KIEVAN RUS (800s-1300s)
Sadly there's no writing documenting the founding of Kiev, but most believe it began to be built up in the late 800s as part of the Khazar state, an empire that spanned from Uzbekistan, through the caucasus region to Eastern Europe, basically encircling the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea. In 882 it was conquered by the Varangians, who were basically Vikings, but not Norse. They came from the Baltic Region and regions east of there. Kiev (and Ukraine as well) was important because it was a good area for trade. You may hear me saying this a lot (in past posts) but if the country is in Eurasia, there's a good chance it was involved in either Silk Road trade or Indian Ocean trade. Eurasia (often called the Old World, with North Africa) was heavily networked with trade routes from the often isolated Japan to Portugal, and from the Mongolians of the north to the various groups of India.
Many consider the Kievan Rus the city state that began the Russian Empire, and while Kiev was the crossroads of Eastern Europe it wasn't as much of a city state as say Singapore is now. It didn't have a unique cultural identity and was more of a band of ethnically similar tribes that formed an urban conglomeration.
Rus in this context means a kingdom or city state under the Russian umbrella. You may know of Belarus, but there was also Chorna Rus, Cherven Rus and the Lithuanian Rus.
These Rus's weren't in anyway unified though. They were constantly at war or bickering, as neighboring political entities tend to do.
However, for the people of Kiev, times weren't as bad as they could have been if they lived in the feudal hellscape of Central Europe. Sure, they weren't as nice as they were in the Arab world at the time, but there's always something worse, I guess.
This relative stability wouldn't last though because in 1240 the Mongols sacked Kiev. DAMMIT! The Mongols ruin everything: Kiev, The Order of the Assassins and countless cool empires. On the bright side he might have reduced carbon emissions by killing so many people forests overtook formerly populated places, so... I guess that's good.
POLISH AND RUSSIAN RULE (1300s-1700s)
Let's skip forward in time a bit to the next big change in Ukraine's history. In 1569 Poland and Lithuania joined forces so they had a better chance of not being invaded every three days by Russia or Prussia. This commonwealth quickly became one of the largest countries in Europe taking over parts of Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Latvia and Estonia. Many ethnically polish people showed up to Ukraine in hopes of farming and using their not-yet-spoiled-by-radiation soil to grow food. The Ukrainians welcomed them with pretty open arms and intermingled with them.
Also, let's not forget that this was the Renaissance and Poland knew it. Poland was the closest thing to a huge art producer like Western Europe that the Ukraine had and Poland introduced new ideas like making paintings of rich people and wearing feathers (and other renaissance things, but mostly those first two).
Many of these Poles that showed up in Ukraine came to be known as Cossacks, which is where we get the term today.
In 1648 the Cossacks rebelled in what is called "The Ruin" (finally historians give something a cool name). The Cossacks were sick of being ruled by Warsaw, which they feel didn't care about Ukrainians and Cossacks. They were almost totally independent at this point, but that meant they would have to fight their own wars and that's exactly what they did against their old parents The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth as well as the Ottomans who just like being dicks and getting in the way.
Here's where Russia shows up. They tell Ukraine (aka the Cossacks) "Hey guys. You're under threat of invasion by Poland-Lithuania at any time. That sucks. We hate them too. How about you let us build some forts in your land and we'll provide protection from them. We're totally not going to slowly overthrow your government and replace it with a puppet government that takes orders from us. That would be totally rude."
But, they did that though. Never trust Russia.
This however did have some upsides. The Ottomans were deathly afraid of Russia so immediately backed off and so did the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, before being partitioned back into nothingness.
But it was mostly bad. Russia, as mighty as they were, were incredibly afraid of uprising or revolution. They banned the Ukrainian language and suppressed their cultural identity, replacing it with a Russian one.
SPLIT BETWEEN RUSSIA AND AUSTRIA (1700s-1991)
For most of the 1800s, Ukraine was split between Austria (and Austro-Hungary) and Russia, with it's massive empire. Russia was gaining territory so quickly it eventually became the largest Empire on earth in size, remnants of it remain today as the country of Russia.
Ukraine, like Uzbekistan (from a couple posts ago) didn't like being under Russia's control. They fought in the Ukrainian War of Independence in 1917. They successfully set up a state (The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic) but it only was independent for 3 years (1919-1922), before being consumed by the massive machine that was the USSR.
In WW2 Ukraine was on the front lines as one of the first points of entry into the USSR from Western Europe and therefore a ton of fighting took place there. Ukrainians weren't all that thrilled to fight under the flag of a country they hated, but they also felt the need to defend their land against the Nazis and Italians.
