ABSTRACT
The Eastern territories of the early modern Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth were called Ruthenia (Ruś), which had been domains of the Kyivan Rus and its successors (principalities of Rus), therefore, traditional inhabitants of Ruthenian lands were Orthodox Christians. After Polish influences began overwhelming Ruthenian lands, local elites gradually acclimated to the new environment, accepting Polish language and Western Christianity as their own. In contrast to the local elites, who became Polonized and Catholicized, Ruthenian non-elites remained Orthodox. Although the Union of Brest (1595–96) made majority of Ruthenian population Eastern Catholic (Uniate), it secured them separate (from Roman Catholic) hierarchy and parishes based on Eastern tradition, therefore, did not Polonize them. As a consequence, a situation peculiar to Ruthenia, where Polish nobility (including Polonized nobility of Ruthenian origin) ruled over Ruthenian peasants, was made up.
