The Cossack Mamai Image and the Musical Theme in Ukrainian Painting of the 17th–18th Centuries.

The musical theme has not become the subject of detailed study by art historians in Ukrainian painting yet, such works have not had a systematic consideration. The paintings «Cossack Mamai» are a part of the musical theme of Ukrainian painting of the 17th – 17th centuries, therefore the purpose of the article is to analyze the paintings «Cossack Mamai», to clarify the reasons for the appearance of such an image in the context of historical and cultural circumstances and the peculiarities of musical culture. The development of the musical theme at this time was significantly accelerated by everyday routine, historical and portrait genres, thus expanding the range of subjects where musicians and musical instruments were presented. The folk painting «Cossack Mamai» originated from realistic portraits of Cossack musicians, whom there were many in the Cossack army at that time. Through description, analysis, synthesis and comparison, the features of the iconography of these 18th century paintings have been analyzed, and the connection between the images of these paintings and the European tradition of chivalry has been established. The phenomenon of Cossack chivalry actively developed in Ukrainian territories and acquired local characteristics here in the 17th – 18th centuries, becoming deeply rooted in the national culture. The paintings «Cossack Mamai» served as symbols and value guidelines for the common people, becoming a symbol that accumulates the socio-historical and moral-cultural norms of the life of the universal means of transmitting historical memory about chivalry, as it unobtrusively interprets examples of exemplary behavior, which includes playing a musical instrument. The question of what instruments were in the hands of Mamai Cossack is debatable, however, we note that when this tradition appeared, artists depicted the instruments itself and the methods of playing it in more detail, and only later in the 19th century did this iconographic attribute acquire  more generalized and simplified appearance.