Post war this new-fangled body called the UN was starting up in from the ashes of the LON and they wanted Ukraine to be in it. But the USSR said "How can one of my constituents act as an independent country. That'd be like asking if Virginia wanted a seat in the UN, without considering the USA". But Ukraine got in, even though it was technically a part of the USSR. The UN shows favoritism for smaller scrappy states that want independence, rather than large monolithic Empires.
INDEPENDENCE (1991-PRESENT)
When the USSR collapsed, Ukraine became one of the largest new nations with a land area larger than most countries in Europe and a large population as well.
The independence referendum which was just a formality at this point got 90% of the vote (only 56% in Crimea, showing their early signs of wanting to split) and they were off on their on way.
Things were rocky at first, like the path for most new nations, and the country was full of corruption, political prisoners and other problems that you'll find all over Eastern Europe and the former Soviet countries.
Things were at a boiling point when Leonid Kuchma, president of Ukraine was convicted of abducting journalist Georgiy Gongadze, who ran an anti-establishment internet newspaper. Kuchma said he wouldn't run for a second term because if he did he would probably get like 0.00001% of the vote.
Their next president Yushcheko tried to cut ties with Russia favoring the EU. He thought fostering relations with the rest of Europe would be a good idea. He was right. Too bad his plan couldn't be enacted because he lost the election to Viktor Yanukovych another Ukrainian politician named Victor with a last name starting with "Y".
He is known to many in the west as a Putin suck up, who carried out illegal political imprisonment and the guy who had a petting zoo installed at his mansion, but when reporters questioned why he would have such a thing claimed all of the animals (mostly ostriches) just showed up there and congregated by themselves.
In 2014 Russia invaded the Crimean peninsula and Yanukovych just kind of let it happen. I WONDER WHY!?!? He let it happen because him and Putin are pals. This invasion split the country. Some were pro EU and Anti-Russia, and some were Anti-EU and pro Russia.
Now Ukraine is in a full on war over Crimea with the death count in the thousands (mostly civilians) with a crumbling economy and rampant corruption. So, it can only get better, I guess.
FUN FACTS
If you don't count Russia, Ukraine is the largest country in Europe by Area.
It is common to say "Ta ni" which translates to "Yeaaaaaaah, no"
Subway stations are massive, because they were designed to hide war-planes and bombs in war time.
Ukraine isn't as big as Texas.
Sadly there's no writing documenting the founding of Kiev, but most believe it began to be built up in the late 800s as part of the Khazar state, an empire that spanned from Uzbekistan, through the caucasus region to Eastern Europe, basically encircling the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea. In 882 it was conquered by the Varangians, who were basically Vikings, but not Norse. They came from the Baltic Region and regions east of there. Kiev (and Ukraine as well) was important because it was a good area for trade. You may hear me saying this a lot (in past posts) but if the country is in Eurasia, there's a good chance it was involved in either Silk Road trade or Indian Ocean trade. Eurasia (often called the Old World, with North Africa) was heavily networked with trade routes from the often isolated Japan to Portugal, and from the Mongolians of the north to the various groups of India.
Many consider the Kievan Rus the city state that began the Russian Empire, and while Kiev was the crossroads of Eastern Europe it wasn't as much of a city state as say Singapore is now. It didn't have a unique cultural identity and was more of a band of ethnically similar tribes that formed an urban conglomeration.
Rus in this context means a kingdom or city state under the Russian umbrella. You may know of Belarus, but there was also Chorna Rus, Cherven Rus and the Lithuanian Rus.
These Rus's weren't in anyway unified though. They were constantly at war or bickering, as neighboring political entities tend to do.
However, for the people of Kiev, times weren't as bad as they could have been if they lived in the feudal hellscape of Central Europe. Sure, they weren't as nice as they were in the Arab world at the time, but there's always something worse, I guess.
This relative stability wouldn't last though because in 1240 the Mongols sacked Kiev. DAMMIT! The Mongols ruin everything: Kiev, The Order of the Assassins and countless cool empires. On the bright side he might have reduced carbon emissions by killing so many people forests overtook formerly populated places, so... I guess that's good.
POLISH AND RUSSIAN RULE (1300s-1700s)
Let's skip forward in time a bit to the next big change in Ukraine's history. In 1569 Poland and Lithuania joined forces so they had a better chance of not being invaded every three days by Russia or Prussia. This commonwealth quickly became one of the largest countries in Europe taking over parts of Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Latvia and Estonia. Many ethnically polish people showed up to Ukraine in hopes of farming and using their not-yet-spoiled-by-radiation soil to grow food. The Ukrainians welcomed them with pretty open arms and intermingled with them.
