Historical geography – wild fields. Few people remember today that in the former Polish -Lithuanian Commonwealth, a young nobleman who wanted to be considered a real citizen of Kresy, he should have been “going to the lap to the wild fields” at least once in his life, i.e. take part in the expedition against the Tatars or in the armed escapade towards the steppes of the lower Dnieper. It was almost a ritual of the passage – not only a military, but also social expedition, with the entire ceremony: armor shimmering in the sun, injuries with Słuck belts, winged pennies and banners. Such trips served not only the defense of the border, but also to know this extraordinary land, whose extent and severity for centuries shaped the course of the history of Eastern Europe. Wild fields stretched from the lower Dnieper to the south, through the lands behind the Porohami, to the steppes on the Black Sea and further east towards the Don. In the West, they reached up to the lower Dniester, and in the north they were in contact with fertile, but more densely populated areas of the Kiev, Bracław and Podolian voivodships. This whole enormity created a natural border belt between the agricultural and nomadic world, between the cities and farms of the Commonwealth and the Crimean Channy, the Ottoman Empire and the growing power of Moscow from the 17th century. It was a land without major forests, with the dominance of black and steppe grasses, cut by rivers’ valleys, in which the water spilled wide in spring, and in the summer it turned into green belts among dried soil. The history of wild fields is the history of constant movement – peoples, troops, herds and caravans. Already in ancient times they were traveled by the Scythians, later Sarmatians, and in the Middle Ages Pieczyngowie, Half -and -Turkish tribes. After the fall of Kiev Ruthenia and the Mongol invasions, the region became part of the Golden Orda and then the domain of Crimean Chanate. It was an area where constant power rarely reached further than to the main river lines, and the law gave way to strength and war skills. In the 15th and 16th centuries, Rzeczpospolita tried to consolidate its presence by giving land and settlement. #Geography #dzikiepola #historiapolski #sters #tatyrzymryscy #sts #Historiaeuropy #rzeczpospolita #chanatkrysky #morekarne #step #step #wyprawykozackie #granice
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