Petrov M. B.

The city of Kamianets-Podilskyi in the 30s of the XV-XVIII centuries: problems of socio-economic, demographic, ethnic and historical-topographical development: urban and castle management. - Kamianets-Podilskyi: aksioma Publ., 2012, 480 p. (in Russian)

Research on urban history of the early Modern period is hardly popular in modern Ukrainian historiography, so the publication of every professional work devoted to this issue becomes an event in the academic environment. This is the monograph of Professor Nikolai Borisovich Petrov of the Ivan Ogienko Kamianets-Podilsky National University (1952-2008). Posthumously published by the efforts of his colleagues, who made a worthy tribute to the author's bright memory, it became a kind of result of more than a quarter of a century of M. Petrov's work on various aspects of the history of Kamianets-Podilsky and its environs during the XV-XVIII centuries.

When writing his work, the author drew on a wide range of sources, the vast majority of which are statistical and descriptive documents: lustrations, tax registers, inventory and military descriptions of the city. Some of them are materials from the archives of Kiev, Lviv, Krakow, Warsaw, and Moscow. Of particular value are the description of 1700, which gives an idea of the state of the city at the time of its return to the rule of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and descriptions of the housing stock conducted in 1721, 1739, and 1789 for the purpose of quartering the garrison. The author's research of magistrate's books allowed to introduce into scientific circulation valuable documents on the history of Kamianets, in particular a copy of the royal charter of 1670 on the equalization of the city in rights with Lviv; a charter issued in 1703 by the Podolsk General Martin Kontsky on the restoration of three-year fairs; a sample of the oath of 1714 established by the Kamianets magistrate etc.

Consideration of a number of court cases, testimonies, complaints, and lawsuits submitted for consideration by the magistrate allowed the author to generally characterize the relations between the Polish, Armenian, and Russian communities of the city during the XVIII century. It is mainly based on the works of F. Kirik, who previously studied the Polish community, and the translations of the court books of the Kamianets Armenians made by A. Garkavets. This allows us to consider it somewhat one-sided and incomplete in relation to the history of the Russian community of Kamianets, whose judicial acts have not survived to our time.

The literature used in writing the book demonstrates the scope of the author's research interests. These are mainly works devoted to various aspects of the historical and social topography of the city, namely the study of the evolution and architectural features of its development; the study of the problems of the mutual location of market squares, streets, religious and residential structures; localization of the territory of residence of three urban communities. Interested in restoring the city to its authentic appearance, the author confirmed some of his conclusions with archaeological excavations, which allowed us to establish the localization of the Armenian church of St. John the Baptist. St. Nicholas, St. John the Baptist, St. Trinity Churches, as well as the Carmelite Church.

Based on the materials of the author's PhD thesis ¹, the second section of the book is the most fruitful in relation to accurate hypotheses and refutation of near-scientific theories. According to N. Petrov, the historical topography of Kamianets-Podilsky was characterized by polycentrism. One of his hearths was an old castle, from which the headman was administered. Another was the Old Town with its market squares and town halls. According to the researcher, from 1374 to 1430 the city center was the Maidan-a market near the Pyatnitskaya Church. The transition of Kamianets under the power of the Polish Crown was distinguished by changes in its historical topography. Referring to the works of A. Prusevich and Y. Nelgovsky, the author claims that the Poles "inscribed" their Maidan market in the central sections of the former main square, pushing back the Orthodox population from there (p. 140). A new market of the Russian community was organized in the northern part of the city. The Armenians, who managed to keep some of the estates in the center, formed their main cell in the southern part of the city. Conclusions n. Petrov refutes the claims of architect A. Plamenitskaya, according to which the Polish market in Kamenka was formed on the basis of the Roman camp of the II-III centuries. and belonged to the Russian community already in the XII - XIV centuries, that is, to the official location of the city by the princes Koriatowicz ². The author rightly notes that the finds of Roman coins on the territory of the city are by no means a sufficient basis for confirming the first part of this hypothesis.

