Kolasky Fellowship awarded to Kozak-era historian (03/19/00)

Kolasky Fellowship awarded to Kozak-era historian

EDMONTON - The recipient of the John Kolasky Memorial Fellowship for fall 1999 was the Rev. Prof. Yurii Mytsyk, a well-known historian and specialist in the Kozak era. The Rev. Mytsyk currently serves as chair of the department of political science and history of the National University of the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy in Kyiv, and also as chair of the division of medieval and Kozak-era literary monuments of the Hrushevsky Institute of Archeography and Source Studies, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.

He has a doctorate in history and is the author of 10 books, more than 350 scholarly articles and hundreds of journalistic pieces. Most recently he has turned his attention to the study of the history of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine and of interdenominational relations, both in the past and the present.

The Rev. Mytsyk spent much of his three-month stay in Canada, from October to December 1999, on archeographic-related work. During his work in the archives and libraries of Edmonton, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Mundare and Toronto, he was able to study unique materials on the history of Ukraine. Among these was a microfilm collection at CIUS containing the war diary of Prince Janusz Radziwill for 1649-1652, which described events associated with the Kozak-Polish wars in the Siverian region of Ukraine.

In the course of his research work, the Rev. Mytsyk also brought to light previously unknown documents of Hetmans Bohdan Khmelnytsky, Ivan Vyhovsky, Ivan Mazepa, Colonel Martyn Nebaba, Kyivan Metropolitan Sylvestr Kosiv and others.

At the consistory of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada in Winnipeg, the Rev. Mytsyk was able to work in the archives of Metropolitan Ilarion (Ivan Ohienko), where he examined some of the hierarch's correspondence with Ukrainian historians, writers and poets. In the Oseredok archive in Winnipeg he found the diary of Ivan Bobersky, which described the Ukrainian-Polish conflict of 1918-1919.

During his stay in Canada, the Rev. Mytsyk completed a manuscript on "The Uman Region in Kozak and Haidamaka Times," submitted for publication two articles on "Research in the Archive of Metropolitan Ilarion" and "Col. Illia Holota and the Battle of Zahalii in 1649," as well as wrote some encyclopedia entries.

He also gave a lecture in the CIUS seminar series on "The Khmelnytsky Revolt Revisited: An Insider's View on Current Polemics in Ukraine," and lectures on the current situation in Ukraine and interdenominational relations in Ukraine before Ukrainian community audiences in Edmonton, Winnipeg, Canora and Saskatoon.

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