a tale of the opryshky told by Ihnat Chornoknysh Hnatysh of Zhabie-Iltsi, from Volodymyr Hnatiuk, Narodni opovidannia pro opryshkiv (1910)

Oleksa Dovbush, killed at Kosmach in 1745, is the greatest of the opryshky, the outlaws of the Carpathian mountains, and the Hutsuls have long told how he came to his death through Shtefan Dzvinka and Dzvinka's wife. This account was told by Ihnat Chornoknysh Hnatysh at Zhabie-Iltsi and written down there on 9 April 1908 by Petro Shekeryk-Donykiv, the young Hutsul whose records Hnatiuk judged the purest Hutsul speech in his collection; the teller calls the hero Dobosh. Shot from the loft, Dobosh fails the outlaws' test of leaping the ditch, takes leave of his men in song, and dies by his own poison when the posse finds him alone in the forest.

Translation

Oleksa Dobosh went roving through the world, through the lands, and nobody could do a thing to him. Oleksa Dobosh robbed the lords and the Jews, and he had money enough. But Oleksa Dobosh fell in love with a woman in Kosmach. That woman was an accursed wh...e, the wife of Shtefan Dzvinka, the one who destroyed Dobosh. Dobosh loved her, brought her money, built her houses of yew, and showered her with every kind of plenty. But once she had got enough from Dobosh and grown rich, then she wanted to be rid of Dobosh. The lords and the Jews begged her to worm it out of Dobosh what could be his death.

One time Dobosh came to Dzvinka's, and she went outdoors with Dobosh to search his head. Dobosh lay down on her knees, and she searches Dobosh's head and keeps on asking what could be his death. Dobosh held out a long time, but at last he told Dzvinka all about it. When Dzvinka had found out what Dobosh's death would be, she told it all to her husband Shtefan. Shtefan went round to the lords and told them what could be Dobosh's death.

The lords at once got together the mane of a twelve-year-old horse, a bullet of spring wheat and a candle from a paroya swarm, and over all that twelve priests said twelve services. And then they handed it all to Shtefan Dzvinka. Shtefan Dzvinka loaded his gun with all of it, just as Dobosh had told Dzvinka. Dzvinka knew when Dobosh was to come, and he hid in his own house, up in the loft.

Dobosh was in his winter hut under Chornohora, and from there he used to go out raiding, and to Dzvinka's. One morning Dobosh woke his young men in Chornohora so they would go with him to Dzvinka's. He rouses them and speaks like this:

Early, lads, get up now,
And wash yourselves,
And get ready for Dzvinka's.
Not so much for Dzvinka's
As for his wife's.
And Kuty we'd not pass by,
And in Kosiv we would be,
And turn aside to Dzvinka's.

When Dobosh had got ready with his young men and set off for Dzvinka's, nobody could have held him back. Dobosh had that kind of nature: when he set his mind on a thing, he must do it just the way he wanted.

Twelve young men came with Dobosh to Dzvinka's. But at Dzvinka's everything was locked up. Dobosh came up onto the porch with his young men and told Dzvinka to let him into the house, or else he would open it all up himself.

And she says to Dobosh:

My doors are made of yew,
And my locks are made of steel!

And Dobosh sprang at the door and began to break the door down, and says to Dzvinka:

Your locks will be no help to you
When I set my shoulders to them.

No sooner had Dobosh broken the door in than Dzvinka, that very moment, fired at Dobosh from the loft. Dobosh sprang aside, and he saw at once that the bullet had taken hold of him. Then Dobosh told them to set the house on fire and scatter, but somehow the opryshky couldn't set it alight, and Dobosh says to them:

Don't do a thing about it,
Just go your ways.

From there Dobosh went with his young men to a certain ditch. The opryshky had this custom: they would dig themselves a deep, wide ditch somewhere in the forest. And when one of the opryshky was shot, he would go to that ditch and leap across it. If he was strong, he would clear it; but if he had grown weak by then and was not going to come through, he couldn't clear that ditch and would fall into it. Such a one the opryshky would usually finish off.

