Carpatho-Rusyn? What's That
By Richard D. Custer, Washington, DC
Carpatho-Rusyns (“Carpatho” signifying their villages being in the Carpathian Mountains) have been called “The People from Nowhere” and “The Kurds of Central Europe.” They have also been known by various names such as Ruthenians, Carpatho-Russians, Rusnaks, or Lemkos. Carpatho-Rusyns, or more simply, Rusyns (sometimes spelled “Rusins”), are one of numerous stateless nationalities/ethnic groups of east central Europe. They live in several countries peacefully among peoples such as Slovaks, Hungarians, Poles, Romanies (or Gypsies), Germans, Romanians, and Ukrainians.
Carpatho-Rusyns live in the very heart of Europe, along the northern and southern slopes of the Carpathian Mountains. Their homeland, known as Carpathian Rus’, is situated where the borders of Ukraine, Slovakia, and Poland meet. Smaller numbers of Rusyns live in Romania, Hungary, Serbia, Croatia, and the CzechRepublic. In no country do Carpatho-Rusyns have an administratively distinct territory. However, Rusyns are recognized as a distinct people in most of the countries where they live, including the United States.
Carpatho-Rusyns belong to the Slavic branch of Indo-European peoples. Their dialects are classified as East Slavic, but are heavily influenced by neighboring Polish, Slovak, and Hungarian. Unlike their West Slav (Polish and Slovak), Hungarian, and Romanian neighbors, Carpatho-Rusyns use the Cyrillic alphabet.
Traditionally, almost all Rusyns belong to the Byzantine/Greek Catholic or Orthodox Christian churches. This was also a cultural marker and, along with their language, was one of the primary ways Rusyns differed from their Slovak, Hungarian, and Polish neighbors.
At the time most Carpatho-Rusyns emigrated to the United States – from the late 1870s until World War I – their homeland was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Specifically, Rusyn-inhabited villages were found in these Austro-Hungarian counties:
(present-day Slovakia:)
Szepes (Spiš), Sáros (Šaryš), Zemplén (Zemplyn), Abaúj-Torna (Abov), Ung (Už);
(present-day Ukraine:)
Ung (Už), Bereg, Ugocsa (Ugoča), Máramaros (Maramoroš);
(present-day Poland:)
Nowy Targ (Novyj Torh), Nowy Sącz (Novyj Sanč), Grybów (Grybiv), Gorlice (Gorlyci), Jasło (Jaslo), Krosno, Sanok (Sjanik), Lesko (Lisko).
Since medieval times, these districts have variously belonged to Austrian Galicia, the HungarianKingdom, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Slovakia, and Ukraine.
Most Rusyns in Slovakia live in the east, mainly in the districts of Stará Ľubovňa, Spišská Nová Ves, Bardejov, Svidník, Humenné, and Snina, and in the city of Prešov. The large towns of Svidník, Medzilaborce, and Stakčin are mostly Rusyn-inhabited, and in all there are over 300 mostly-Rusyn villages in Slovakia. In Poland, Rusyns (there called Lemkos) historically lived in mountain villages south of regional towns like Grybów, Gorlice and Sanok. In Ukraine, Rusyns mainly inhabit the Transcarpathian/Zakarpatska oblast, including the cities/towns of Užhorod, Mukačevo, Velykyj Bereznyj, Svaljava, Iršava, Chust, Volovec’, and Rachiv; of all the countries where Rusyns live, their population in Ukraine is the largest, estimated at about 650,000. The approximate total number of Rusyns in their European homeland today is about 850,000.
Many villages in these regions give witness to the local Rusyn population by carrying names with “Rus” in them, e.g., Ruská Voľa, Ruský Potok, Ruská Nová Ves, Ropycja Ruska (now Ropica Gorna), Ustja Ruske (now Uscie Gorlickie), Rus’koje, Rus’ka Kučova, Ruscova, and many others.
Rusyns speak a language also called Rusyn (which like all languages has a number of different dialects). Rusyn is quite similar in many respects to eastern Slovak dialects as well as to western Ukrainian dialects, but with many unique features and many loanwords from Hungarian and several from Romanian. Although Rusyn dialects have traditionally been classified as western dialects of the Ukrainian language, linguists are beginning to recognize Rusyn as a separate language in its own right. Rusyn is written in the Cyrillic (“Russian”) alphabet, but the Latin (“English”) alphabet has also been used, especially in Slovakia (and in the emigration in the United States).
