Cossacks

[Wallachian]

Does anyone have any information regarding the earliest formation of the cossack bands?

So far I have found information that the cossacks had started forming after the fall of the Kievan Rus when parts of the population moved to the safer steppes by the Dnieper river. This forming was then stunted by the Mongol invasion. The first mention of the word 'kazak' was in a ruthenian chronicle from 1395. I also know that the number of cossacks grew at a very high rate between the XVth and XVIIth century due to the number serfs running from their master's estates in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and joining them. This is when the cossacks started making their name known in the world and there are more and more sources about them from the XVIth century onwards culminating with Bogdan Hmelnitki's rebellion.

My question is: were there any cossack bands in the southern part of Ukraine during the Tsardoms timeframe?

[Bagatyr]

My question is: were there any cossack bands during in the southern part of Ukraine during the Tsardoms timeframe?

intresting question .Well i don't know but the idea to make them unit for Moldova can be good

[Wallachian]

As I mentioned in the Dev forum from the XVIth century onwards they were used as mercenaries by the Principality but occassionally they also raided and pillaged its lands. For example the Moldavian Voivode Ioan Voda cel Viteaz allied himself with the Ukrainian cossacks and used a great number of cossack troops in his anti-ottoman campaign onf 1572 - 1574.

I just don't know that much about our period. It does make sense that they would have been around the area in the late XVth and early XVIth century but Im just looking for some sources.

[2Shy]

Well we can always look for ukrainian or russian researcher to helps us with this question.

[Wallachian]

Ive found more sources stating that the cossacks started making a name for themselves from the XVth century. At the start some of their names included mongol names which suggests some intermingling but by the mid XVth century all the mentioned names are of slavic-russian origin. Poland, Lithuania and Muscovy had started using them as mobile troops in their armies from the mid XVth century.

[Silesian_Noble]

The word cossack was recorded for the first time in the Codex Cumanicus from late XIIIc written in Kaffa. In that record Cossack meant a sentry. Another mention came from year 1308 and this time word cossack meant bandits. So yeah, You could have Cossacks in Tsardoms

[Wallachian]

Thanks for the info, it confirms my research. Planning to have them as an AOR unit in the NE territories of the map and also as mercenaries in Moldavian roster,