Ukraine on My Mind

This story is an essential part of Ukraine’s sense of who they are.

In the year 1676 Sultan in Turkey, who was a Muslim, wrote this elegant letter to the Cossacks:

As the sultan; son of Muhammad; brother of the sun and moon; grandson and viceroy of God; ruler of the kingdoms of Macedonia, Babylon, Jerusalem, Upper and Lower Egypt; emperor of emperors; sovereign of sovereigns; extraordinary knight, never defeated; steadfast guardian of the tomb of Jesus Christ; trustee chosen by God Himself; the hope and comfort of Muslims; confounder and great defender of Christians – I command you, the Zaporogian Cossacks, to submit to me voluntarily and without any resistance, and to desist from troubling me with your attacks.

The Cossacks, who were Christians, sent a rude response:

O sultan, Turkish devil and damned devil’s kith and kin, secretary to Lucifer himself. What the devil kind of knight are thou, that canst not slay a hedgehog with your naked arse? The devil shits, and your army eats. Thou shalt not, thou son of a whore, make subjects of Christian sons. We have no fear of your army; by land and by sea we will battle with thee. Fuck thy mother. Thou Babylonian scullion, Macedonian wheelwright, brewer of Jerusalem, goat-fucker of Alexandria, swineherd of Greater and Lesser Egypt, pig of Armenia, Podolian thief, catamite of Tartary, hangman of Kamyanets, and fool of all the world and underworld, an idiot before God, grandson of the Serpent, and the crick in our dick. Pig’s snout, mare’s arse, slaughterhouse cur, unchristened brow. Screw thine own mother! So the Zaporozhians declare, you lowlife. You won’t even be herding pigs for the Christians. Now we’ll conclude, for we don’t know the date and don’t own a calendar; the moon’s in the sky, the year with the Lord. The day’s the same over here as it is over there; for this kiss our arse!

The Cossacks’ letter was “found” by an ethnographer-hobbyist from Dnipro in the 1870s. It may be a forgery, it’s a good story, and it’s true that the Cossacks did not surrender.

200 years later Ilya Rapin, made a huge a painting 6 ft 8 in by 11 ft 9 in painting called ”Reply of the Zaporozhian Cossacks to Sultan Mehmed IV of the Ottoman Empire.“  He started it in 1880 and finished it 11 years later. The Czar bought it and it now hangs in a museum in St. Petersburg.

But Rapin wasn’t satisfied with it. He felt it didn’t show the rudeness and defiance of the Cossacks vividly enough, so he made another painting.

It is shown in the opening credits of the Ukrainian TV series “Servant of the People”  where the everyman-who-accidently-becomes-president character, played by Volodymyr Zelenskyy, walks by it on his way to work. It actually is not in Kyiv but hangs in Museum of Fine Arts in Kharkiv, which is 19 miles from the Russian border. In any case, the Ukrainians are very familiar with it.

100 years later, in 1991, after the Soviet Union collapsed, Ukraine declared its independence.

In 2014 Putin invaded Crimea and Donbas and they have been at war ever since.

In 2017 a group of Ukrainians posted a photo on social media a re-construction of Rapin’s first painting and entitled ”Reply of the Zaporozhian Cossacks to Sultan Mehmed IV of the Ottoman Empire” (otherwise known as: “Cossacks of Saporog Are Drafting a Manifesto”). The original is on top obviously:

Putin posted an essay “On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians” on July 20, 2021 claiming that Ukraine doesn’t exist and its destiny is to be part of Russia. In response, members of the Ukrainian parliament, some wearing Ukrainian clothing, posted this photo of themselves:

After Putin’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, some Ukrainian soldiers posed, photographed themselves, and posted it.

You can see all these pictures in this article:

https://www.dailyartmagazine.com/zaporozhian-cossacks-reply/

Slava Ukraini! Heroyam slava!

Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the heroes!