Krypiakevych, Ivan

Krypiakevych, Ivan [Крип’якевич, Іван; Kryp'jakevyč], b 25 June 1886 in Lviv, d 21 April 1967 in Lviv. Noted historian; full member of the Shevchenko Scientific Society (NTSh) from 1911 and of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR from 1958. He received his doctorate from Lviv University in 1911 and from 1911 to 1939 taught history in Polish gymnasiums in Zhovkva, Rohatyn, and Lviv, and at the Academic Gymnasium of Lviv. He also taught Ukrainian history at the Kamianets-Podilskyi Ukrainian State University (1919), the Lviv (Underground) Ukrainian University (1921–4), and the Greek Catholic Theological Academy (1934–9). From 1913 to 1914 he edited Iliustrovana Ukraïna, a popular semimonthly. For many years he served as director of the historical-philosophical section of NTSh, and in 1934 he became the editor of its periodical, Zapysky Naukovoho tovarystva im. Shevchenka (ZNTSh). In 1939 he was appointed professor at Lviv University, and in 1940 he became the director of the Lviv Branch of the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR. From 1946 to 1951 he was politically persecuted by the Soviet regime, but in 1953 he became the director of the Institute of Social Sciences of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR in Lviv.

Krypiakevych began his career as a historian under the tutelage of Mykhailo Hrushevsky. At first he devoted himself to the socioeconomic and cultural history of Lviv and Galicia in the 16th and 17th centuries. His main publications in this period were ‘Materiialy do istoriï torhivli L'vova’ (Materials on the History of Trade in Lviv, ZNTSh, vol 65 [1905]) and ‘L’vivs’ka Rus' v pershii polovyni XVI v.’ (Lviv Rus’ in the First Half of the 16th Century, ZNTSh, vols 77–9 [1907]). Soon, however, his attention focused on the history of the Cossacks and the Hetman state, and his major works are devoted to this subject. Among them are ‘Kozachchyna i Batoriievi vol'nosti’ (The Cossacks and Bathory’s Privileges, Zherela do istoriï Ukraïny-Rusy, vol 8), ‘Kozachchyna v politychnykh kombinatsiiakh 1620–1630 rr.’ (The Cossacks in the Political Combinations of the 1620s–1630s, ZNTSh, vols 117–18 [1914]), ‘Studiï nad derzhavoiu Bohdana Khmel'nyts'koho’ (Studies of Bohdan Khmelnytsky’s State, ZNTSh, vols 138–40, 144–5, 147, 151 [1925–31]), and the large monograph Bohdan Khmel'nyts'kyi (1954), which was written in conformity with official Soviet historiography. His monograph Halyts’ko-Volyns’ke kniazivstvo (The Principality of Galicia-Volhynia, 1984) appeared posthumously.

Krypiakevych is the author of over 500 works on historiography, archeography, sphragistics, the study of primary sources, numismatics, historical geography, and cultural history. They include Ukraïns’ka istoriohrafiia (Ukrainian Historiography, 1923), Istoriia ukraïns’koï kul’tury (The History of Ukrainian Culture, 1937), and Dzherela z istoriï Halychyny periodu feodalizmu (do 1772 r.) (Sources for the History of Galicia in the Feudal Period [to 1772], 1962). He was a brilliant popularizer and wrote many popular surveys and accounts of the history of Ukraine. The best known among them are Velyka istoriia Ukraïny (The Great History of Ukraine, 1935) and Istoriia ukraïns’koho Viis’ka (A History of Ukrainian Armed Forces, 1936), written in collaboration with other historians, and Istoriia Ukraïny (The History of Ukraine, 1949, under the pseudonym Ivan Kholmsky). Under the pseud Ivan Petrenko he wrote stories with historical themes for children and youth; they appeared in Dzvinok (which he edited in 1911–14) and as separate booklets.

Bibliographies of his writings, by O. Kizlyk, were published in Lviv in 1966 and 1988. A short biography, by Volodymyr Hrabovetsky, was published in 1996, while a short memoir, edited by Yurii Slyvka, appeared in 2000. The Institute of Ukrainian Studies of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (formerly the Institute of Social Studies) was named after Krypiakevych in 1993.

Oleksander Ohloblyn

[This article was updated in 2014.]