, the Archeographic Commission of the TsAU was reorganized and eventually became a department of the NKVD. The persecution of the scholars and directors of TsAU led to the abolition of the Archeographic Commission of the All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences.

In the 1930s the political situation was unfavorable for the development of Ukrainian archeography. It was abolished in Soviet Ukraine and could not develop in Galicia or abroad because of a lack of financial resources and the dispersal of scholarly cadres. Only the Ukrainian Scientific Institute in Warsaw managed to publish vol 1 of Diiarii het'mana Pylypa Orlyka (The Diary of Hetman Pylyp Orlyk, 1936), under the editorship of Jan Tokarzewski-Karaszewicz; vol 1 of Arkhiv M. Drahomanova: Lystuvannia Kyïvs'koï Staroï hromady z M. Drahomanovym, 1870–1895 (M. Drahomanov’s Archive: The Correspondence of the Kyiv Old Hromada with Mykhailo Drahomanov, 1870–1895, 1938); Pavlo Shandruk’s collection of documents Ukraïns'ko-moskovs'ka viina 1920 r. (The Ukrainian-Russian War of 1920, vol 1, 1933); the memoirs of Oleksander Lototsky—Storinky mynuloho (Pages of the Past, 3 vols, 1932–4) and U Tsarhorodi (In Constantinople, 1939); and other memoirs. A host of materials in the history of Ukrainian emigration in the 18th century, mostly on the activities of Pylyp Orlyk and Hryhor Orlyk, were published by Elie Borschak and Borys Krupnytsky. The Second World War cut this work short.

Archeographic research and publication resumed in Ukraine and abroad only after the war. Soviet historians took advantage of the post-Stalin thaw in the 1950s to publish a series of valuable archeographic collections. The 1954 celebration of the 300th anniversary of the Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654 provided the occasion for such publications. A collection of documents Ukraïna naperedodni vyzvol'noï viiny 1648–1654 rr. (Ukraine on the Eve of the War of Liberation of 1648–1654) was published before then, in 1946. In 1953–4 the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR published the monumental Vossoedinenie Ukrainy s Rossiei (Reunification of Ukraine with Russia) in three volumes, covering the period 1620–54. The anniversary inspired two other large collections, which were published later: Dokumenty Bohdana Khmel'nyts'koho, 1648–1657 (The Documents of Bohdan Khmelnytsky, 1648–1657, Kyiv 1961), prepared by the Institute of Social Sciences of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR in Lviv and the Archival Administration of the Council of Ministers of the Ukrainian SSR and edited by Ivan Krypiakevych and Ivan Butych, and Dokumenty ob osvoboditel'noi voine ukrainskogo naroda 1648–1654 gg. (Documents on the Liberation War of the Ukrainian People in 1648–1654, Kyiv 1965), a selection of Polish documents made by A. Baraboi, Olena Kompan (associates of the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR), I. Butych, and A. Katrenko (associates of the Archival Administration). Moreover, the two institutions co-published such archeographic collections as Otmena krepostnogo prava na Ukraine (The Abolition of Serfdom in Ukraine, Kyiv 1961); Selians'kyi rukh na Ukraïni (seredyna XVIII–persha chvert' XIX st.) (The Peasant Movement in Ukraine [mid-18th–First Quarter of the 19th Century], Kyiv 1970); Haidamats'kyi rukh na Ukraïni v XVIII st. (The Haidamaka Movement in Ukraine in the 18th Century, Kyiv 1970); Obshchestvenno-politicheskoe dvizhenie na Ukraine v 1856–1864 gg. (The Sociopolitical Movement in Ukraine in 1856–1864, 2 vols, Kyiv 1963–4); Grazhdanskaia voina na Ukraine 1918–1920 (The Civil War in Ukraine, 1918–1920, 3 vols, Kyiv 1967); and many collections of materials on the recent history of Ukraine, most of which are not of a scholarly archeographic nature. For its part, the Institute of Linguistics of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR published a number of scholarly works, including Aktova knyha Zhytomyrs'koho mis'koho uriadu XVI st. (1582–1588 rr.) (Statute Book of the Zhytomyr Town Government in the 16th Century, [1582–1588], Kyiv 1965); Pam’iatky ukraïns'koï movy XIV i XV st. (Monuments of the Ukrainian Language of the 14th and 15th Centuries); and Hramoty XIV st. (Legal Documents of the 14th Century, Kyiv 1974).

