Not ukrainian-british relations текст be confused with Kazakhs. Not to be confused with Cassock.
The origins of the first Cossacks are disputed, though the 1710 Constitution of Pylyp Orlyk claimed Khazar origin. The Don Cossack Host, which had been established by the 16th century, allied with the Tsardom of Russia. By the 18th century Cossack hosts in the Russian Empire occupied effective buffer zones on its borders. The expansionist ambitions of the Empire relied on ensuring the loyalty of Cossacks, which caused tension given their traditional exercise of freedom, democracy, self-rule, and independence. Similar to the knights of medieval Europe in feudal times or the tribal Roman auxiliaries, the Cossacks came to military service having to obtain charger horses, arms and supplies at their own expense. During the Russian Civil War, Don and Kuban Cossacks were the first people to declare open war against the Bolsheviks. Cossack Mamay–the ideal image of Cossack in Ukrainian folklore.
In written sources the name is first attested in Codex Cumanicus from the 13th century. In English, “Cossack” is first attested in 1590. Early “Proto-Cossack” groups are generally reported to have come into existence within the present-day Ukraine in the mid-13th century as the influence of Cumans grew weaker, though some have ascribed their origins to as early as the tenth century. In the midst of the growing Moscow and Lithuanian powers, new political entities had appeared in the region, such as Moldavia and the Crimean Khanate. In 1261 some Slavic people living in the area between the Dniester and the Volga were mentioned in Ruthenian chronicles.
As early as the 15th century a few individuals ventured into the “Wild Fields”, the southern frontier regions of Ukraine separating Poland-Lithuania from the Crimean Khanate, which was a naturally rich and fertile region teeming with cattle, wild animals and fish. Ottoman Turks in battle against the Cossacks, 1592. The Cossacks of Zaporizhia, centered on the lower bends of Dnieper, inside the territory of modern Ukraine, with the fortified capital of Zaporozhian Sich. They were formally recognised as an independent state, the Zaporozhian Host, by a treaty with Poland in 1649. The Don Cossack State, on the River Don. The capital of the Don Cossack State was initially Razdory, then it was moved to Cherkassk, and later to Novocherkassk.
Cossacks, of whom Sary Azman was the first Don ataman and which not only were assimilated by Don Cossacks but had their own irregular Bashkir and Meschera Host up to the end of the 19th century. The Gypsy Cossacks are the least known ones now. They became a well-known group whose numbers increased greatly between the 15th and 17th centuries. The Zaporozhian Cossacks played an important role in European geopolitics, participating in a series of conflicts and alliances with the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Russia, and the Ottoman Empire. The Zaporozhian Sich had its own authorities, its own “Nizovy” Zaporozhsky Host, and its own land. In the latter half of the 18th century, Russian authorities destroyed this Zaporozhian Host and gave its lands to landlords. Some Cossacks moved to the Danube delta region, where they formed the Danubian Sich under Ottoman rule.
