Carpathian Ruthenia

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Image:Zakarpattia oblast detail map.png Carpathian Ruthenia, Transcarpathian Ruthenia, or Subcarpathia (Ukrainian: Karpats’ka Rus’, Slovak: Podkarpatská Rus, Hungarian: Kárpátalja, Romanian: Transcarpatia) is a small region of Central Europe located in western Ukraine, today mostly in Ukraine's Zakarpattia Oblast (Ukrainian: Zakarpats’ka oblast’) and easternmost Slovakia, mostly in Prešov kraj and Košice kraj. The region briefly declared its independence in 1939 as Carpatho-Ukraine.

It is inhabited mainly by Ruthenian-speakers (Ukrainians, Rusyns, who may refer to themselves and their language as Rusnak or Lemko). Places inhabited by Rusyns also span other, adjacent regions of the Carpathian Mountains, and include small regions of present day Poland, Hungary, Romania, and the Balkans as well.

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Historic overview

The first Slavs came to the central part of Carpathian Ruthenia probably in the 6th century. A denser Slavic population followed in the 8th century. In the 9th century the western part of the territory was part of Great Moravia, and in the 10th-11th centuries Carpathian Rus was a border region between newly-created Hungary and Kievan Rus'. From the mid-11th century, Carpathian Rus was part of the Kingdom of Hungary (the Hungarian counties of Máramaros, Ugocsa, Bereg, Zemplén, Sáros and Ung). At the outset of the 14th century, the region was ruled by the two powerful de facto independent local rulers, Aba and Pok.

From 1526, the region was under Habsburg rule (within the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary). Since 1570, the region was divided between the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary and Ottoman Transylvania. During this period, an important factor in the Ruthenian cultural identity, namely religion, came to the fore. The Unions of Brest-Litovsk (1595) and of Uzhorod (1646) were instituted, causing the Byzantine Orthodox Churches of Carpathian and Transcarpathian Rus to come under the jurisdiction of Rome, thus establishing so-called "Unyat", or Eastern Rite Catholic churches in the region, the Ruthenian Catholic Church and the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. In the 17th century (until 1648) the entire region was part of Transylvania, and between 1682 and 1685, its north-western part belonged to the Principality of the prince Imre Thököly, while south-eastern parts belonged to Transylvania. Since 1699, the entire region was part of the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary.

Image:West ukraine.png Between 1850 and 1860 the Kingdom of Hungary was divided into five military districts, and the region was part of the Military District of Košice. In 1918 and 1919, the region for the short time was part of the independent West Ukraine Republic.

After World War I and the Treaty of Trianon (1920), Carpathian Rus became part of Czechoslovakia. Whether this was widely popular among the mainly peasant population, is debatable; clearly, however, what mattered most to Ruthenians was not which country they would join, but that they be granted autonomy within it. After their experience of Magyarization, few Carpathian Rusyns were eager to remain under Hungarian rule, and they desired to ensure self-determination.

On November 8, 1918, the first National Council (the Lubovňa Council, which was later reconvened as the Prešov Council) was held in western Ruthenia. The first of many councils, it simply stated the desire of its members to separate from Hungary, but did not specify a particular alternative — only that it must involve the right to self-determination. Over the next months, councils met every few weeks, calling for various solutions. Some wanted to remain part of Hungary but with greater autonomy; the most notable of these, the Uzhhorod Council (November 9, 1918), declared itself the representative of the Rusyn people and began negotiations with Hungary, resulting in the adoption of Law no. 10, making four of the Rusyn counties autonomous. Other councils, such as the Carpatho-Ruthenian National Council meetings in Khust (November 1918), called for unification with a Ukrainian state. It was only in early January 1919 that the first calls were heard in Rus for union with Czechoslovakia.