And Dobosh had such a ditch in the forest, not far from the Dzvinka family's house. Dobosh went with his young men to that ditch, but he couldn't clear it, and he fell into the ditch. Then Dobosh said sorrowfully to his lads:

Oh, you lads, my fine young fellows,
Look you over the hillside:
Have the hills grown any higher,
Or my legs grown heavy?
It's not the hills that have grown higher,
It's my legs that have grown heavy.

So Dobosh spoke to his lads when he saw that he had grown so weak that he couldn't leap those two little hills he used to leap over easily while he was well. Dobosh saw that he would soon be dying. From there Dobosh went on, limping now:

Oh, he leans upon his leg,
Props himself up on his hatchet.
Props himself up on his hatchet,
And he says to his lads:
Oh, you lads, my fine young fellows,
Lead me off to Chornohora,
There into Kydrovata...
There stand two fir trees,
Those are my two sisters;
There stand two sycamores,
Those are my little brothers...
If Kydrovata were to open,
It would light up the whole wide world.

So Dobosh told his young men about his great treasure-store in Kydrovata. After that Dobosh could walk no more, and he took leave of his young men forever, and they parted. The opryshky went off into Chornohora, and Dobosh stayed in the forest alone. At last the posse came up and found Dobosh in the forest alone.

But Dobosh told them nothing. They asked whether he would not make his confession. But Dobosh said he had confessed already. As soon as he had said it, he took the shinka of his shirt into his mouth, and chewed it, and in that same moment he died. He had arsenic in the shinka. The opryshky always carried poison for themselves in the shinka: as soon as there's need, the opryshok takes the shinka into his mouth, and that's the end.

Afterwards they carted Dobosh off and buried him, it seems, in Kolomyia. That's how the bitch destroyed a man. Dobosh said it well when he was dying:

Only so much faith in a woman
As foam on swift water!

Colophon

Translated from the Hutsul of Volodymyr Hnatiuk (ed.), Narodni opovidannia pro opryshkiv (Etnohrafichnyi zbirnyk 26, Lviv 1910), no. 109, pp. 128–131, told by Ihnat Chornoknysh Hnatysh and recorded at Zhabie-Iltsi on 9 April 1908 by Petro Shekeryk-Donykiv. The text was transcribed from the page images of the Internet Archive scan. The teller calls the hero Добош, Dobosh, throughout, and the English keeps the name as he says it. Hnatiuk's glossary settled цара, "a land, a country" (світами, царами, "through the world, through the lands"); пташати, "to give gifts, to endow" (so Dobosh "showered her with every kind of plenty"); зимовик, an empty hut where the opryshky spent the winter ("winter hut"); покорнєти, "to wake" (корнєє, "he rouses them"); шанец, a ditch; ровта, a band raised to hunt the opryshky under the lead of the mountain police ("the posse"); штрикнути, "to jump" (штрик, перештрикнути); вити, "from there"; витак, "afterwards". Дванацятак is read as a twelve-year-old horse, on the pattern of Hnatiuk's own glossary entry девєтак, a nine-year-old horse. Відий is відай, "it seems", by the change of а to и that Hnatiuk illustrates in his preface with this very word; нишку is ніжку, "leg", with the ж to ш that he also describes. Тесовії in Dzvinka's verse is read as тисовії, "of yew", as the same verse runs in the songs about Dovbush in this volume and as this teller's own prose has двори тисові; but тесовий is also a word of its own, "of hewn planks", and the line may as well say "My doors are made of planks". Пароя роя is kept in the dialect as "a paroya swarm". From the bee-keeper's word (Polish parojek) it is read as a maiden swarm, one cast by a young swarm in its own first summer, but neither Hnatiuk's glossary nor the volume defines it; no. 29 of this volume asks for wax з пароя роя for such a candle, so it is the swarm's wax that makes the candle. Єра пшениця is spring wheat; аршеник is arsenic; трийло is poison; топирець is the Hutsul hatchet that serves as a staff; єлици are firs and євирчики little sycamores; Кидровата is a place in the mountains that other tellers in this volume name as one of Dovbush's treasure-stores. The teller alternates ледїнї and хлопцї for Dobosh's men; the English gives "young men" for the first and "lads" for the second. Подивіт ци по гороньцї is read as "look you over the hillside", the ци taken as the reflexive си; it may instead be "whether", "look and see whether, on the hillside…", which comes to the same. Дзвинчиної хати is the possessive of Дзвинка, a name the teller gives both to Shtefan and to his wife, and the English says "the Dzvinka family's house". Two words are kept in the dialect: paroya, above, and shinka, the part of the shirt in which the opryshky carried their poison and which Dobosh chewed. From the context it is something at the neck or edge of the shirt that the mouth can reach, perhaps the collar, but neither Hnatiuk's glossary nor the volume settles it.

