VOLHYNIA IN THE 19TH CENTURY AS A REGIONAL CENTER OF THE CULTURAL STAGE OF MODERN UKRAINIAN NATION-BUILDING

Abstract

The article offers a comprehensive study of 19th-century Volhynia as a significant regional cultural center that played a crucial role in the formation of the modern Ukrainian nation during the cultural stage of the national revival. Drawing upon contemporary historiography, archival documents, interdisciplinary research, and regional studies, the article demonstrates that Volhynia was not a peripheral territory of Ukrainian cultural life but a dynamic space shaped by the interaction of educational, confessional, ethnocultural, and urban processes. Special attention is devoted to the role of key educational institutions – including the Kremenets Lyceum, the gymnasiums of Lutsk and Zhytomyr, and Basilian schools – which served as intellectual platforms for forming a new generation of Ukrainian intelligentsia. Another important cultural institution was Baron F. R. von Steingel’s Horodok Museum, one of the earliest centers for preserving, studying, and promoting the cultural heritage of Volhynia. The article highlights the significance of the region’s ethnoconfessional diversity in shaping local cultural practices and analyzes the contribution of urban centers such as Zhytomyr, Lutsk, Ostróg, and Dubno to the modernization of the regional cultural landscape. It is argued that the Ukrainian movement in Volhynia emerged through the combination of folk cultural tradition, increasing educational mobility, ethnographic research, and expanding interregional intellectual networks, which facilitated the gradual shift from the cultural to the political phase of the national revival. The study concludes that Volhynia represented a vital component of the broader Ukrainian nation-building process in the 19th century and that its cultural environment requires further systematic exploration.