The struggle for the hetman's mace after the death of Ivan Skoropadsky (1722–1727)

Abstract

The purpose of the article is to examine the struggle between representatives of various groups of Cossack leaders in the Hetmanate and beyond for the hetmanate government after the death of I. Skoropadsky. This Ukrainian resistance occurred during a tragic period in the history of the Ukrainian Cossack state, when Peter I intensified his attack on its rights, attempting to eliminate the hetmanate and replace it with the rule of an imperial institution – the Little Russian Collegium. Even during a certain liberalisation of Ukrainian politics by the governments of Catherine I and Peter II, the strategic goal of the Moscow rulers remained unchanged – to transform the Hetmanate into one of the provinces of the Russian state. The article highlights the opposition to this Moscow offensive by Cossack leaders, who balanced between defending the autonomy of the Hetmanate and realising their ambitions for power. One of the important components of the Cossack elite's resistance to imperial pressure was the desire to restore the hetmanate as an important attribute of the autonomy of the Cossack state. The research methodology is based on a combination of the principles of historicism, objectivity, polyfactoriality and systematicity with general scientific principles (generalization, synthesis and analysis) and special-historical (problem-chronological, historical-comparative) research methods, which created conditions for an unbiased interpretation of the course of historical processes. The scientific novelty of the study lies in the comprehensive study and comparative analysis of the power aspirations of P. Polubotka, D. Apostol, and P. Orlyk against the background of the Cossack elders' resistance to imperial pressure. The author attempted to characterize a number of aspects of the struggle for the hetman's mace by representatives of various groups of Cossack officers in the 1720s, which remain insufficiently studied or require new rethinking. Conclusions. The confrontation between the Moscow authorities and the Cossack leaders regarding the autonomy of the Hetmanate, which began, in fact, as early as 1654, became especially acute at the end of the reign of Peter I. The tsar's actions (subordination of the Hetmanate to the Senate, restriction of the rights of the Cossack leaders, prohibition of electing a hetman, transfer of the territory of the Ukrainian regiments under the control of Velyaminov's board) actually undermined the autonomy of the Cossack state. The forms of resistance of the Ukrainian elders to imperial pressure were various actions aimed at preserving the rights and freedoms of the Cossack state: preserving Cossack institutions, seeking support and assistance from foreign states, and fighting to preserve their own power. It is a pity that during a difficult and responsible time for the Hetmanate, its sincere patriots P. Polubotka, D. Apostol, and P. Orlyk did not always manage to unite their efforts to protect the rights of the Ukrainian people. This only played into the hands of tsarism, which, by inciting enmity among the elders, implemented its aggressive policy of incorporating Ukrainian lands.