Patterns Made by Weaving, Not Embroidery ── The Rushnyky of Krolevets

Diamonds, flowers and trees rising from pots, in red thread, line the two ends of a white cloth. The ceremonial cloth called rushnyk, made in the town of Krolevets (Кролевець) in Sumy Oblast, northeastern Ukraine, has these patterns not stitched with a needle but woven on the loom. It has been on Ukraine’s national list of intangible cultural heritage since the list’s very first year, under the name “Krolevets pick-up weaving” (Кролевецьке переборне ткацтво).

What Rushnyky Have Been Used For

Rushnyk (рушник) is usually translated as “towel,” but what is discussed here is not an everyday hand towel but a long, narrow cloth used for decoration and ceremony. The Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine (IEU, published by the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies (CIUS) at the University of Alberta; the entry “Rushnyk” was first published in 1993) describes it as a cloth about 20–50 cm wide and 1–4 m long, decorated with embroidered or woven patterns.

According to the same entry, the rushnyk was a cloth that accompanied a person through life. A newborn child was first laid on a rushnyk. At the betrothal and the church ceremony, the hands of the couple were bound with a rushnyk, and the two stood on a rushnyk during the ceremony. The wedding bread was also placed on a rushnyk. At funerals, the deceased was covered with a rushnyk, and the coffin was lowered into the grave with a rushnyk. When building a house, the final beam was hoisted with a rushnyk, which was then given to the carpenter. A cloth used to decorate an icon or a treasured picture was called a “bozhnyk.”

There are two ways of applying the pattern: embroidering it, or weaving it in. Embroidered rushnyky, and regional differences in embroidered shirts, were covered in the article on vyshyvanka. This article is about the leading centre for the woven kind.

What Is “Pick-Up Weaving”?

The word “perebir” (перебір) in the technique’s name is translated in this article as “pick-up weaving.” The Great Ukrainian Encyclopedia (VUE; the entry “Krolevets pick-up weaving,” written by V. Shpryndel, published 2023) explains that Krolevets rushnyky are woven using a complex technique called “hand pick-up” (ручний перебір), which lets the weaver render exactly the design she has in mind, using a loom fitted with heddles.

The same entry divides pick-up weaving into several detailed techniques. Some produce the same pattern on both the front and back (double-faced weaving); others produce a pattern raised on only one face, in which case front and back are clearly distinguished. In some techniques, the pattern threads are made four to five times thicker than the ground threads.

IEU’s entry “Rushnyk” likewise states that Krolevets weaving stands out clearly against a white ground, centred on geometric motifs — rosettes, diamonds, pots, flowers, and above all the tree of life — with most of the pattern concentrated at the two ends of the cloth.

Caution is needed about the “meaning” of the patterns. VUE calls the tree of life and the world tree “central symbols,” but does not cite sources showing what each image actually represents. Tetiana Kara-Vasylieva, Doctor of Art History, stated in a 2015 report that the genealogical link between rushnyk imagery and the “tree of life” or “world tree” can be spoken of only as a hypothesis (introduced in the article on vyshyvanka).

How Long Has It Been Woven?

The starting date differs depending on the source.

IEU’s entry “Krolevets” (first published 1989) dates the town’s founding to 1601 and states that Krolevets and its surroundings have been known for decorative weaving since the 16th century. IEU’s entry “Rushnyk” likewise gives “since the 16th century.” In the era of the Hetmanate (1650–1781) it was the centre of a company (sotnia) of the Nizhyn Regiment, and in the 18th–19th centuries it was a commercial town with major annual fairs.

VUE gives somewhat more specific dates. Spindle whorls from the 5th–7th centuries have been found at the site of the town’s fortress. A weavers’ guild existed by at least 1765, with 34 households and around 100 members. The first record of weavers’ surnames dates from the early 1780s. In 1781, the weaver Andriikha Oboronska, together with her sons, is said to have begun the distinctively Krolevets way of weaving rushnyky. Neither encyclopedia names the source document underlying this date.

In the 19th century, according to VUE, the weaving Ryndin family produced rushnyky in large quantities and sold them abroad as well, exhibiting at fairs in Poltava, Kyiv, Kharkiv and elsewhere between 1830 and 1860. In the early 20th century they won medals at international exhibitions in Belgium, Paris, London and Tunis.

IEU’s entry “Weaving” (first published 1993) states that home-based weaving flourished from the 1650s onward, and that Krolevets became one of the largest centres of folk decorative weaving. On the Soviet era, the “Krolevets” entry states that home-based production was replaced by weaving cooperatives (arteli), which became a factory in the 1960s. The “Rushnyk” entry also notes that, alongside traditional motifs, the Soviet era saw designs made with portraits of Lenin and Stalin, five-pointed stars, the hammer and sickle, and political slogans.

The National List, and the Geographical Indication

In the “National List of Elements of Ukraine’s Intangible Cultural Heritage” (the version published by the Ministry of Culture in June 2026), “Krolevets pick-up weaving” is the second element (protection number 002н.к.с.). Its domains are “traditional craftsmanship” and “other: elements of clothing and interior decoration,” and its region is the city of Krolevets, Sumy Oblast. Two orders are cited as the basis for its listing: Ministry of Culture Order No. 1521 of 14 December 2012, and Order No. 105 of 12 February 2018.

In an explanation published in August 2024, the Ministry of Culture states that this national list began with Order No. 1521 of 14 December 2012. Order No. 105 of 2018 is the order that approved the current list. This means Krolevets pick-up weaving has been on the list since it began.

The first element on the same list is Kosiv painted ceramics, which is also on UNESCO’s Representative List. As of September 2026, seven Ukrainian elements are on UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage Lists, and Krolevets pick-up weaving is not among them.

There is also a separate system. In the register of geographical indications published by Ukraine’s National Intellectual Property Office (UKRNOIVI), “Krolevets rushnyky” (Кролевецькі рушники) was registered on 26 October 2020 (registration number 3120). The covered products are rushnyky, tablecloths, napkins, aprons and wall hangings. Petrykivka decorative painting was registered on the same day. Whereas the list of intangible cultural heritage is a system for recording skills passed down over generations, the geographical-indication system determines the scope within which a place name may be used on a product.

Today’s Practitioners

According to VUE, the town’s municipal enterprise “Krolevets Rushnyky” has been making the products since 2013. It also states that 13 women weavers preserve and pass on this skill as part of the local community’s culture (the year to which this number refers is not stated). The same entry also notes that the Krolevets Weaving Museum was established in the town in 2011 to preserve and study the skill, and that an international literary and arts festival called “Krolevets Rushnyky” has been held every year since 1995.

Sumy Oblast, where Krolevets is located, borders Russia. This article does not address the condition of Krolevets’s workshops or museum after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which began on 24 February 2022.

At the end of VUE’s entry, a local tradition is recounted: that the Koshuk family wove a wedding rushnyk for the poet Taras Shevchenko. The encyclopedia presents this as “oral tradition” and provides no documentary evidence for it.