Frontline town centres within the area of the Hirskyi Tikych river

Abstract

The study presents the history of the emergence, development and decline of the frontline towns concentrated in the area of the Hirskyi Tikych River. The research focuses on Buzivka, Buky, Vorone, Zelenyi Rih, Zubrykha, Okhmativ, Sokolivka and Monastyryshche. Natural factors and the branching of the Black Way determined the concentration of settlements in the river area. The study of the frontline towns is relevant due to the peculiarities of urban processes in Central Ukraine and is important for the development of historical and architectural reference plans. The research aims to determine the spatial features of the city centre in the cities of the right-bank Ukraine frontier in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In the course of the study, the methods of analysis (for literary sources), comparative analysis (for the cartography of different times), and a set of field studies were used. The studied towns had an optimal defensive perimeter dominated by a Ukrainian wooden church, and a key element of the spatial image was a residential wooden house. It is determined that the cities of the frontier had political and cultural conflicts with the centre of the state, which caused the loss of the role of settlements and the division of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the late seventeenth century. Based on historical cartography, source material, and the preserved ancient street network, the urban planning features of the town centres are localised and identified. The frontier towns concentrated in the area of the Gorny Tikich River were economically and culturally united and were characterised by rational planning. Improvements in the town centres of the frontier towns are linked to the political and economic intentions of magnates in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. The spatial layout of the town centre was centred around a Ukrainian wooden church, except Monastyryshche, which also had a wooden church in the town centre. The main building element was the Ukrainian wooden house, which defined the spatial and cultural image of the settlement. Due to the uncertain political boundaries and the division of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the late seventeenth century, the frontier towns lost their significance. In the nineteenth century, except for Monastyryshche, all settlements declined economically and administratively. The practical value of the study lies in the fact that the results can be used in the development of historical and architectural reference plans, revitalisation projects for the centres of historic towns, downtown regeneration projects, and the commemoration of lost important monuments. The research materials can be used in a course on the history of urban planning and architecture of Ukraine, as well as in the development of tourist and recreational routes