Historical surveys and descriptive works

The vast majority of writings on the period between 1772 and 1848 consists of secondary literature dealing with three topics: the establishment of the Austrian administration, socioeconomic developments, and most especially cultural history.

There are only a few general histories that cover the period as a whole. One of the earliest was written in 1846 by lakiv Holovats’kyi, whose work provides the perspective not only of a contemporary but of a participant in the historical process as well.^[298] The period is treated at greater length in the first volume of Pylyp Svystun’s history of Ukrainians under Austrian rule. Svystun, who was a Galician Russophile, is generally critical of the Austrian government which, because of its fear of the Russian Empire he argues, cooperated with Galician-Polish magnates and the Greek Catholic hierarchy to restrict contacts between Galician “Russians” and their brethren in the east.^[299] The Ukrainian viewpoint, which is much more favorably disposed toward the efforts of Austria during its initial years of rule in Galicia, is presented by Tyt Voinarovs’kyi as part of a larger work on Ukrainians under Polish rule before 1851.^[300]The Polish view of Galicia’s history, which focuses primarily on the western Polish-inhabited areas, is presented by Kazimierz Bartoszewicz.^[301] Useful for factual data is the last volume of Antin Petrushevych’s chronicle of Galician history, covering the years 1772 to 1800.^[302]

Several important descriptions of Galicia as a whole during the years 1772 to 1848 are available. Among the first of these is a statistical analysis of the province at the outset of the nineteenth century by Michal Wiesiotowski.^[303] This has been followed by a solid monograph by A. Brawer on Galician society as it was when the Austrians first acquired it, and by detailed accounts by Walerian Kalinka and Stanislaw Grodziski on the historical, social, religious, political, legal, economic, and military aspects of the province throughout the first seventy-five years of Austrian rule.^[304] These same years are also described in contemporary accounts by native and foreign visitors; the more important of these are by the first Austrian governor of Galicia, Count Anton Pergen, the director of police in L’viv, Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, the Moravian leader, Karel Zap, and the local Galician leader, lakiv Holovats’kyi.^[305] The impressions of several other writers have been preserved in anthologies compiled by Stanislaw Schniir-Peplowski and Marian Tyrowicz.⁹

<< | >>

↑

Source: Magocsi P.R.. The roots of Ukrainian nationalism. Galicia as Ukraine's Piedmont. University of Toronto Press,2002. — 214 p.. 2002

Historical surveys and descriptive works

More on the topic Historical surveys and descriptive works: