HARVARD UKRAINIAN STUDIES - See also - Harvard University

THE EYALET OF KANT'IANEC 89William Harborne succeeded in acquiring the first English capitulationswith the Ottomans, it was stated that the English merchants would thenenjoy the same privileges as the French, Venetian, and Polish subjects. 7This policy of equilibrium lasted into the seventeenth century. SuccessivePolish-Lithuanian triumphs over Muscovy in 1619 and 1632 were followedimmediately by two Ottoman attacks against the Commonwealth—in1621 (Sultan Osman's Xotyn campaign) and in 1633 (led by Abaza Paşa).In 1657 the Tatars were sent, this time to help weaken Poland-Lithuaniaagainst the coalition of Sweden, Brandenburg, the Cossack Hermánate, andTransylvania.In 1667, after the cataclysms of Xmel'nyc'kyj's uprising and the warsagainst Sweden, Russia, and Transylvania, the Commonwealth was forcedto cede Smolensk and a great part of Eastern Ukraine, including Kiev, toRussia. Polish historians consider this date a turning point in the relationsbetween the two states. Between 1667 and 1795, when the Polish noblestate was liquidated, the border moved only westward. Given these circumstances,an Ottoman attack against the Commonwealth could onlystrengthen Russia.As we have seen, neither economic, nor demographic, nor political reasonscan account for the war of 1672. This war was, in addition, very unpopularamong the Ottoman soldiers. Poland was considered a remote and coldcountry; it did not offer great spoils and could not even feed the invadingarmy. The road through the Balkans and Moldavia was long and exhausting.Poor systems of communication excluded any greater Ottoman territorialgain in Eastern Europe. Paul Kennedy's term of "strategical overextension"8is applicable not only to the Hungarian and Persian limitations onOttoman growth, but also to the Polish-Ukrainian limitations.It was not accidental that almost all the Turkish-Polish truces weresigned at the end of October. The Turks preferred to be home by ruz-iKasım (5 November), the day when peasants paid the second installment ofthe timar and other taxes. This was also the end of the season for tradetraffic on the Black Sea. If we consider that one month was necessary forassembling troops, at least one month was needed to reach the Polishborder, and at least one month more to return home, the time available for7S. A. Skilliter, William Harborne and the Trade with Turkey 1578-1582: A DocumentaryStudy of the First Anglo-Ottoman Relations (London, 1977), p. 50.8P. Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and MilitaryConflict from 1500 to 2000 (New York, 1987), p. 11.