5
Western Borderlands in
the Eighteenth Century
The eighteenth century witnessed breath-taking expansion westward and south to
the Black Sea, fulfilling long-standing imperial goals. Peter I accomplished major
expansion on the Baltic, while Catherine II presided over major gains from the
Ottoman empire and Commonwealth of Poland-Lithuania. Although Catherine II,
guided by cameralism and Enlightenment, attempted to impose some administra-
tive standardization, this was not a century of homogeneity. Brought into the
Russian empire, these lands were allowed to maintain their well-articulated political
systems and social elites. Side by side with Russian central administration, law,
taxation, social services, and governance continued in Livonia, the Hetmanate,
Jewish communities, Magdeburg Law towns, the Duchy of Courland and lands of
Right Bank Ukraine in a greatly different manner than in the center. Westward
expansion more than any other demonstrates Russia’s politics of difference.
TOWARDS THE BLACK SEA
By the middle of the eighteenth century the Russian empire was in a strong position
to lay claim to the Black Sea steppe (Map 5). Successful against the Ottoman
empire and the Crimean khanate in thefirst of three Turkish wars in this century
(1735–9), Russia pursued a steady process of integrating these borderlands into the
empire, undermining their autonomies and settling the lands with new colonists,
for military and economic benefit.
The Zaporozhian Cossacks were among thefirst big losers. In 1709 they threw
their lot in with Hetman Ivan Mazepa against Peter I and suffered in his defeat.
Moscow destroyed their fortress and Zaporozhian Cossacks moved to Ottoman
protection on the lower Dnieper. On the eve of the Russo-Turkish war of 1735–9,
however, the Zaporozhians negotiated a return to their former territories and a
semi-autonomous status under Russian control from Kyiv (1734). Russia built a
third line (1731–40) to protect the new Zaporozhian Sich territory, reaching 285
km with twenty fortresses from Orel to the Northern Donets. Colonization—
peasants and Cossacks from Left and Right Bank Ukraine and Russianodnodvortsy
from the east—flourished behind the line. By 1762 the vast lands claimed by the
Zaporozhian Cossacks, stretching from the Southern Bug to Sloboda Ukraine, were
settled by 33,700 Cossacks and over 150,000 peasants. Here as in the lands of the