Criticizing the theory of O. Plamenitskaya, the historian points out that none of the cities of the Galician-Volyn state knew regular, much less rectangular planning and development of the main city Maidan-the market (p.129), which can be agreed. N. Petrov also drew attention to the fact that " the shrine has been a mandatory attribute in the public center-market of Ukrainian cities since the times of Kievan Rus and the Galician-Volyn state. Later, these norms were adopted by the Lithuanians, seizing Ukrainian lands, as well as by urban planners of the Moscow state" (p. 139). It is difficult to agree with the latter, since the appearance of the Gediminovichi in the Belarusian and Ukrainian lands was by no means a conquest, and Muscovy largely inherited the traditions of the Vladimir-Suzdal region, which was part of the same Rus (Kievan or Ancient, depending on the terminology adopted by different researchers).

On the further pages of the book, describing in detail the nature of the residential and religious development of Kamianets, the author states that within the Polish and Ukrainian jurisdictions of the city, almost every block was identified by the location on its territory of a church that formed a separate church parish or parish. The absence of this feature in the topography of Armenian sites, in his opinion, was due to the relief, which became a factor in the terrace development of the southern part of Kamianets and the small number of Armenian churches. During the entire period under study, only four churches of the Armenian community functioned in the city (p. 143).

This situation led to close mutual influences between the Armenian and Russian, and later Polish communities of the city. Yes " north-east side

^{Petrov N. B.} 1 Istoricheskaya topografiya Kamianets-Podolskogo XII-XVIII vv.: Diss. ... kand. ist. nauk. - K., 1987. - 243 p.

² See: Plamenitskaya O. Kamianets-Podilsky. - K., 2004.

The Armenian market was bounded by the Pyatnitskaya Church estate, and the south-eastern one at the end of the XVI century - by the Ioanno-Predtechenskaya estate. From the north, the cemetery of the Church of St. Friday in the second half of the XVI century was approached by the estate with the Stone of the philistine Kyriakos, which since 1658 served as the house of the magistrate for the Ukrainian community... The western side of the market closed the block that formed around the wooden Orthodox Church of the Ascension. [ ... ] From the north-western side of the market, you could get to the Polish market along Voznesenskaya Street" (pp. 140-141). This suggests that the presence of a large number of Orthodox churches, which from different sides limited the Armenian market square, prompted the townspeople to mutual tolerance, dictated by the need to coordinate the timing of divine services and religious processions on the occasion of the election of city and guild constables.

M. Petrov's study of the "nation-topography" of early-modern Kamianets suggests that the city's communities ceased to be closed as early as the 16th century. Their members, having stopped adhering to the medieval norms of settlement based on ethnic and religious grounds, began to buy houses outside of "their" neighborhoods. Since 1555, the mutual isolation of the Kamenetz communities was finally destroyed by the charter of Sigismund Augustus, who legalized the rights of Rusyns and Armenians to own estates in the quarters of Catholic Poles (p.163, 215, 220). The situation was similar in the suburbs, where, despite the dominance of the Greek rite population, there were residences of Catholic monastic orders, as well as Jews. Ethno-confessional heterogeneity was complemented by social heterogeneity, since a significant number of territories in the suburbs were owned by the gentry and patricians.

Most of the houses in the suburbs, as, after all, in the city itself during the XV-XVII centuries.were wooden, and therefore often suffered from natural disasters. Large-scale stone construction began only after the fire of 1616 on the personal order of Sigismund III. Archaeological excavations conducted by the author in the central part of the city confirm this fact, convincingly refuting O. Plamenitskaya's assumptions about the construction of the Polish market in the XV-XVII centuries by stone residential structures of the Baltic type (p. 130, 157).

