False Friends: The Pereiaslav Agreement of 1654 and Competing Narratives in Russian and Ukrainian Historiographies

Authors

Jiansheng Zhang, Princeton UniversityFollow

Abstract

The Pereiaslav Agreement of 1654, concluded between the Cossack Hetmanate and the Grand Duchy of Muscovy at the Pereiaslav Rada, marked the beginning of modern Cossack-Muscovite (in perspective, Ukrainian-Russian) relations. Owing to its central role in shaping both Russian and Ukrainian national narratives, the agreement remains a highly contentious event in Eastern European history. Historians from the Russian and Ukrainian historiographical traditions offer divergent interpretations of how the agreement was conceived and received by the Cossacks and Muscovites. Drawing on a wide range of primary and secondary sources, this essay critically examines these competing narratives and concludes that Ukrainian historiography—emphasizing the divisions between the two parties—offers a more accurate reconstruction of the Pereiaslav Agreement.

First Page

1

Last Page

37

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Recommended Citation

Zhang, Jiansheng (2025) "False Friends: The Pereiaslav Agreement of 1654 and Competing Narratives in Russian and Ukrainian Historiographies," Armstrong Undergraduate Journal of History: Vol. 15: Iss. 2, Article 1.
DOI: 10.20429/aujh.2025.150201
Available at: https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/aujh/vol15/iss2/1