Mazepa

21 hrs. 42 min.

Language Russian

Author Nikolay Kostomarov

Narrator Evgeny Ternovsky

Description

The founder of Russian historical thought, N. I. Kostomarov (1817–1885), devoted one of his serious scholarly works to Mazepa—an eponymous monograph, which to this day remains the most detailed study of this controversial figure. The name of Mazepa is connected with an important period in Ukrainian history—the “Hetmanate”—which, despite the centuries that have passed, still remains one of the most politicized, and Mazepa’s figure is still the subject of endless disputes.
The name of Ivan Stepanovich Mazepa is known to the modern reader most likely as one of the characters in A. S. Pushkin’s poem “Poltava,” from which we borrowed the succinct Pushkin characterization and used it as the title of this preface. A real historical person associated in one way or another with the history of Peter’s era, Mazepa is interesting not only in the context of the Great Northern War between Peter the Great and Charles XII. This figure appeared on the horizon of the Ukrainian people’s history during a time when the euphoria of reunification with Russia had already blown away under the harsh pressure of the tsar’s fist; when, instead of the Polish system of serfdom, Ukrainian peasants were subjected to enslavement by their own “fellow-blooded” nobility, under the aegis of— and with intensified support from—the ruling class of the Russian state.