Without going into the analysis of another discussion between the author-historian and his opponent-architect regarding the authenticity of the reconstruction of city towers based on the Cracow models of the XIV century, it is worth emphasizing that at the end of the second chapter M. Petrov presents a detailed description of the evolution of Kamenetz fortifications during the XV-XVII centuries. the local fortress was provided primarily by its successful geographical location in the canyon of the Smotrich River. The stone wall around the city was built only in 1567 (pp. 52, 59, 176). The next stage of modernization of the city fortifications took place at the beginning of the XVII century. in 1617, a system of stone and earth bastions was erected on the western side of the Old Castle, which was called the New Castle. Based on the results of topographical studies and the evidence of contemporaries, N. Petrov considered the construction of the gornwerk to be the main reason for the loss of the city's former defense potential. The capture of the bastions was not difficult for a well-armed enemy, who, under their protection, had the opportunity to bombard the city with cannons. Doesn't raise any objections

and the researcher's assumption that the capture of the new castle was the main reason for the surrender of the fortress to the Ottoman army in 1672 (p. 196). The processes of reconstruction of fortifications during the XVIII century, when the city lost its former defensive significance, did not attract the attention of the scientist.

The analysis of Kamianets demography carried out in the third chapter of the book requires methodological clarifications. Chronologically, the earliest determination of the number of philistines was carried out by the author according to the lustration of 1570, which certified their residence in 645 houses. In his calculations, N. Petrov refused the coefficient of 5 people per house proposed by M. Vladimirsky-Budanov, considering it underestimated. The researcher used the method of M. Kapral, who increased this indicator to 8 people for Lviv in the XVI century. Adding to the number obtained in this way the approximate number of peasants of the surrounding filvarks and residents of the suburbs, confessors, zhovnirs and castle servants, he received 6 thousand people (p. 203). In general, the approach to such coefficients should be justified in more detail, taking into account the specifics of each city and its archeology, because even when calculating the population in the XVII-XVIII centuries, the author, calling on the works of M. Krikun, takes the coefficient of 6 people. Thus, information was obtained about 7.5 thousand philistines who lived in Kamenka in the first half of the XVII century (p. 204).

It should be noted that from the second half of the XVII century, about half of the city's population began to be soldiers. The presence of a Turkish garrison of tens of thousands since 1672 (p.206) makes its classification as a major city in Ukraine and Europe (p. 213) somewhat strained, especially considering that according to the census conducted three years later, only 5 thousand burghers lived here (p. 206). During the 17th century, demographic indicators in Kamenka did not rise above this figure, under the influence of heavy weather, natural disasters and military operations, ranging from 3 to 5 thousand people. Of course, when considering these calculations of the author, we should not forget that he did not have time to complete the final version of the Work, and certain contradictions in the text are often preliminary in nature.

According to the author, since the end of the 14th century, the Russian community has been largely dominated by the Armenian and Polish communities. Only in the second half of the 17th century did the Rusyns lose to the Poles (pp. 204-205, 219). During the period of Ottoman rule, the city's dominance was briefly restored, as a result of the large-scale emigration of Poles and Armenians, a significant part of the Orthodox population of the surrounding area moved to the city (p. 206). In the sources used by the author since the XVIII century, there are no references to the Russian community, which, in his opinion, testified to the growing polonization of the inhabitants of Kamianets (p. 221).

Reconstructing the history of the city self-government, G. Petrov expressed the opinion that during 1374-1430 the Russian and Armenian communities co-existed here on equal rights, each of which had full self-government. With the transition of Kamianets under the power of the Polish Crown, only Poles received it. The Armenian and Russian communities were limited to an elective Voit, which simultaneously performed judicial and economic functions. The legal features of the early stages of cohabitation of three communities are highlighted by the author's privilege of Casimir Jagiellonchik from 1461. This document distributed duties in relation to the charioteer and watchman between,

on the one hand, the Russian and Armenian communities, and on the other-the "Latin inhabitants of Kamianets" (p. 214). This division of responsibilities only strengthened the contacts between the two communities, which were founded in the 14th century. Sources of the 16th and 17th centuries provide numerous evidence of their presence at both the highest and lowest levels of the social ladder. Mutual misunderstandings, depending on the nature of the case and the ethno-confessional affiliation of the parties, were resolved within both Russian and Armenian jurisdictions. In addition, Armenians living in the territory under Russian jurisdiction were tried under Russian law until 1670 (p. 215).

