“Exceptional Success” Or the Source of Future Upheaval? Once Again to the Balance of Achievements and Losses of the Ukrainian Nobility at the Lublin Sejm of 1569

Abstract

The aim is to analyze the key elements of the concept of its “exceptional success” in Lublin 1569.

The research is based on the principle of historicism and employs methods of contex tual analysis, comparative studies, and systematization.

Main results. It has been established that Ukrainian nobility, like other elites at that time, were fully aware of the signifi cance of political subjectivity and had every reason to promote the idea of Ruthenia as the third member of the Po lish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. It has been proven that they recognized the harm of the idea of Ruthenia as a natural part of the Crown and deliberately disrupted this point in Kyivan privilege. However, the strategies employed in Lublin were limited to securing their prerogatives and guaran tees of estate inviolability. Th e price paid by the Ukrainian elite for their participation in the functioning of the Commonwealth included direct territorial losses in Lublin, the relentless erosion of the distinctiveness enshrined in the Kyiv and Volynian privileges, and the looming threat of losing the full structural integrity of the Ukrainian world. Th e study refutes the notions of “establishing a unique state connection between the Crown and the annexed lands” and the idea of the Commonwealth as “their own state” for Ukrai nians. It has been demonstrated that the “inviolable” Kyivan privilege was directly violated at the Lublin Sejm. Practical signifi cance. Th e practices of the Ukrainian elite in Lublin signifi cantly shaped the scholarly understanding of Ukraine’s presence within the Commonwealth until 1648 and fundamentally infl uenced the entire Ukrainian historical narrative.