Left-bank Ukraine (Ukrainian: Лівобережна Україна Russian: Левобережная Украина, Polish: Lewobrzeżna Ukraina ): historic name of the part of Ukraine on the left bank of the Dnipro River, comprising the modern-day regions of Chernihiv, Poltava and Sumy and the eastern part of the Kyiv and Cherkasy regions, in Russian histories jointly called Little Russia. From the Treaty of Pereyaslav of 1654, this area of Ukraine was under Muscovite control, later reaffirmed in the Treaty of Andrusiv (1667) and the Eternal Peace Treaty (1686) between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Muscovy.
Left-bank Ukraine initially enjoyed, within Muscovy (from 1721, imperial Russia), a degree of autonomy which was gradually eliminated through the 18th century.
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