No English translation of this narrative is known to us.

© 2026 Tianmu Anglican Church. This English translation is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0: you may share and adapt it for non-commercial use with credit to the Good Works Library, tianmu.org. The source text keeps its own terms. For other uses, see Rights and Reuse.

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Source Text: Смерть Олекси Довбуша

The Hutsul text as printed by Hnatiuk (1910), no. 109, transcribed from the page images.

Ходив Олекса Добош світами, царами, тай нїхто єму нїчього ни мих изробити. Олекса Добош грабував панив, Жидив, тай доста гроший мав. Але Олекса Добош полюбив собі одну жинку у Космачі. Тота жинка то була проклята к...ва, жинка Штефана Дзвинки, шо збавила Добошя. Добош її любив, гроший їй носив, двори тисові їй понакладав, та усєкими достатками її пташив. Але єк уна уже набрала доста вид Добошя тай стала богата, тогди уна уже хотїла Добошя си позбути. Ії просили пани, Жиди, аби уна вимудрувала Добошя, вид чого єму може бути смерть.

Єкос раз Добош прийшов до Дзвинки тай уна пишла з Добошем си обіскати на двир. Добош їй лїх на колїна, а вна обіскає Добошя тай усе си випитує, вид чого єму може бути смерть. Добош довго си операв, а нарештї розказав про усе Дзвинцї. Єк си вивідала Дзвинка, вид чього Добошеви смерть, то розказала усе свому чьоловікови Штефанови. Штефан пишов коло панив тай розказав, вид чього смерть може бути Добошеви.

Пани зараз постарали з дванацятака коня гриву, з єрої пшеницї кулю, з пароя роя свічьку тай над тим дванацїть попив видправило службий дванацїть. И витак то все подали Штефанови Дзвинцї. Штефан Дзвинка набив тим усим свою пушку так, єк Добош розказав був Дзвинцї. Дзвинка знав, коли Добош має прийти, тай си сховав у себе в хатї на поду.

Добош був у зимовику пид Чорногоров, тай вити хожував на грабунки тай до Дзвинки. Одного ранку Добош збудив своїх ледїнїв у Чьорногорі, аби вни ишли з ним до Дзвинки. Вин їх корнєє тай так промовєє:

Рано, хлопцї, вставайте,
Тай си умивайте,
Тай до Дзвинки си зберайте.
Та ни так до Дзвинки,
Єк до єго жинки.
И Кути би ни минути,
Тай у Косові би бути,
Тай до Дзвинки повернути.

Єк си зибрав Добош з своїми ледїнями тай пишов до Дзвинки, то нїхто би був єго ни спер. Добош мав таку натуру, шо єк на шо си поважи, то муси так зробити, єк захотїв.

Прийшло з Добошем до Дзвинки дванацїть ледїнїв. Але у Дзвинки усе було позамикано. Добош прийшов з своїми ледінями на пидсїнє тай сказав, аби Дзвинка єго пускала в хату, бо инакше вин сам собі поотворєє.

А вна каже до Добошя:

В мене двері тесовії,
А замки сталевії!

