10.17951/f.2019.74.183-212 ANNALES UNIVERSITATIS MARIAE CURIE-SKŁODOWSKA LUBLIN – POLONIA VOL. LXXIV SECTIO F 2019 National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine OLEKSANDR D. SUKHOMLYN ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0864-8560
[email protected] Russian Military Presence and Colonisation of Zaporizhian Host (Orel-Samara Region) in the Age of New Sich (1734–1775)* Obecność wojsk rosyjskich i zasiedlenie terytorium Zaporoża (regionu między rzekami Orelą i Samarą) w okresie Nowej Siczy (1734–1775) SUMMARY This article considers general course of the region’s settlement and the process of creating slobodas in the vicinity of Russian strongholds, and the colonisation efforts (state and private) undertaken by the Russian administration on the basis of micro-historical approach. Analysis of documents on the census proves that it was the Zaporizhian elites, and not the Russian strongholds, that had a fundamental impact on the process of settlement of Zaporizhia in the 1740s and 1760s. Attempts to control the slobodas, situated near the strongholds, by the Russian administration and attempts to extend power to Zaporizhian subjects were not successful. Keywords: Zaporizhian Host; Southern Ukraine; sloboda; colonisation; confessional census; Russian strongholds INTRODUCTION The period of New Sich is significant for the history of Southern Ukraine. It is important that an active settlement of areas which belonged to the Zaporizhian * This article was prepared as part of a research project “Unification and Integration of Eu- ropean Frontier: Comparative Research of Imperial Incorporation Policies in Danubian and Pontic Regions (17th–19th centuries)”, financed by the Scholarship Programme of the Visegrad Fund (Viseg- rad Scholarship Program, for post-masters).