Previous to this, in July 1918, Rusyn immigrants in the United States had convened and called for complete independence. Failing that, they would try to unite with Galicia and Bukovina; and failing that, they would demand autonomy, though they did not specify under which state. They approached the American government and were told that the only viable option was unification with Czechoslovakia. Their leader, M. Žatkovič, then signed the "Philadelphia Agreement" with Czech President Tomas Masaryk, guaranteeing Rusyn autonomy upon unification with Czechoslovakia. A referendum was held among American Rusyn parishes, with a resulting 67 % in favor. Another 28 % voted for union with Ukraine, and less than one percent each for Galicia, Hungary and Russia. Less than 2 % desired complete independence.

In May 1919, a Central National Council convened under Žatkovič and voted unanimously to accept the Czechoslovak solution. Back in Rus, on May 8, 1919, a general meeting of representatives from all the previous councils was held, and declared that "The Central Russian National Council... completely endorse the decision of the American Uhro-Rusin Council to unite with the Czech-Slovak nation on the basis of full national autonomy."

Image:Czechoslovakia1927.png The Treaty of St. Germain (September 10, 1919) granted the Carpathian Rusyns that autonomy, which was later upheld to some extent by the Czechoslovak constitution. Some rights were, however, withheld by Prague, which justified its actions by claiming that the process was to be a gradual one; and Rusyn representation in the national sphere was less than that hoped for. In 1927, the Czechoslovakia was divided into four provinces and one of them was Sub-Carpathian Rus.

While it was the Rusyns themselves who had arrived at the decision to join the Czechoslovak state, it is debatable whether their decision had any influence on the outcome. At the Paris Peace Conference, several other countries (including Hungary, Ukraine and Russia) laid claim to Carpathian Rus. The Allies, however, had few alternatives to choosing Czechoslovakia. Hungary had lost the war and therefore gave up its claims; Ukraine was seen as politically unviable; and Russia was in the midst of a civil war. Thus the Rusyns' decision to become part of Czechoslovakia can only have been important in creating, at least initially, good relations between the leaders of Carpathian Rus and Czechoslovakia.

In November 1938, under the First Vienna Award — which was a result of the Munich Agreement — Czechoslovakia, and later Slovakia, were forced by Germany and Italy to cede the southern third of Slovakia and southern Carpathian Rus to Hungary. The remainder of Carpathian Rus received autonomy.

Following Adolf Hitler's seizure of Czechoslovakia in 1939, on March 15 Carpatho-Rus declared its independence as the Republic of Carpatho-Ukraine, with Avhustyn Voloshyn as head of state, and was immediately invaded and annexed by Hungary. On March 23 Hungary annexed further parts of eastern Slovakia west of Carpatho-Rus.

Image:Map of Ukraine political simple Oblast Transkarpatien.png After World War II, in June 1945, a treaty was signed between Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union, ceding Carpatho-Rus to the Soviet Union. In 1946, Rus was incorporated into the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.

The latter in 1991 became the independent state of Ukraine, with Carpatho-Rus as an integral part. Currently, the region is a province within Ukraine, officially known as Zakarpattia Oblast.

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Nomenclature

During the Hungarian rule, the region was officially called Subcarpathia (Kárpátalja) or North-Eastern Upper Hungary. After the Treaty of Trianon of 1920 until 1938, as part of Czechoslovakia, it was known as Subcarpathian Rus/Ruthenia/Russia or Subcarpathian Ukraine (Czech/Slovak Podkarpatská Rus, Ukrainian Підкарпатська Русь) and from 1927 also Subcarpathian Land (Země/Zem podkarpatskoruská, Země/Zem podkarpatskoruská). From November 1938 to March 1939, autonomous within Czechoslovakia, it was Carpatho-Ukraine. In 1939-1945, annexed by Hungary, it was again known as Subcarpathia. Since 1945, as part of the Ukrainian SSR and subsequently of an independent Ukraine, it has been called Transcarpathia.

Alternative, unofficial names used in Czechoslovakia before World War II were: Subcarpathia (Podkarpatsko), Carpathian Rus/Ruthenia/Russia (Karpatská Rus) and, rarely, Hungarian Rus/Ruthenia/Russia (Uherská/Uhorská Rus). In Ukraine, it has been known as Transcarpathia or Transcarpathian Ukraine (Закарпаття, Zakarpattia; Закарпатська Україна, Zakarpats'ka Ukraina; in Slovak: Zakarpatsko, Zakarpatská Ukrajina), hence the modern Ukrainian province name of Zakarpats'ka Oblast'.