Also, let's not forget that this was the Renaissance and Poland knew it. Poland was the closest thing to a huge art producer like Western Europe that the Ukraine had and Poland introduced new ideas like making paintings of rich people and wearing feathers (and other renaissance things, but mostly those first two).
Many of these Poles that showed up in Ukraine came to be known as Cossacks, which is where we get the term today.
In 1648 the Cossacks rebelled in what is called "The Ruin" (finally historians give something a cool name). The Cossacks were sick of being ruled by Warsaw, which they feel didn't care about Ukrainians and Cossacks. They were almost totally independent at this point, but that meant they would have to fight their own wars and that's exactly what they did against their old parents The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth as well as the Ottomans who just like being dicks and getting in the way.
Here's where Russia shows up. They tell Ukraine (aka the Cossacks) "Hey guys. You're under threat of invasion by Poland-Lithuania at any time. That sucks. We hate them too. How about you let us build some forts in your land and we'll provide protection from them. We're totally not going to slowly overthrow your government and replace it with a puppet government that takes orders from us. That would be totally rude."
But, they did that though. Never trust Russia.
This however did have some upsides. The Ottomans were deathly afraid of Russia so immediately backed off and so did the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, before being partitioned back into nothingness.
But it was mostly bad. Russia, as mighty as they were, were incredibly afraid of uprising or revolution. They banned the Ukrainian language and suppressed their cultural identity, replacing it with a Russian one.
SPLIT BETWEEN RUSSIA AND AUSTRIA (1700s-1991)
For most of the 1800s, Ukraine was split between Austria (and Austro-Hungary) and Russia, with it's massive empire. Russia was gaining territory so quickly it eventually became the largest Empire on earth in size, remnants of it remain today as the country of Russia.
Ukraine, like Uzbekistan (from a couple posts ago) didn't like being under Russia's control. They fought in the Ukrainian War of Independence in 1917. They successfully set up a state (The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic) but it only was independent for 3 years (1919-1922), before being consumed by the massive machine that was the USSR.
In WW2 Ukraine was on the front lines as one of the first points of entry into the USSR from Western Europe and therefore a ton of fighting took place there. Ukrainians weren't all that thrilled to fight under the flag of a country they hated, but they also felt the need to defend their land against the Nazis and Italians.
Post war this new-fangled body called the UN was starting up in from the ashes of the LON and they wanted Ukraine to be in it. But the USSR said "How can one of my constituents act as an independent country. That'd be like asking if Virginia wanted a seat in the UN, without considering the USA". But Ukraine got in, even though it was technically a part of the USSR. The UN shows favoritism for smaller scrappy states that want independence, rather than large monolithic Empires.
INDEPENDENCE (1991-PRESENT)
When the USSR collapsed, Ukraine became one of the largest new nations with a land area larger than most countries in Europe and a large population as well.
The independence referendum which was just a formality at this point got 90% of the vote (only 56% in Crimea, showing their early signs of wanting to split) and they were off on their on way.
Things were rocky at first, like the path for most new nations, and the country was full of corruption, political prisoners and other problems that you'll find all over Eastern Europe and the former Soviet countries.
Things were at a boiling point when Leonid Kuchma, president of Ukraine was convicted of abducting journalist Georgiy Gongadze, who ran an anti-establishment internet newspaper. Kuchma said he wouldn't run for a second term because if he did he would probably get like 0.00001% of the vote.
Their next president Yushcheko tried to cut ties with Russia favoring the EU. He thought fostering relations with the rest of Europe would be a good idea. He was right. Too bad his plan couldn't be enacted because he lost the election to Viktor Yanukovych another Ukrainian politician named Victor with a last name starting with "Y".
He is known to many in the west as a Putin suck up, who carried out illegal political imprisonment and the guy who had a petting zoo installed at his mansion, but when reporters questioned why he would have such a thing claimed all of the animals (mostly ostriches) just showed up there and congregated by themselves.
In 2014 Russia invaded the Crimean peninsula and Yanukovych just kind of let it happen. I WONDER WHY!?!? He let it happen because him and Putin are pals. This invasion split the country. Some were pro EU and Anti-Russia, and some were Anti-EU and pro Russia.
Now Ukraine is in a full on war over Crimea with the death count in the thousands (mostly civilians) with a crumbling economy and rampant corruption. So, it can only get better, I guess.
FUN FACTS
If you don't count Russia, Ukraine is the largest country in Europe by Area.
It is common to say "Ta ni" which translates to "Yeaaaaaaah, no"
Subway stations are massive, because they were designed to hide war-planes and bombs in war time.
Ukraine isn't as big as Texas.
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