Pynsk region

Pynsk region [or Pinsk region; Пинщина; Pynshchyna]. A historical-geographic region in the upper reaches of the Prypiat River in Polisia. Until the late 12th century it was part of Turiv-Pynsk principality, but later it constituted an appanage of Pynsk principality, with its capital in Pynsk, dominated by the princes of Kyiv and Volodymyr-Volynskyi. The rulers of Pynsk principality included the brothers Yaroslav Yaroslavych (1183) and Yaropolk Yaroslavych (1190) and their descendants, Volodymyr (1206–7), Rostyslav (1228–32), Mykhailo (1228), Teodor (1262), and Yurii (d 1289). In the mid-13th century the principality recognized the overlordship of King Danylo Romanovych of Galicia-Volhynia, and ca 1318 it was annexed by the Lithuanian grand duke Gediminas. From 1471 to 1521 it was governed by the Olelkovych family of Lithuanian-Ruthenian princes of Kyiv. Thenceforth it was under Polish rule. During the Cossack-Polish War the principality’s nobles officially joined the Hetman state on 20 June 1657, and created Pynsk-Turiv regiment. Today part of Brest oblast in Belarus, the Pynsk region lies, for the most part, within the vaguely defined boundaries of the Ukrainian ethnic territory stretching north of the Ukraine–Belarus state border.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]