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Population

According to the 1880 census, the population of the present-day territory of Carpathian Ruthenia (Zakarpattia Oblast) was composed of:

According to the 1989 census, the population of the present-day territory of Carpathian Ruthenia (Zakarpattia Oblast) was composed of:

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Ruthenians of Carpathian Ruthenia

The area of present-day Carpathian Ruthenia was probably settled by Slavic tribes in the 6th century. The Ruthene population was ethnically the same as the population of the areas north of the Carpathian Mountains.

However, because of geographical and political isolation from the main Ukrainian-speaking territory, the inhabitants developed some distinctive features. In addition, between the 12th and 15th centuries, the area had been colonized by groups of Vlach highlanders. They were assimilated into the local Slavic population, but strongly influenced the culture, making it more distinctive from the culture of other Ruthenian-speaking areas.

In 19th and 20th centuries, Carpathian Ruthenia was a field of struggle between Ukrainian nationalist and pro-Russian activists. The former claimed the Carpatho-Ruthenians were part of the Ukrainian nation, while the latter claimed them to be a separate ethnicity and nationality, or part of the Russian ethnos.

The present-day inhabitants usually consider themselves Ukrainians or Rusyns.

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Minority groups

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Hungarians

Carpathian Ruthenia was a part of the medieval Kingdom of Hungary from the 11th century. From 1526, the region was within the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary, and since 1570, it was divided between the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary and Hungarian principality of Transylvania under Ottoman suzerainty. In the 17th century (until 1648) the entire region was part of Transylvania, and between 1682 and 1685, its north-western part belonged to the Hungarian Principality of the prince Imre Thököly, while south-eastern parts belonged to Transylvania. Since 1699, the entire region was part of the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the nobility and middle class in the region was almost solely Hungarian-speaking. Following separation of Carpathian Ruthenia from the Kingdom of Hungary, the Hungarian population decreased slightly; the Hungarian census of 1910 shows 185,433, the Czechoslovak census of 1921 shows 111,052, but much of this difference presumably reflects differences in methodology and definitions rather than such a large decline in the region's ethnic Hungarian (Magyar) or Hungarian-speaking population. Even according to the 1921 census, Hungarians still constituted about 18% of the region's total population.

On the eve of World War II, the First Vienna Award allowed Hungary to annex Carpathian Ruthenia. However, the end of the war was a cataclysm for the ethnic Hungarian population of the area: 10,000 fled before the arrival of Soviet forces. Many of the remaining adult men (25,000) were deported to the Soviet Union; about 30% of them died in Soviet gulags. As a result of war losses, emigration and extermination of Hungarian-speaking Jews, the Hungarian-speaking population of Carpathian Ruthenia decreased from 161,000 in 1941 (Hungarian census) to 66,000 in 1947 (Soviet census); the low 1947 number is doubtless in part a result of Hungarians' fear to declare their true nationality.

As of 2004, about 170,000 (12-13%) inhabitants of Transcarpathia declare Hungarian as their mother tongue.

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Jews

See main article History of the Jews in Carpathian Ruthenia.

Memoirs and historical studies provide much evidence that in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries Rusyn-Jewish relations were generally peaceful. In 1939, census records showed that 80,000 Jews lived in the autonomous province of Ruthenia.

During the Holocaust 17 main ghettos were set up in cities in Ruthenia, from which all Jews were taken to Auschwitz for extermination. Ruthenian ghettos were not liquidated until 1944. Many of the Jews of Carpathian Ruthenia were killed, though a number surived, either because they were hidden by their neighbours, or were forced into labor batallions, which strangely enough, often guaranteed food and shelter.


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Gypsies

There are approximately 25,000 ethnic Gypsies in present-day Carpathian Ruthenia. Some estimates point to a number as high as 50,000 but a true count is hard to obtain as many Roma will claim to be Hungarian or Romanian when interviewed by Ukrainian authorities.

