The West Ukrainian Babylon, or how did different nationalities cohabitate in Lviv

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Lviv historian Petro Radkovets narrates how Lviv was divided by several ethnic communities throughout its history, why it was called a «German city» during the Austro-Hungarian times, and how the traders from other continents maintained the city’s constant international appearance.
Photo: tirastour.com.ua

Photo: tirastour.com.ua

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I don’t know if anyone has ever compared Lviv to Babylon, but this comparison seems most appropriate. And this is not because there are tall towers in Lviv, or due to its location at the crossroads of ancient trade routes, but because «all kinds of people are mixed here»...

The engraving was made by Abraham Hogenberg, based on a drawing of the Lviv panorama from the end of the 16th to the beginning of the 17th century. Works of Aurelio Passarotti, the engineer of King Sigismund III Vasa’s fortification (1587-1632).

Lviv owes its multinational character to its special place on the borders of two great world cultures – Greek-Byzantine in the East and Latin in the West. Ask a Lviv resident: «Which city is the most beautiful in the world?» – and you will have an unambiguous answer: «Lviv». A Ukrainian, a Pole, a German, a Jew, and an Armenian will give you such an answer.

According to archaeological data, people appeared on the territory of modern Lviv twenty thousand years ago. In pre-Christian times, the local population worshipped ancient Slavic gods, who were depicted in the form of stone or wooden pillars. They were called «did» (grandfather) and «baba» (grandmother). When disputes arose between them, according to the beliefs, lightning would shoot from the sky. This is exactly what the 13th-century chronicler accused the «baba» of when describing the fire in the city of Kholm [modern city of Chelm in Poland] – the first written mention of Lviv:

Layout of the 13th century Lviv

«...And when [Galician princes] Danylo and Vasylko were preparing for battle with the Tatars, something like punishment for sins happened. The fire started at Kholm because of the wretched baba..., and the flames were such that the glow was visible from all over the land, also from Lviv, it was visible on Belz fields because the flames of the fire were strong...»

According to academician Isayevych, the territory of the modern city was continuously inhabited for fifteen centuries (approximately from the 5th century AD).

In the 13th century, Lviv itself was located on the western slope of Zamkova Hora (Castle Hill) and reached the banks of the Poltva River. During princely times, Ukrainians (then called Ruthenians) made up the majority of the population. This is evidenced by a large number of churches in various places of the city. Below the princely court was the church of St. Nicholas and the monastery of St. Onuphrius, a little lower – the church of St. Theodore. And further, along the modern street of B. Khmelnytskoho, the churches of St. Paraskeva, Church of Resurrection, and Church of the Savior.

The Church of St. Paraskeva. Photo 1861-1871

On both sides of the outdoor church of St. Nicholas, «prince dignitaries» and nobles built their houses, a little further – smaller craftsmen and merchants. It was these people who constituted the Ruthenian core of the princely city. The trading centre of Lviv at that time was a merchant’s shop, the site of which is indicated by the modern Staryi Rynok square. Merchants from all over came here. Furs, skins, and wax were brought from Volyn and Transnistria; from the south, through Halych, there arrived goods from Greece and Asia: silk, oriental roots, wine; from the north and western countries – cloth, woollen fabrics, canvas, metal products. Merchants from all over the world pitched their tents here – Greeks, Italians, Armenians, Tatars, and Germans, but the Ruthenian merchants had the first place among them.

Not far from Staryi Rynok Square, there was already another precinct, where other people surrounded the Church of St. John the Baptist. According to legend, this temple was built in 1250 for the wife of Prince Lev, Constantia, the daughter of the Hungarian king Béla IV. Today, there is nothing left of the building of that time, except for the location. The founders of the church were Dominican monks. They were the first to come to Kyivan Rus’ with the preaching of Catholicism. In addition to the servants of the princess, the Germans who came for trade and crafts gathered at the church of St. John. These were people who brought ancient things from Germany, Hungary and the more distant West. By this time, the Germans already had some self-government. In particular, they were not tried by princely officials, only by their own mayor, according to «German law».

Constantia of Hungary, the daughter of the Hungarian king Bela IV, the wife of Prince Lev, in honour of whom Lviv was named

In another part of ancient Lviv, where Pidzamche railway station now is, a completely different world opened up. People with black hair and dark faces, dressed in oriental clothes and speaking oriental languages ​​met here. They had a lot of goods from Asia, in particular the expensive spices and fabrics. They were natives of distant Armenia. Under the onslaught of the Greeks, and later the Turks, they had to retreat, leave their ancestral lands to find refuge in distant Rus’. According to their religion, these people were Christians, their rites are very close to those of the Rus’. A significant number of Armenians lived in Lviv, and probably back in the days of the city’s founding, there were three churches here – St. Anna, St. Jacob, and St. Christ temples, of which only the last one, located at the modern Zamarstynivska Street, has survived to this day. According to the legend, it was built on the site of a tree, the fruit of which in section resembled a cross. Armenians had their elders as well as the right they inherited from the Armenian kings and brought with them from a distant homeland.

