Gadiach, Treaty of 1658

Gadiach, Treaty of (1658) 

or Gadiach Union, concluded between the traitorous Ukrainian hetman I. Vygovskii and the Polish government on September 6 (16) in the city of Gadiach. The Treaty of Gadiach provided for the transfer of the Ukraine to Poland and for the restoration of the rule of the Polish feudal lords. The starshina (officers in the Ukrainian cossack army) received szlachta (Polish nobility) privileges, and the size of the registered cossack host was set at 60,000. (In a secret declaration Vygovskii pledged to reduce it to 30,000.) The Orthodox clergy was guaranteed freedom of worship, and representatives of the higher Orthodox clergy were given seats in the Polish senate. The senate seats from the Kiev voevodstvo (territory under a military governor) were reserved exclusively for the Orthodox szlachta, and senate seats from the Bratslav and Chernigov voevodstvos were reserved for members of the Orthodox szlachta and Catholics in turn. The Treaty of Gadiach corresponded to the interests of that section of the Ukrainian starshina which aspired to the privileges of the Polish szlachta, but signified the enslavement of the Ukrainian people by szlachta Poland. The Polish Sejm hastened to confirm the Treaty of Gadiach, but the treaty never really went into effect because a popular uprising led to Vygovskii’s deposition in 1659.

V. A. GOLOBUTSKII