Hetman is a political title fromCentral and Eastern Europe, historically assigned to military commanders (comparable to afield marshal or imperial marshal in theHoly Roman Empire). First used by theCzechs inBohemia in the 15th century, it was the title of the second-highest military commander after the king in theCrown of the Kingdom of Poland and theGrand Duchy of Lithuania from the 16th to 18th centuries. Hetman was also the title of the head of theCossack state inUkraine after theKhmelnytsky Uprising of 1648.[1] Throughout much of the history ofRomania andMoldavia, hetmans were the second-highest army rank. In the modernCzech Republic, the title is used for regionalgovernors.
The termhetman was aPolish borrowing, most likely stemming via Czech from theTurkic titleataman (literally 'father of horsemen'),[2][3][unreliable source?] however it could also come from the GermanHauptmann –lit. captain.[4] Since hetman as a title first appeared in Czechia in the 15th century, assuming it stems from a Turkic language, it is possible it was introduced to Czechs by theCumans.[citation needed]
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The Polish titleGrand Crown Hetman (Polish:hetman wielki koronny) dates from 1505. The title ofHetman was given to the leader of thePolish Army. Until 1581 the hetman position existed only during specific campaigns and wars. After that, it became a permanent title, as were all the titles in theCrown of the Kingdom of Poland and thePolish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. At any given time the Commonwealth had four hetmans – aGreat Hetman andField (deputy)Hetman each for both Poland and Lithuania.
From 1585, the title could not be taken away without a proven charge of treachery, so most hetmans served for life.Jan Karol Chodkiewicz literally commanded the army from his deathbed (1621).[5] Hetmans were not paid by the royal treasury. Hetmans were the main commanders of the military forces, second only to the monarch in the army'schain of command. The fact that they could not be removed by the monarch made them very independent, and thus often able to pursue independent policies.
This system worked well when a hetman had great ability and the monarch was weak, but sometimes produced disastrous results in the opposite case. The security of the position notably contrasted with that of military leaders in states bordering the commonwealth, where sovereigns could dismiss their army commanders at any time. In 1648 theZaporizhian Host (then a Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth subject) elected a hetman of its own,Bohdan Khmelnytsky,[6] igniting theUkrainian struggle for independence.
The military reform of 1776 curtailed the powers of the hetmans. The Hetman office was abolished after theThird Partition of Poland (1795).
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At the end of the sixteenth century, the commanders of theZaporizhianCossacks were titledKoshovyi Otaman orHetman;Christof Kosynsky was the firstZaporizhian hetman. In 1572, a hetman was a commander of theRegistered Cossack Army (Ukrainian:Реєстрове козацьке військо) of theCommonwealth. From 1648, the start ofBohdan Khmelnytsky'suprising, a hetman was the head of the wholeUkrainian State —Hetmanshchyna and heads of theCossack Hetmanate. As supreme military commanders and lawmakers (by administrative decree), they had very broad powers, although they were elected.
After the split ofUkraine along theDnieper River by the 1667Polish–RussianTreaty of Andrusovo, Ukrainian Cossacks (and Cossack hetmans) became known as Left-bank Cossacks (of theCossack Hetmanate) and Right-bank Cossacks.
In theRussian Empire, the office of Cossack Hetman was abolished byCatherine II of Russia in 1764. The last Hetman of the Zaporozhian Army (the formal title of the hetman of Ukraine) wasKyrylo Rozumovsky, who reigned from 1751 until 1764.[7]
The title was revived in Ukraine during the revolution of 1917 to 1921. In early 1918, a conservative German-supportedcoup overthrew the radical socialist UkrainianCentral Rada and itsUkrainian People's Republic, establishing a hetmanate monarchy headed byPavlo Skoropadskyi, who claimed the titleHetman of Ukraine. This regime lasted until late 1918, when it was overthrown by a newDirectorate of Ukraine, of a re-established Ukrainian People's Republic.
Used by theCzechs inBohemia from theHussite Wars (15th century) onward,hejtman is today the term for the elected governor of aCzech region (kraj).[8]
For much of the history ofRomania and thePrincipality of Moldavia, hetmans were second in rank in the army, after the ruling prince, who held the position ofvoivode.
Hetman has often been used figuratively to mean 'commander' or simply 'leader'. Examples:
Queen (chess piece) is calledhetman in Polish and coded asH in thealgebraic notation.
They say there was a whole band of them, and that this bearded man was their elder, the hetman.
Media related toHetmans at Wikimedia Commons
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