Armenian Church of the Holy Christ on St. Zamarstynivska

Tatars, who came from the east and were good craftsmen, knew blacksmithing and goldsmithing, and traded with small goods. Among the merchants in Lviv were the Caraims who came from Crimea.

The Jewish district in the princely city was located on both banks of the Poltva River, which flowed along the modern Chornovola avenue. The Jewish quarters encompassed modern B. Khmelnytskoho Street, the area from Knyaz Yaroslav Osmomysl Square to the Old Market Square.

Prince Yaroslav Osmomysl Square, end of the 19th century.

As already mentioned, there was a German colony in princely Lviv, which even during the time of prince Lviv had its leader – Bertold Stecher. The parish church of the German community was the Church of Mary the Snow, so they settled mainly in the vicinity of the modern Zvenyhorodskyi Square. And when the Polish king Kazimir III finally conquered Lviv in 1349, he granted the German burghers new privileges. First of all, he allowed the foundation of a new fortified city, south of the Vysokyi Zamok hill, across the bank of the Poltva river.

Church of Mary the Snow. The church was built by German Catholic colonists and was originally wooden. In 1350, it was built of stone.

In the book «Chronicle of the City of Lviv», B. Zymorovych calls Lviv of that time a German city. The basis for this was the year 1356, when the city was granted the so-called «German» or better known «Magdeburg law», on the basis of which the first Lviv magistrate began to act.

In the 14th century, the city, quadrangular in plan, was small: it was limited to modern Svobody Avenue and Pidvalna Street, Danylo Halytskyi Square and Valova Street. Like princely Lviv, the medieval city was divided into precincts based on national characteristics.

Armenian Cathedral on an old engraving

Most of the Rynok Square and the western part of the city were occupied by Roman Catholics, the Armenians had their precinct in the north, the Ruthenians occupied the precinct in the east near Ruska Street, and the Jews had their quarter next to the Ruthenians. The town was ruled by a council consisting of the richest burghers, the «patricians» consisted only of Catholics – Germans and Poles. For many years, the Stavropol Brotherhood fought for the right to elect Ukrainians to the council. And only in 1745, the first Ukrainian, Yurii Kotsiy, entered the city council.

This is how the people of Lviv dressed in different times

For a medieval burgher, there were two most important buildings in Lviv: the town hall and the church. The special pride of every citizen was the temple, where the most important state decrees were announced. Military trophies and the most important documents were kept there. The beauty of the temple was a kind of manifestation of patriotism, so they never spared money on it and built their homes next to it.

Photo of the Dormition Church of the end of the 19th – beginning of the 20th century

The Church of the Assumption was the spiritual, educational and cultural centre of the Ruthenians of medieval Lviv. It is worth noting that this building is the work of different peoples. It was built for the Ruthenians by Italian builders, and money was given by Moldovan landlords and Greek merchants. The Kornyakta tower rises near the Church of the Assumption. Its bells were distinguished by a good voice, and the nearest neighbours – Dominicans, complained that they prevented them from performing divine services. The largest bell is called «Kyrylo» (two meters in diameter and the same height). It was cast in place of the first «Kyrylo», which melted, according to one of the versions, as a result of a fire during the capture of Lviv by the Swedish troops of King Charles XII in 1704. From the 16th century until 1939, a brotherhood operated at the Assumption Church, which in 1586 received stavropygia – independence from the local church authorities.

Latin Cathedral. A view of the beginning of the 20th century

The main Catholic church was the cathedral. It was built for more than 140 years, but it was never completed: according to the plan of the architects, two towers were supposed to be built, but only one was built, and the second was constructed to the roof. Turkish kernels hang on the walls of the cathedral as a memory of the enemy siege. These are the same kernels that were fired at Lviv, which, after getting inside the temple, did not harm it. The people of Lviv took it as a miracle, a sign from God. In 1629, Bishop Meletii Smotrytskyi performed divine service in the cathedral for the first time. In 1772, the front entrance to the church was bricked up. And this way, the Catholic, particularly the Polish, community protested against the occupation of Galicia by Austria.

Italian courtyard, Rynok (Market) Square, 6

The territory of the modern Rynok Square was first settled by the Germans. They did it with their characteristic precision and planning. The very name «rynok» comes from the German word «ring» – a circle, a closed space. In the middle of the square stood the town hall, the basements of which were a prison for drunkards, vagabonds and other vagrants. Even before the 20th century, there was a bazaar around where you could meet a Persian and an Englishman, a Turk and a Dutchman, a Romanian and a Frenchman. In general, I had the impression that behind the city gate, you can see the masts of sea merchant ships.

Near the town hall stood the «Pillar of Shame» (Pranger), which symbolized justice and punishment. Iron rings were attached to the lower part of the pillar. Petty thieves, drunkards, and hooligans were chained to them for several days, «putting them to shame,» and executed death sentences, but only nobles were executed here.

