The Boykos or Boikos (; ; ; ), or simply Highlanders (; ), are an ethnolinguistic group located in the Carpathian Mountains of Ukraine, Slovakia, Hungary, and Poland. Along with the neighbouring Lemkos and Hutsuls, the Boykos are considered a sub-group of Rusyns and speak a distinct East Slavic dialect.[[Richard T.Schaefer (ed.), 2008, Encyclopedia of Race, Ethnicity, and Society, Volume 1, Sage Publications, p. 1341. ][ James Stuart Olson, Lee Brigance Pappas & Nicholas Charles Pappas, 1994, An Ethnohistorical Dictionary of the Russian and Soviet Empires, Greenwood Publishing Group, pp. 109–110.] Boykos differ from their neighbors in dialect, dress, folk architecture, and customs.
Etymology
Regarding the origin of the name Boyko there exist several etymological hypotheses,
but it is generally considered, as explained by priest
Joseph Levytsky in his
Hramatyka (1831), that it derives from the particle boiie.
Specifically, it derives from the exclamation "бой!, бойє!" (
< bo-i-je >), meaning "it is really so!", which is often used by the population.
The 19th-century scholar Pavel Jozef Šafárik, with whom Franjo Rački and Henry Hoyle Howorth agreed, argued a direct connection of the Boykos with the region of
White Serbia mentioned in the 10th century
De Administrando Imperio,
but this thesis is outdated and rejected,
as most scholars, Mykhailo Hrushevsky among them, already dismissed it in the 19th century because
Boiki is a clear reference to
Bohemia, which in turn derives from the Celtic tribe of
Boii.
The derivation from Boii,
is also disputed because there is not enough evidence.
They are also called
Vrchovints (Highlanders).
As in the case of
Hutsuls and
Lemkos, they are recorded in historical and ethnographic sources since the 18th and 19th century.
Some people otherwise identifiable as Boykos regard that name as derogatory and call themselves highlanders ( verkhovyntsi).
Origin
Boykos are either considered one of the descendants of
East Slavs tribes, specifically
White Croats who lived in the region,
possibly also
Ulichs who arrived from the East,
or
Vlach shepherds who later immigrated from Transylvania.
Demography
In the Boyko Region (,
Boyko dialect and ), there lived up to 400,000 people of whom most were Boykos.
They also lived in
Sanok County,
Lesko County and Przemyśl County of the Podkarpackie Voivodeship in Poland, before the Population exchange between Poland and Soviet Ukraine and the forced relocation of Rusyns and Ukrainians in Poland in 1947.
In commemoration of Boykos, Ukraine's national parliament, the
Verkhovna Rada, in 2016 renamed
Telmanove Raion into Boykivske Raion where Boykos were deported from Czarna, Bieszczady County (today in Poland) after the 1951 Polish–Soviet territorial exchange. It is estimated from the evidence available that in 1970 there lived 230,000 people of Boyko origin.
In Ukraine, the classification of Boykos as an ethnicity distinct from Ukrainians is controversial.[Professor Ivan Pop: Encyclopedia of Subcarpathian Ruthenia(Encyclopedija Podkarpatskoj Rusi). Uzhhorod, 2000.][Paul Robert Magocsi, Encyclopedia of Rusyn History and Culture . University of Toronto Press, June 2002.][Tom Trier (1998), Inter-Ethnic Relations in Transcarpathian Ukraine] The deprecated and archaic term , while also derived from Rus', is ambiguous, as it technically may refer to Rusyns and Ukrainian people, as well as Belarusians and in some cases Russians, depending on the historical period. According to the 2001 Ukraine census, only 131 people identified themselves as Boykos, separate from Ukrainians.
Location
To the west of Boykos live Lemkos, east or southeast Hutsuls, northward Dnistrovyans, Opillia.
Бойки.png|Areas of Boyko settlement on the border of Ukraine (right) and Poland (left)
PogMAP2.png|Ethnographic groups of southeasternmost Poland, Boykos in dark blue.
Bojky001.jpg|Boyko family. Dolyna district. 1898
Бойки.jpg|Boyko family. Beginning of the XX century
Bojki1837.jpg|Boyko inhabitants of Galicia, lithograph from 1837
Boiko from Beskydy.jpg|Boyko man, 1925–1939.
Boykos 2.jpg|Boyko family, prewar.
Boykivshchyna (2).jpg|Boyko family, prewar.
Tucholka. Bojkiwska chata 1903.jpg|Boyko hut, 1903
Bojkhata.JPG|interior of the Boyko hut. Museum of Culture and Life of Boykivshchyna
Religion
Most Boykos belong to the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, with a minority belonging to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. The distinctive wooden church architecture of the Boyko region is a three-domed church, with the domes arranged in one line, and the middle dome slightly larger than the others.
DrohobychCer3.JPG|St. George's Church in Drohobych
File:Krivki church.jpg|Kryvka Church in Lviv
File:Rosolin, cerkiew św. Onufrego (HB1).jpg|Wooden Church of St. Onuphrius in Rosolin
Михайлівська церква (дер.) 1700 р. Вишка 7661-HDR.jpg|Church of Saint Michael in Vyshka
Церква Зіслання Святого Духа (1804).jpg|Church of the Pentecost in Verkhnia Rozhanka
Гукливий, Церква Св. Духа 2010 (6074).jpg|Holy Spirit Church in Huklyvyi
Matkiv.jpg|Saint Demetrius Church in Matkiv
Notable people
-
Yuriy Drohobych (1450–1494), first doctor of medicine in Ukraine, rector of the University of Bologna (1481–1482), professor at Jagiellonian University (1488).
-
Petro Konashevych-Sahaidachny (1582–1622), Ukrainian political and civic leader, Hetman of Ukrainian Zaporozhian Cossacks (1616–1622).
-
Ivan Franko (1856–1916), Ukrainian poet, writer and political activist.
See also
External links
target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> Characteristics of Boikos dialect use in Kherson region in the mid 20th century''. "Domiv". 8 March 2016.