The legal basis for cohabitation of the three Kamianets communities underwent changes after the city came under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. The legal proceedings of the Russian community, which had been abolished in 1670, were restored. The Turkish administration instead revoked Polish and Armenian self-government. Speaking about the period of 1672-1699, the author does not reveal the nature of relations between the Ottoman constables and the inhabitants of the city, but the sources analyzed by him indicate that after the end of the Turkish period, representatives of the Polish community took decisive measures to regain their dominant positions. In 1699, by the decision of the Warsaw Sejm, the Orthodox population was forbidden to live within the city limits. At the same time, instead of the previous separate ones, one was formed - the Polish-Russian jurisdiction. Representatives of the new apostolic magistrate sought the subordination of "Rus" to Polish law during the sessions of the Sejm of 1702. A year later, the goals were achieved and the Russian community finally lost its self-government (p.221). According to M. According to Petrov, such actions of the Polish administration were dictated primarily by the desire to prevent the growth of Russian influence, which could increase due to the influx of Orthodox population in the surrounding area mentioned in the previous chapter.

Representatives of the Armenian community, who had already restored their self-government at the beginning of the century, also came under pressure. The competition in trade and crafts that they represented to the Polish population gave rise to conflicts, which even special royal commissions were involved in solving. The author believes that this long-term struggle turned out to be one of the factors of acculturation: contradictions between the Armenian and Polish-Russian magistrates led to the fact that Armenian Patricians, buying real estate within the respective quarters, passed under the jurisdiction of the latter, which was more reliably protected by the norms of Magdeburg law (p. 234). As a result, a single magistrate was created in Kamenka. However, the date of its occurrence seems contradictory. The Polish researcher R. Krul-Mazur, calling on documents from the collection of A. Czolowski of the Manuscripts Department of the V. Stefanik Lviv National Scientific Library, claims that the jurisdictions were integrated in 1787.3 according to M. Petrov, a single magistrate began functioning in 1790 ⁽p. 235), while the author did not specify the source of his information, which leads me to believe that he just made a mistake.

Separate professional research is also required on the problems of self-government of the Jewish community of Kamianets and the district. Throughout the 15th and 18th centuries, the Polish king, wanting, on the one hand, to protect Christians from competition, and on the other - to increase the income that went to the treasury, repeatedly forbade Jews

^{Król-Mazur R.} 3 Miasto Trzech Nacji: Studia z dziejów Kamienca Podolskiego w XVIII wieku. - Kraków, 2008. - S. 595.

settle within the city limits. However, thanks to the official or semi-legal patronage of the village elders and city constables, they were able to develop their activities in the city. In the introduction to the work, the author notes that the Jews did not manage to achieve a separate self - government (p.23), but on the pages of the book several times there is a quote from Ulrich von Werdum, who testified to the existence of a separate court and two synagogues in the Kamenetz Jews-in the city and on its outskirts (p. 61, 254). Moreover, among the documents of the civil-military commission, which functioned in the city during 1789-1793, contained a decree on supervision of the procedure for paying debts by the local cahal (p. 257).

