The ethnonyms “Ukrainians”, “Little Russians” and “Cherkas” in pre-revolutionary texts of Don Cossack authors

The article is dedicated to the problem of usage of ethnonyms, which are now generally associated with Ukrainian ethnos, by pre-revolutionary Don Cossack authors. It shows that, since the 18th century, sources have been mentioning a significant number of “Little Russians” / “Khokhols” / “Cherkas’” living on the territory of the Don Host, often identified by contemporary historians with modern Ukrainian ethnos. The article argues that in reality the situation turned out to be much more complex. The worldview of prerevolutionary Don authors in those parts related to matters of ethnicity/nationality often differed fundamentally from the one that is common today and might not have implied the division of Eastern Slavs into three ethnic groups (Russians / Great Russians — Ukrainians / Small Russians — Belarusians). The division was more extensive and included a larger number of groups. For example, “Small Russians” and “Ukrainians” turned out to be different historically stable population groups, according to N. I. Krasnov. As a result, instead of the dual scheme of division as Russians / Great Russians vs. Ukrainians / Small Russians, the scheme of division into the major estates was used for East Slavs. Their number could vary, but the Cossacks, the indigenous peasants, and the Kalmyks were always differentiated. At the same time, historical terms, generally associated with Ukrainian ethnos nowadays, were used to indicate indigenous peasants. Thus, a local peasant of Russian descent was identified as a “Little Russian”, while a Cossack of Ukrainian descent was still a “Cossack”. This example shows that a yet unexplored worldview might explain the historical use of ethnonyms, and it is incorrect to associate peoples who were labelled with such ethnonyms with modern ethnicities. First and foremost, these authors’ worldview must be reconstructed, without the understanding of which the use of ethnonyms themselves will remain unclear.