MODERNIZATION OF THE CONTENT OF HISTORICAL EDUCATION: STEREOTYPES OF NATIONAL HISTORY – «KHORTYTSIA SICH»

Abstract

The proposed article highlights the genesis of the Zaporozhian Sich, on the clarification of which the approach to the coverage of the history of the Zaporozhian Cossacks largely depends. The purpose of the article is to refute the stereotype of national history about the «town» of Prince Dmytro Vyshnevetskyi as the first Zaporozhian Sich and to reflect the relevant terminology in school textbooks and manuals in order to modernize historical education. The research methodology is based on the principles of historicism, scientific objectivity, and a dialectical approach to the analysis of historical phenomena. It is emphasized that the emergence of the Cossack center on the southern border was due to the growth of its numbers and the need to protect Ukrainian lands from Tatar expansion. No direct evidence of the functioning of the Sich in the 50s of the 16th century has been found in written sources, only the presence of a «town» or «castle» in Zaporizhzhia is recorded. Hence, the idea of identifying Dmytro Vyshnevetskyi's «town» with the so-called Khortytska Sich seems doubtful. At the same time, the representative of an aristocratic family made great efforts to defend Ukrainian lands, thus contributing to the consolidation of the Cossack population. This is the outstanding role of Prince Knight Dmytro Vyshnevetskyi in national history. And the castle he built on the Kichka Cape of the Dnipro River, also recorded in the sources on the island of Mala Khortytsia, became a kind of prototype of the fortification of the Zaporozhian community, which, having established itself on the island of Tomakivka in the 80s of the sixteenth century, was called the Zaporozhian Sich. Thus, the study refutes the stereotypes of national history in order to modernize historical education.