However, the «Pillar of Shame» was not the only place of punishment. In 1594, a long chain with hoop was attached to a townhouse on the Market square.

«Battle of Grunwald in 1410.» Z. Rozvadovskyi

Many glorious events took place on the streets and squares of Lviv. For example, in 1410, 52 banners of the troops of the Teutonic Order were brought to Lviv, after being captured under Grunwald by the united units of all Slavic peoples. They were thrown into the swamp on the Market Square – according to the ancient custom of the winners. The largest painting in Ukraine (500x1000 cm) «Battle of Grunwald 1410» by Z. Rozvadovskyi is stored in the Lviv Historical Museum. This battle was the only historical fact when all Slavic peoples united in the fight against a common enemy.

As already mentioned, Armenians settled in Lviv since the time of Danylo Halytskyi. The centre of the Armenian precinct was and remains the Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary on Virmenska Street. Passing by, it is difficult not to pay attention to the courtyard of the church lined with tombstones, because according to Armenian belief, the soul of the deceased will go to heaven as soon as the inscription on the tombstone is erased.

One of the tombstones paving the southern courtyard near the Armenian Cathedral of the Assumption of the Virgin

Turning from Virmenska Street, you could get to the glorified Lviv swordsmen. Since 1382, this street was called Tatarska or Pohanska, later its name was Saratsynska. But all these names came from one thing: Tatars once lived here. The road to Kraków started from here, which is why this street later got the name Krakivska. According to legend, a mosque stood at its intersection with Lesya Ukrainka Street.

The history of Lviv knows a case when a Muslim rang the bell. It happened like this: during one of the numerous sieges of the city, a Lviv burgher captured a Tatar, tied him to the tongue of a church bell, and the Muslim, swinging on a rope, announced the victory over the enemy.

The Great Suburban Synagogue on Syanska Street. Photo from 1921

Jews in medieval Lviv had the right to live only within the boundaries of the ghetto (yes, I was not mistaken – the ghetto itself). Even in medieval Venice, the Jewish quarter had this name, and from there the word travelled around the world. The glorified «Golden Rose» synagogue, built in 1582, stood on this site. A touching legend says that the beautiful Roza Nakhmanovych bought the synagogue with the price of her honour, after which she committed suicide. Lviv Jews were known far beyond their hometown. This is confirmed by the site of building No.19 on Ivana Fedorova Street. Until the beginning of the 20th century, the tenement house of Simhe Menachem, who was the personal physician of the Turkish Sultan and later King John III, stood on this place.

Most of the architectural face of Lviv was created by Italian builders, whose craft was highly valued not only in Europe, but also throughout the world. But Italians in Lviv were known not only for their manual labour. In the 16th century, Antonio Massari lived on Rynok Square, 14. Having arrived in our city, he accepted city citizenship, married a rich local girl, engaged in trade and also performed the functions of the consul of the Republic of Venice. Two more Italians became an integral part of the history of Lviv – Roberto Bendinelli and Monteluppi. The latter organized the first post office in our city at the beginning of the 17th century, and Bendinelli improved it in 1629. Special couriers carried letters to Warsaw, Krakow, Lublin and Gdańsk. The author of the oldest known image of Lviv was also an Italian – fortification engineer A. Pasarotti.

Lion of St. Mark, symbol of Venice on the building of Antonio Massari, Rynok Square, 14

After the first partition of Poland (1772), Lviv came to the Austrian Empire. The city became «the centre of a large province.» By order of Emperor Joseph II, 27 churches and monasteries, seven Ukrainian and three Armenian churches in Lviv were closed, turning them into institutions, citadels and prisons. However, during the 146 years of Austrian rule, many national cultural and educational societies emerged in Lviv, including the Scientific Society named after Taras Shevchenko, scientific institution «Ossolineum», Lviv Historical Museum and others. Newspapers appeared in national languages, covering the life of individual Lviv communities. For the first time in 1796, Antin Anhelovych, a Ukrainian church educator, was elected rector of the Lviv University. Until 1900, 14 more Ukrainians were rectors of the university. In general, the national question in Lviv in the 19th and 20th centuries deserves a more detailed explanation, which should be embodied in the works of researchers.

In addition to the peoples I mentioned, many others settled in Lviv, and everyone brought here a part of their homeland. Falling into the fertile Lviv soil, they gave sprouts and blossomed, so it is not said senselessly that in Lviv, you can find similarities to any city in the world. It is as if, having left ancient Babylon, its inhabitants found an «arbour in the middle of paradise» on the fertile land of Lviv and have been finding a common language here for more than seven centuries.

Translated by Vitalii Holich

The author’s column is a reflection of the author’s subjective position. The editors of «Tvoe Misto» do not always share the opinions expressed in the columns, and are ready to give those who disagree the opportunity for a reasoned answer.

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