Mezhyhiria Chronicle

Mezhyhiria Chronicle (Межигірський літопис; Mezhyhirskyi litopys). A valuable source for events in Ukraine from 1608 to 1700. The manuscript was kept in the Mezhyhiria Transfiguration Monastery near Kyiv, and initially belonged to its overseer, I. Koshchakivsky (d 1720). Some scholars (eg, Mykhailo Marchenko) consider him to be the compiler, but others ascribe authorship of the chronicle to one of the former Cossacks residing at the monastery. The chronicle consists of 41 narratives, including ones about the rebellions led by Yakiv Ostrianyn and Pavlo Pavliuk, the Cossack-Polish War of 1648–57, and Turkish-Tatar invasions of Ukraine. Seven describe natural disasters, such as a locust plague, a solar eclipse, and a fire and earthquake in Kyiv. The chronicle was published in Kyiv in Sbornik letopisei, otnosiashchikhsia k istorii Iuzhnoi i Zapadnoi Rusi (Collection of Chronicles Relating to the History of Southern and Western Rus’, 1888), edited by Volodymyr Antonovych.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]