They are by far the poorest and least-represented ethnic group in the region and face intense prejudice. The years since the fall of the USSR have not been kind to the Roma of the region, as they have been particularly hard hit by the economic problems faced by peoples all over the former USSR. Some Roma in western Ukraine live in major cities such as Uzhhorod and Mukachiv, but most live in encampments on the outskirts of cities. These encampments are known as "taberi" and can house up to 300 families. These encampments tend to be fairly primitive with no running water or electricity.

For further information, see http://www.romaniyag.uz.ua/en/

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Romanians

Some 30,000 Romanians live in this region, mostly around the southern towns of Rakhiv (Rahău) and Tzachiv (Teceu) and close to the border with Romania.

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Western view on Ruthenia

For urbane European readers in the 19th century, Ruthenia, whether seen as at the far end of Slovakia, or in the distant corner of Ukraine or as a forgotten piece of Hungary, was one original of the 19th century's imaginary "Ruritania" the most rural, most rustic and deeply provincial tiny province lost in forested mountains that could be imagined. Conceived sometimes as a kingdom of central Europe, Ruritania was the setting of several novels by Anthony Hope, especially The Prisoner of Zenda (1894).

Recently Vesna Goldsworthy, in Inventing Ruritania: the imperialism of the imagination (1998) has explored the origins of the ideas that underpin Western perceptions of the “Wild East” of Europe, especially of Ruthenian and other rural Slavs in the upper Balkans, but ideas that are highly applicable to Carpathian Ruthenia, all in all "an innocent process: a cultural great power seizes and exploits the resources of an area, while imposing new frontiers on its mind-map and creating ideas which, reflected back, have the ability to reshape reality."

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Cities and towns in Carpathian Ruthenia

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Further reading

  • Henri Baerlein, In Czechoslovakia's hinterland, Hutchinson, 1938, ASIN B00085K1BA
  • Stefan A. Fent, Greetings from the Old Country to all of the American Russian people ! (Pozdravlenije iz staroho Kraja vsemu Amerikanskomu Karpatorusskomu Narodu!), 1935, ASIN B0008C9LY6
  • Frantisek Nemec & Vladimir Moudry, The Soviet Seizure of Subcarpathian Ruthenia, Hyperion Press, Toronto, 1955 (Reprint edition: November 1, 1980), ISBN 0830500855
  • Christian Ganzer, Die Karpato-Ukraine 1938/39 - Spielball im internationalen Interessenkonflikt am Vorabend des Zweiten Weltkrieges, Hamburg, 2001 (Die Ostreihe - Neue Folge. Heft 12).
  • Albert S. Kotowski, "'Ukrainisches Piemont'? Die Karpartenukraine am Vorabend des Zweiten Weltkrieges." In: Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas 49 (2001), Heft 1. S. 67-95.
  • Kamil Krofta, Carpathian Ruthenia and the Czechoslovak Republic, 1934, ASIN B0007JY0OG
  • Paul R. Magosci, The Ruthenian decision to unite with Czechoslovakia, Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, 1975, ASIN B0006WVY9I
  • Paul R. Magocsi, The Shaping of a National Identity. Subcarpathian Rus`, 1848-1948, Cambridge, Massachusetts, London, 1978, ISBN 0674805798
  • Vincent Shandor, Carpatho-Ukraine in the Twentieth Century. A Political and Legal History, Cambridge, Mass., Harvard U.P. for the Ukrainian Research Institute, Harvard University, 1997, ISBN 0916458865
  • Peter Stercho, Carpatho-Ukraine in International Affairs 1938-1939, Notre Dame, 1959
  • Michael Winch, Republic for a day: An eye-witness account of the Carpatho-Ukraine incident, University Microfilms, 1973, ASIN B0006W7NUW
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External links

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See also

ca:Rutènia cs:Podkarpatská Rus de:Karpato-Ukraine eo:Karpata Rutenio et:Karpaadi-Vene fr:Ruthénie subcarpatique hu:Kárpátalja no:Karpato-Ruthenia pl:Ruś Zakarpacka sk:Podkarpatská Rus uk:Карпатська Україна

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