Навеки с Москвой, навеки с русским народом

Forever with Moscow, forever with the Russian people! "... What to do next: whether to stop the war and again recognize the domination of Poland over themselves, or to accept citizenship to the Turkish sultan, or the Crimean Khan, or to unite with the fraternal Russian people." - After three questions, the whole people unanimously answered: "We are under the Tsar of the Eastern, Orthodox... God confirm, God strengthen, so that we may be one forever!" On January 8 (18), 1654, Hetman B. Khmelnitsky convened the rada on the issue of the annexation of Ukrainian lands to Russia. The act of reunification of Ukraine with Russia took place in Pereyaslav (modern Pereyaslav-Khmelnitsky) — then a significant economic and political center of Ukraine. Hundreds of people — foremen, Cossacks, peasants, burghers, clergy — represented all classes-estates of society at that time. Describing the situation of the Ukrainian lands after a six-year bloody war, the hetman said that the Zemsky Sobor had agreed to accept Ukraine into the Russian state. "And who will disagree with us," said Khmelnitsky, "now where the free road wants to go." The diary kept by the Russian ambassadors quite fully conveys the atmosphere that prevailed at the meeting. In response to these words of the Hetman , the whole people unanimously declared: "We want to be an Eastern, Orthodox tsar." Then the Cossack foreman asked again: And again the answer was the same: "Everything is unanimous." All the participants of the rada unanimously spoke in favor of the unification of fraternal peoples in one state.
The painting by Mikhail Ivanovich Khmelko "Forever with Moscow, forever with the Russian people" depicts a famous political event of the 17th century - the Pereyaslav Rada.
M.I.Khmelko "Forever with Moscow, forever with the Russian people", 1951, H.M., Dimensions with frame: 221 x 130 cm. Today the painting is sold.