Later attempts to expand archeographic studies in Soviet Ukraine ended in failure. In 1969 the Archeographic Commission of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR was established ‘to co-ordinate and to expand documentary publications in the republic.’ The commission’s executive, headed by Andrii Skaba and including Ivan Hurzhii, Kost Huslysty, Vadym Diadychenko, and Viacheslav Strelsky, prepared a plan to publish sources for the ancient and modern history of Ukraine. The project was to include a series of chronicles of the 17th-18th century, among them the chronicle of Samiilo Velychko, the Hrabianka Chronicle, and the Samovydets Chronicle. An annual collection, Arkheohrafiia Ukraïny (Archeography of Ukraine), was approved. But only L'vivs'kyi litopys i Ostroz'kyi litopysets’ (Lviv Chronicle and Ostroh Chronicle, Kyiv 1970), edited by O. Bevzo, and Litopys samovydtsia (Kyiv 1971), edited by Ya. Dzyra, appeared. The subsequent repression of Ukrainian historical studies in 1972–3 put an end to the commission’s activities. Although archeographical publications, mostly dealing with recent Ukrainian history, appeared from time to time, the development of scientific archeography in Soviet Ukraine was hampered by the lack of a single scholarly center, the dispersal of specialists, and, most of all, by the ideological-political censorship of the Soviet authorities and the Communist Party.

Outside Soviet Ukraine, important scholarly archeographic publications by émigré specialists began to appear only in the 1950s. The two most productive institutions in the field were two Ukrainian church centers in Rome. The Basilian monastic order published materials on the history of Ukraine and history of the Ukrainian church from the Vatican archives in the series Documenta ... ex archivis Romanis under the editorship of Rev Atanasii Velyky (52 vols to 1984). The other center was the Ukrainian Catholic University (Rome), which, under Cardinal Yosyf Slipy’s sponsorship, published documents from Rome’s archives in Monumenta Ucrainae Historica (15 vols, 1964–77).

In the United States of America the Lypynsky East European Research Institute in Philadelphia published a collection of documents from Vienna archives dealing with events in Ukraine in 1914–22 (4 vols, 1966–9), edited by Rev T. Hornykevych, and Dmytro Doroshenko’s and Osyp Nazaruk’s correspondence with Viacheslav Lypynsky (2 vols, 1973–6), edited by Ivan Korovytsky and Ivan Lysiak Rudnytsky.

Among archeographic publications devoted to the Cossack period the following should be mentioned: Rev Alexander Baran and George Gajecky, The Cossacks in the Thirty Years’ War, vol 1: 1619–1624 (Rome 1969) and Orest Subtelny’s collection On the Eve of Poltava: The Letters of Ivan Mazepa to Adam Sieniawski, 1704–1708 (New York 1975). Individual documents were also published in the journals Ukraïns’kyi istoryk and Harvard Ukrainian Studies. In 1972 the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute reprinted the 1878 Kyiv Archeographic Commission edition of Litopys samovydtsia.

(For later period, see Institute of Ukrainian Archeography and Source Studies of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.)

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Levitskii, O. Piatidesiatiletie Kievskoi komissii dlia razbora drevnikh aktov, 1843–1893 (Kyiv 1893)
Doroshenko, D. ‘A Survey of Ukrainian Historiography,’ AUA, 5–6 (1957)
Ohloblyn, O. ‘Ukrainian Historiography 1917–1956,’ AUA, 5–6 (1957)
Isaievych, Ia. ‘Ukraïns'ka arkheohrafiia v XVII–XVIII st.,’ in Istorychni dzherela ta ïkh vykorystannia, no. 1 (Kyiv 1964)
Iakovliev, S. Ukraïns'ka radians'ka arkheohrafiia (Kyiv 1965)
Butych, I. ‘Literatura do istoriï ukraïns'koï arkheohrafiï,’ in Istorychni dzherela ta ïkh vykorystannia, no. 3 (Kyiv 1968)
Radians'ki vydannia dokumental'nykh materialiv z istoriï Ukraïny (1917–68) (Kyiv 1970)
Komarenko, N. Ustanovy istorychnoï nauky v Ukraïns'kii RSR (Kyiv 1973)
Mitiukov, O. Radians'ke arkhivne budivnytstvo na Ukraïni 1917–1973 (Kyiv 1975)

Elie Borschak, Oleksander Ohloblyn, Orest Subtelny

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 1 (1984).]