Mykhailo Khanenko

Mykhailo Stepanovych Khanenko (Polish: Michał Chanenko, Ukrainian: Михайло Степанович Ханенко, c. 1620 – 1680) was a Ukrainian Cossack military leader, and nominal hetman of Right-bank Ukraine from 1669 to 1674 in rivalry with Petro Doroshenko during The Ruin.

Hetman Khanenko

Biography

Khanenko was the son of Zaporozhian Cossack Stepan Khanenko. In 1656, he became a colonel (polkovnyk) of Uman regiment, and fought in the Khmelnytsky uprising. He was one of the cossacks who opposed the second Treaty of Pereyaslav (October 27, 1659) between Yuri Khmelnytsky and the Russian tsar, which drastically limited the Cossack autonomy. In 1661, he received a noble title from King John II Casimir of Poland.

Khanenko family coat-of-arms.

In 1669, he was proclaimed Hetman of Right-bank Ukraine by three regiments. Khanenko and otaman Ivan Sirko led raids on Crimean Khanate and the Ottoman Empire. He was pro-Polish, and greatly opposed to rival Petro Doroshenko whom he often fought, sometimes with Polish support. In 1670 Khanenko signed a treaty with Polish authorities, according to which authonomy of the Cossack class was recognized in exchange of the hetman's vassalage to the Polish king.^[1]

In 1674, Khanenko suffered a disastrous defeat to Doroshenko, and was forced to get the aid of Left-bank hetman Ivan Samoylovych. He renounced all claims to power, and swore loyalty to Moscow. In 1677-1678 Khanenko was imprisoned by Samoilovych in Baturyn after Moscow had suspected him of preserving ties with Poles, but later was released.^[1] He was allowed to live in peace on the left bank of the Dnieper and the exact time and place of his death are still unknown.

Family

His nephew Danylo Khanenko served as a colonel of Lubny Regiment. Danylo's son Mykola Khanenko (1693-1760) was a notable political figure of the Cossack Hetmanate, a diplomat and an author of memoirs, who served under hetmans Ivan Skoropadsky, Pavlo Polubotok and Kyrylo Rozumovsky.^[1] Mykola's great-grandson Oleksandr Khanenko (1816-1895) was a collector of Ukrainian antiquities, as well as a civic and cultural activist, who served as a Marshal of the Nobility of Surazh county and took part in the Emancipation reform of 1861.^[1] Oleksandr's nephew Bohdan Khanenko (1849-1917) was an art collector and archaeologist who founded the Khanenko Museum in Kyiv.^[1]