page_title: Zaporozhian Cossacks
section_title: Within the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
hierarchical_section_title: Zaporozhian Cossacks / Within the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
caption_attribution_description: English: Ukrainian cossacks under the leadership of Petro Konashevych-Sahaidachny capture the Turkish sea-port of Caffa (Feodosia) in 1616. This city was the largest Turkish centre for the human slave trade, and the capture by the cossacks enabled many Christian men, women and children to be freed from a life of slavery. Woodcut from a 1622 book commemorating Petro Konashevych-Sahaidachny. Українська: Здобуття Кафи (Феодосія) запорожцями на чолі з Петром Конашевич Сагайдачним у 1616 році. Гравюра з книжки "Вірші на жалісний погреб шляхетного лицаря Петра Конашевича-Сагайдачного" Касіяна Саковича 1622 року.
context_page_description: The Zaporozhian Cossacks, Zaporozhian Cossack Army, Zaporozhian Host or simply Zaporozhians were Cossacks who lived beyond the Dnieper Rapids, the land also known under the historical term Wild Fields in today's Central Ukraine. Today much of its territory is flooded by the waters of Kakhovka Reservoir.
  The Zaporozhian Sich grew rapidly in the 15th century from serfs fleeing the more controlled parts of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It became established as a well-respected political entity with a parliamentary system of government. During the course of the 16th, 17th and well into the 18th century, the Zaporozhian Cossacks were a strong political and military force that challenged the authority of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Tsardom of Russia, and the Crimean Khanate.
  The Host went through a series of conflicts and alliances involving the three powers, including supporting an uprising in the 18th century. Their leader signed a treaty with the Russians. This group was forcibly disbanded in the late 18th century by the Russian Empire, with most of the population relocated to the Kuban region in the South edge of the Russian Empire.
context_section_description: In the 16th century, with the dominance of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth extending south, the Zaporozhian Cossacks were mostly, if tentatively, regarded by the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth as their subjects. Registered Cossacks were a part of the Commonwealth army until 1699.
  Around the end of the 16th century, relations between the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Ottoman Empire, which were not cordial to begin with, were further strained by increasing Cossack aggression. From the second part of the 16th century, the Cossacks started raiding Ottoman territories. The Polish government could not control the fiercely independent Cossacks but, since they were nominally subjects of the Commonwealth, it was held responsible for raids by their victims. Reciprocally, the Tatars living under the Ottoman rule launched raids in the Commonwealth, mostly in the sparsely inhabited south-east territories of the Ukraine. Cossacks, however, were raiding wealthy merchant port cities in the heart of the Ottoman Empire, which were just two days away by boat from the mouth of the Dnieper River.
  By 1615 and 1625, Cossacks had managed to raze townships on the outskirts of Constantinople, forcing the Ottoman Sultan Murad IV to flee his palace. His nephew, Sultan Mehmed IV, fared little better as the recipient of the legendary Reply of the Zaporozhian Cossacks, a ribald response to Mehmed's insistence that the Cossacks submit to his authority. Consecutive treaties between the Ottoman Empire and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth called for both parties to keep the Cossacks and Tatars in check, but enforcement was almost non-existent on both sides. In internal agreements, forced by the Poles, the Cossacks agreed to burn their boats and stop raiding. However, boats could be rebuilt quickly, and the Cossack lifestyle glorified raids and looting.
  During this time, the Habsburg Monarchy sometimes covertly employed Cossack raiders to ease Ottoman pressure on their own borders. Many Cossacks and Tatars shared an animosity towards each other due to the damage done by raids from both sides. Cossack raids followed by Tatar retaliation, or Tatar raids followed by Cossack retaliation, were an almost regular occurrence. The ensuing chaos and string of conflicts often turned the entire south-eastern Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth border into a low-intensity war zone and led to an escalation of Commonwealth–Ottoman warfare, from the Moldavian Magnate Wars to the Battle of Cecora (1620) and wars in 1633–34.
  Cossack numbers expanded, with Ukrainian peasants running from serfdom in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Attempts by the szlachta to turn the Zaporozhian Cossacks into serfs eroded the Cossacks' once fairly strong loyalty towards the Commonwealth. Cossack ambitions to be recognised as equal to the szlachta were constantly rebuffed, and plans for transforming the Polish–Lithuanian Two-Nations Commonwealth into a Polish–Lithuanian–Ukrainian Commonwealth (with the Ukrainian Cossack people) made little progress, owing to the Cossacks' unpopularity. The Cossacks' strong historic allegiance to the Eastern Orthodox Church put them at odds with the Catholic-dominated Commonwealth. Tensions increased when Commonwealth policies turned from relative tolerance to the suppression of the Orthodox church, making the Cossacks strongly anti-Catholic, which at that time was synonymous with anti-Polish.
  The waning loyalty of the Cossacks and the szlachta's arrogance towards them resulted in several Cossack uprisings against the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in the early 17th century. Finally, the King's adamant refusal to bow to the Cossacks' demand to expand the Cossack Registry was the last straw that prompted the largest and most successful of these: the Khmelnytsky Uprising, which started in 1648. The uprising became one of a series of catastrophic events known as the Deluge, which greatly weakened the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and set the stage for its disintegration one hundred years later. Even though Poland probably had the best cavalry in Euro
caption: Thousands of slaves were freed in 1616 when the Cossacks under the leadership of Petro Konashevych-Sahaidachny captured the town of Kaffa in Crimea
exif: {}