History of Zaporozhye Cossacks

The history of the Zaporozhye Sich is not yet clear enough. The exact time of its formation is unknown. It is known only that it was formed in the late 16th century. Already at the end of the 15th century Cossacks sought for Zaporozhye for various reasons (it should be noted that Zaporozhye and the article does not mean a city, but a place beyond the Dnieper rapids, covering the territory of the present Zaporozhye, Kherson, Dnipropetrovsk regions. There was a rich fish and animal industry, to. the locality was little populated.

Cossacks also went against the Tatars at the request of the royal elders, and the Cossacks themselves felt a certain desire to go "to the bottom" to beat the Tatars. Even then, Zaporozhye was seen as an outpost created by nature itself. From the island of Khortitsa and other islands, which are now flooded with Lake Lenin and Kakhovka reservoir, the Dnieper was controlled. It was possible to conduct raids in the steppe and go to Khortitsa. In 1556, Prince Dmitry Ivanovich Vishnevetsky, being the leader of the Cossacks, built a fortification behind the rapids on Khortitsa and repulsed the attack of the Crimean Khan,However, in 1558 he left the island due to lack of strength. With the growth of the Cossack forces, independent Cossack campaigns by land routes and Cossack boats - seagulls on the Tatar and Turkish possessions became more frequent. In the early seventies of the 16th century there was already a permanent Cossack guard in Zaporozhye. But the Cossacks' raids on the Tatars and Turks were seasonal. In summer the Cossacks came from Kiev, Chernigov and other places. In the winter, the Sich existed only as an outpost. The impetus to the formation of a permanent community behind the Dnieper rapids was given by the measures of the Polish government both in relation to the South Russian lands in general, and especially in relation to the Cossacks.

The attack of the Cossacks on the Crimea and Turkey was caused by Tatars raids on the Ukraine (that was the time they called these places) and the threats of war from the Porte, under the influence of which the Polish Seyms began to take a number of measures against the Zaporozhye Cossacks. Already in 1607 the Sejm ordered to prevent the withdrawal of peasants and Cossacks in Zaporozhye; similar prescriptions were repeated many times and sometimes supported by armed force (hetman Zholkevsky in 1616, hetman Stanislav Konetspolsky in 1625)