> But the affection wasn't mutual. At a reading in 1992,
> less than a year into Ukraine's existence as an independent
> nation, Brodsky offered a new poem titled "To the Independence

Brodsky was a Jewish-Russian man, recognized as a notable Soviet
poet, but presenting him as a spokesman for Russian national
consciousness would be a wrong encroach, he was a peculiar person.

> of Ukraine." "Farewell khokhols," he intoned, using a racial
> slur for Ukrainians.

Khokhol is akin to Maozi. Ukrainians, in turn, use "racial slur"
Katsap for the Moscow's Russians. "Racial" is quite a ridiculous
adjective in this context, but the American mass media seek to
expand their domestic racial obsession wherever possible, and as
much as possible.

Etymology of Khokhol is clear. It means "style of haircut that
features a long lock of hair left on the otherwise completely
shaved head", as says <https://is.gd/EqB7Zg> the Wikipaedia (the
English article is inaccurate and misleading). Regular Ukrainians
didn't wear their hair like that, Zaporozhia Cossacks did.

What it looks like <https://is.gd/iuF0R0>. Such a hairstyle was
long traditional for Turkic men. The Cossacks inherited/borrowed
it from steppe Turks.

Intense contacts between Moscow's Russia and the Ukrainian (edge)
region began after the Cossack-led 1648 anti-Poland uprising
<https://tinyurl.com/yydsssuu>. The Cossacks' local hair fashion
became associated with the Ukrainian area. And later the term was
mechanistically extended to all the locals.

These pictures show people (or severed heads) with "khokhols".
<https://tinyurl.com/y6lgun7n>
<https://tinyurl.com/y2ur7syv>
<https://tinyurl.com/y22556ph>
The "khokhols" in these Euro-pictures are Turkish, not Ukrainian.

Zaporozhia Cossacks weren't identical to ethnic Ukrainians.
Their community was grossly multi-ethnic: about 35% of Slavic /
Slavic-Finnic and Moldovan people of misc subbreeds from Poland-
Ukraine/Moscow, East Europe and Balkan area, about 30% of Turkic
people, including from Central Asia, and non-Turks from Middle
East (Persians, Arabs), about 20% of Caucasus people, and about
15% of non-Slavic south-Europeans (Greek/Italian/French/Spanish).

So much "racial".

About the same time, these western Cossacks adapted the word
Katsap to call the Russians. Poleaxes <https://is.gd/hxRU2n>
that resembled butcher cutters were usually present in the
equipment of the Moscow's Streltsy <https://is.gd/LuGoHg> at the
time. Katsap (or kasab) means butcher in Turkish. They adapted a
Turkic word becase the Cossackdom as such was a continuation of
basically Turkic habitude since about the 11th century.

Both Khokhol and Katsap may be frivolous-familiarly or hateful-
insulting depending on context and intonation, generally they
are not considered obscenities and may be found in literature.

The present hostilities between Russia and the Kiev regime are
not about "Khokhols/Katsaps". The first cause is the Banderism
<https://bit.ly/3q5yHav>. It's historically linked with Galicia,
a peculiar west-Ukrainian region that got especial impact from
Austria and had nothing to do with the Cossacks.

The problem with this kind of extreme nationalism is that it
represents too petty "small nation" mindset that can not cope
with the diversity within quite a large territory the Ukraine
inherited from the USSR (so when they managed to usurp power in
2014, they naturally got separatism in response).

> The idea that Ukrainians aren't a real people and that
> Ukrainian nationhood is an artificial construct has long been
> mainstream in Russian culture, literature and politics-including
> among liberal luminaries like Brodsky, who died in 1996. Putin's
> views on Ukraine, which he expounded in an essay last year that

The Putin's essay and my additional comments on the topic is here
<https://tinyurl.com/yh33mena>. This is a recommended reading.
It is more recommended than this misleading WSJ's article.