Kolomak Articles

Kolomak Articles (Коломацькі статті; Kolomatski statti). Ukrainian-Muscovite treaty concluded on 4 August 1687 at the Cossack general council held on the Kolomak River, which formed the boundary of the Hetman state. The council, attended by a limited number of Cossacks, was surrounded by Muscovite troops under the command of Prince Vasilii Golitsyn. Under Russian pressure the council deposed and arrested Hetman Ivan Samoilovych, elected Ivan Mazepa hetman, and accepted a previously prepared agreement.

The treaty consisted of 22 articles and was based on the Hlukhiv Articles of 1669, supplemented with articles accepted during Ivan Samoilovych's rule. Although the treaty reasserted Ukrainian rights and privileges and preserved the 30,000-man Cossack register, it also required that the hetman obtain the tsar's approval for any changes in high offices, thus defending the interests of the Cossack starshyna. Furthermore, it entrenched Muscovy's military and political supremacy over Ukraine: the hetman could not establish diplomatic relations with other countries; he had to maintain an ‘eternal peace and alliance’ with Poland, thus recognizing in effect Poland's right to Right-Bank Ukraine; he had to provide troops for campaigns against the Crimean Tatars and Turkey; and Muscovite soldiers were to be stationed in Baturyn, capital of the Hetman state. By this treaty the Hetman state was obliged for the first time ‘to unite by every method and means the Little-Russian people with the Great-Russian people and to lead them by intermarriage and other measures to an indestructible and firm harmony.’ These articles marked another step in the erosion of Ukraine's independence to the advantage of Muscovy.

Oleksander Ohloblyn

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 2 (1988).]