The last three sections of M. Petrov's monograph are devoted to urban economy, that is, domestic and foreign trade, handicraft production and agricultural activities of philistines. In these areas, the ethnic factor also played a significant role. In particular, the author notes that Polish and Russian merchants were primarily engaged in small - scale internal trade, while Armenians were engaged in external trade, mainly importing goods from the East to the country. Trade with Turkey remained the leading branch of the city's economy until the end of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. However, according to M. Petrov, in the XVIII century. Its size has significantly decreased. The historian saw the reason for this phenomenon in the competition that Jewish merchants, nobles and garrison officers began to make up for the Armenians. Today, R. Krul-Mazur opposes this hypothesis. In her work, she notes that at the end of the XVIII century, on the contrary, there was a large increase in the trade of Kamenetz Armenians in Turkey, associated with the transition under the rule of the Habsburgs of three former Polish cells of Oriental trade: Brody, Lviv and Stanislav ⁴. This issue is debatable and requires additional research. It seems that M. Petrov's version is unquestionable only in relation to the first third of the XVIII century.

Craft in Kamenka functioned on the basis of a guild organization. During the XVI-XVIII centuries, the springs number from 12 to 18 workshops in the city. At first, they were divided along ethnic lines, but since the 1530s, representatives of the Russian community began to enter Polish workshops. Only the Armenians managed to maintain separate organizational structures during the study period. Among the crafts, those that focused on the processing of agricultural products became widespread.

Field farming, gardening and horticulture developed primarily in the suburbs and surrounding areas, where, in addition to three urban communities, nobles, representatives of the Castle administration and clergy owned plots. According to N. Petrov, during the XVI-XVII centuries, agriculture, which was engaged in about 35% of urban residents, brought insignificant profits to the city, performing primarily an auxiliary function (p. 332). On the other hand, since the 18th century, the city "shows a certain decline in interest in the defense factor, and instead the agrarian factor is activated, which encouraged the patricians to accumulate means of production as land, and the city - to more rapid evolution in industrial and craft relations" (p.330). If you can argue with the second part of the thesis, then about

^{Król-Mazur R.} 4 Miasto Trzech Nacji: Studia z dziejów Kamienca Podolskiego w XVIII wieku. - S. 689.

the correctness of the first one is evidenced by numerous conflicts between the bourgeoisie and the gentry over the ownership of land in the suburbs and villages of the surrounding area.

Expressing their gratitude to the colleagues of the prematurely deceased researcher, first of all to Professor V. Stepankov, the reviewers cannot but pay attention to certain shortcomings of the publication. Probably, M. Petrov himself would have eliminated a significant part of them, and the editors did not dare to interfere with the author's text. that is why there are numerous repetitions in it, which relate both to the theses discussed in the book and to identical source data, and often in the same chapter (for example, p. 272 284-dates of Kamianets fairs; p. 281, 283-amounts of trade duties in Kamianets; p. 283, 288-thesis on the state of trade of Podol merchants in "forest goods"; p. 302-303-evidence of the simultaneous functioning of two Kushnir workshops in the city: Armenian and Polish-Russian, etc.). citations in the original language without translation (p. 162, 176), grammatical and typesetting errors in proper names (p. 107, 302), names (p. 134), etc. However, this circumstance does not detract from the scientific value of the book, which contains rich factual material from various spheres of urban life in Kamianets-Podilsky in the XV-XVIII centuries. but it only makes you grieve over the inexorability of death, which snatched a talented researcher out of his life, and did not allow him to complete the main work of his life.

L. V. Voitovich (Lviv), E. I. Polyakov (Lviv)

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L. V. Voitovich, E. I. Polyakov, Petrov M. B. the city of Kamenets-Podilsky in the 30s of the XV-XVIII centuries: problems of socio-economic, demographic, ethnic and historical-topographic development: urban and castle management // Moscow: Libmonster Russia (LIBMONSTER.RU). Updated: 02.01.2024. URL: https://libmonster.ru/m/articles/view/Petrov-M-B-the-city-of-Kamenets-Podilsky-in-the-30s-of-the-XV-XVIII-centuries-problems-of-socio-economic-demographic-ethnic-and-historical-topographic-development-urban-and-castle-management (date of access: 06.06.2026).

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