In the European homeland, Rusyns are best known for their wooden Greek Catholic and Orthodox churches (some of which are in outdoor museums – skansens) and their icons (especially those in the Šariš Museum in Bardejov, Slovakia and the Ethnographic Museum in Sanok, Poland), their Easter eggs (pysankŷ or krašankŷ), and their folk dancing and singing. Major folk festivals of Rusyn folksong & dance ensembles are held annually in Svidník and Medzilaborce, Slovakia, in Żdynia, Krynica, Zyndranowa, and Michałów, Poland, in Mukačevo, Ukraine, and elsewhere.
Carpatho-Rusyns have left their homeland at different times for various reasons, primarily economic. The first group to leave, in the middle of the 18th century, settled in the Vojvodina (historic Bačka) and Srem regions of the former Yugoslavia, in present-day northern Serbia and eastern Croatia. The Rusyns of Vojvodina, while numbering only about 25,000, have been very successful in maintaining their language and identity; Rusyn is an official language of the Vojvodina province, and Rusyn-language media and publishing have had many decades of state and public support. Smaller groups of emigrant Rusyns established themselves in the CzechRepublic (northern Moravia and Prague) and the Banat region of Romania.
Rusyns in Poland (Lemkos) have had to deal with particular challenges and sorrows. About two thirds of the native Lemko populace was encouraged after the devastation to their homeland in World War II to emigrate in 1945-1946 to the Soviet Union, where they were promised bountiful economic opportunities. Those who remained were deported from their homeland in 1947 and dispersed throughout western Poland in a shameful campaign known as the Vistula Operation (Akcja Wisła). After this, most of the Lemko villages fell into ruin or were plundered by others who took advantage of the opportunity to move into the now-empty, yet far from bountiful, land and homes. About 10,000 Lemkos have been able to return to their native villages since the 1960s, where they have recovered some of their churches and community life, even though they had to purchase their own land back in doing so. The other survivors of Akcja Wisła and their descendants in western Poland continue to live in small communities in cities like Legnica, Wrocław, and Warsaw, all of which now have Lemko churches, schools, and cultural organizations.
In the countries of their homeland under Communist rule in the mid- to late-20th century, Rusyns were declared to be Ukrainians and could not have their own cultural institutions nor officially use their own language. In Slovakia, most chose to identify as Slovaks rather than Ukrainians, and in Poland, living in diaspora, they quickly assimilated into Polish society. Today Rusyns in Europe are undergoing a revival after the fall of Communism in 1989. Today they have their own newspapers, magazines, radio programming, and professional dramatic theatre companies. A number of primary schools in Rusyn-inhabited villages and towns include courses on the Rusyn language in their curriculum, and universities in Prešov, Kraków, and Nyíregyháza (Hungary) have departments of Rusyn studies. In Ukraine, UžhorodNationalUniversity has faculty specialists in Carpatho-Rusyn ethnography, language, and history, but following the official policy of the Ukrainian government, Rusyns are studied completely in the context of belonging to the Ukrainian people, as “Transcarpathian Ukrainians.”
At least one cultural organization (in most cases, numerous organizations) in each country of the Rusyn homeland represents the interest of Rusyns as a distinct people/nationality, and these organizations have joined together with Rusyn organizations in former Yugoslavia, Hungary, Romania, the United States, Canada, and Germany to form the World Congress of Rusyns, which meets every two years to discuss their common concerns, celebrate their respective progress made in cultural revival, and to set goals for collaboration on projects in developing Rusyn language and literature, expanding the education of children in their mother tongue, and promoting national consciousness. Even young Rusyns have formed a similar structure, the World Forum of Rusyn Youth, to address concerns of special interest to young people in how to preserve and develop their culture in a modern context and to strengthen a Rusyn identity among their peers.
Most Rusyn immigrants to America came between 1880 and 1914, to places like New York City, Passaic, N.J., Bridgeport, Ct., the eastern Pennsylvania hard coal region, western Pa. (especially Pittsburgh and Johnstown), Cleveland, Chicago, Minneapolis, and Detroit. Today smaller numbers of Rusyn immigrants are coming to the U.S., mostly to metro New York/New Jersey. Between 600,000 and 750,000 Americans have at least one Rusyn immigrant ancestor. Some famous Rusyn Americans past and present are actresses Sandra Dee, Lizabeth Scott, and Meg Ryan, actors Robert Urich and John Spencer, pop artist Andy Warhol, professional boxer Pete Latzo, U.S. Marine Michael Strank of the Iwo Jima flag-raisers, composer Peter Wilhousky, jazz pianist Bill Evans, and NHL hockey star Peter Bondra.