А Добош штрик ид дверем тай зачєв ломити двері тай каже до Дзвинки:

Ни поможут тобі замки твої,
Як пидложу плечі свої.

Лише Добош виломив двері, а Дзвинка у тот раз лиш из поду стрілив у Добошя. Добош видскочів у бик тай уже уздрів, шо єго си куля имила. Добош тогди сказав палити двир тай си розходити, але єкос опришки ни могли пидпалити, а Добош каже до них:

Ничьо з цего ни робіте,
Лиш си розходїте.

Вити Добош пишов з ледїнями до одного шанця. Опришки мали такий звичєй, шо викопували собі дес у лїсї глїбокий, широкий шанец. Тай єк котрого опришка пострілє, так вин ишов до того шанця, тай скакав почерез тот шанец. Та єк дужий, то перештрикне, а єк уже ослабне и з того ни вибуде, то ни годен перештрикнути тот шанец и паде у тот шанец. Такого звичєйно уже опришки добивали.

Тай Добош мав такий шанец ни делеко вид Дзвинчиної хати у лїсї. Пишов Добош з ледїнями до того шанца, але ни мих єго перештрикнути тай упав у шанец. Тогди Добош сказав тужно до своїх хлопцїв:

Ой ви хлопцї, ви молодцї,
Подивіт ци по гороньцї,
Ци гороньки пидвишіли,
Ци ноженьки отєжіли?
Ни гороньки пидвишіли,
А ноженьки отєжіли.

Так сказав Добош до своїх хлопцїв, єк уздрів, шо уже так ослаб, шо ни годен був перескочіти тоти дві гірцї, котрі лехко перескакував, доків був здоровий. Добош видїв, шо уже низадовго буде умерати. Вити Добош пишов уже храмаючі:

Ой на нишку налєгає,
Топирцем си пидперає.
Топирцем си пидперає,
А до хлопцїв промовяє:
Ой ви хлопцї, ви молодцї,
Поведїте мене ид Чьорногорцї,
Там у Кидровату...
Там є дві єлици,
То дві мої сестрици;
Там є два євирчики,
То мої брачики...
Єк би си Кидровата отворила,
На увес світ би засвітила.

Так Добош сказав до своїх ледїнїв про велику свою комору в Кидроватій. Витак Добош ни змих ити, тай си з своїми ледїнями випрощєв на віки тай си розлучіли. Опришки пишли собі у Чьорногору, а Добош си лишив самий у лїсї. Нарештї надийшла ровта тай найшли Добошя у лїсї самого.

Але Добош нїчьо їм ни казав. Питали си, ци би си ни висповідав. Але Добош сказав, шо уже сповіданий. Єк то договорив, так узєв шінку вид сорочьки у рот, тай її пожвакав тай в тим чєсї сконав. Вин мав у шінцї аршеник. Опришки усе носили у шінцї собі трийло; скоро треба, а опришок шінку у рот тай конец.

Добошя витак видвезли тай відий исховали у Коломиї. Отак сука збавила чьоловіка. Добре Добош сказав, єк умерав:

Тілько жинцї віри,
Єк на бистрий водї піни!

Source Colophon

Volodymyr Hnatiuk (ed.), Narodni opovidannia pro opryshkiv (Etnohrafichnyi zbirnyk 26; Lviv: Naukove tovarystvo im. Shevchenka, 1910), no. 109, pp. 128–131. Public domain. Transcribed from the page images of the Internet Archive scan (identifier etnohr_26). Hnatiuk's phonetic spelling of the Hutsul is kept as printed, with its ї, є, ґ and dialect forms; line-end hyphens are joined, and Hnatiuk's longer paragraphs are divided at the same places as the English. The word к...ва is printed with the printer's dots, and is so kept. In ледінями on p. 129, a faintly printed line, the print shows a single dot, and the letter is kept as it shows. Hnatiuk's footnotes are not reproduced; he gives none for this narrative. His record line reads: В Жабю-Ільци, 9/4, 1908, від Ігната Чорнокниша Гнатиша зап. Петро Шекерик-Доників.

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