The Northwestern European Frontier of the Ottoman State: The Steppe of Budjak in the Late 18th and the Early 19th Centuries

Abstract

In the last quarter of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, the territory known as the Steppe of Budjak can be considered as the last European Steppe frontier of the Ottoman state. An important component of this frontier was the policy of active colonization and the involvement of workers from neighboring countries. Such a policy was successfully pursued by the Ottoman state. As a result, various social and ethnic groups settled on the border and influenced the relations between the Ottoman and the Russian Empires. Among these groups, one of the most important was the Ukrainian Zaporozhian Cossacks, who created their own autonomous organization on the frontier – the Sich.