THE HISTORIOGRAPHY OF THE HISTORY OF THE MUSEUM WORK IN TRANSCARPATHIA OF THE 20TH CENTURY

The article analysed the historiographical heritage of the history of museum work in Transcarpathia in the 20th century. The historical conditions of the creation and formation of the museums of Transcarpathia have been highlighted, and the museum's role as a public institution for the preservation and study of the region's cultural heritage has been revealed. The main stages of the research of the Transcarpathian Museum of the 20th century are highlighted according to the chronological principle of the pre-Soviet period (the 1920s and 1930s), the Soviet period (1945 – 1980s), and the modern Ukrainian period (since 1991). It's worth noting that the process of the historical development of museum construction in Transcarpathia is provided with sources of primary information unevenly, both quantitatively and substantively. Thus, the evidence regarding the stage of origin and formation of regional museum education is extremely limited. Only in the 20s and 30s of the 20th century, when the territory of Transcarpathia was part of the Czechoslovak Republic, the public increasingly began to show increased attention to national traditions, history, culture, and art. The first attempts to create a museum were made by public associations – T. Legotsky Museum Society (1919), Prosvita Society (1920), Regional Museum Society (1929), Society "Russian National Museum" (1930), Ethnographic Society of Subcarpathian Rus (1939). There were scientists, public figures, local historians, and members of cultural and educational societies who left their memories and dedicated their research to the museum work. However, these studies were mainly devoted to separate museums. After the establishment of Soviet power in the region, the network of museum institutions was constantly growing, as proved by the great scientific interest in this problem. In addition to descriptive works, generalizing ones also appear. The burst of interest in the problem occurred in the 1990s when Ukrainian historians got rid of the ideological limitations of Soviet historiography. The number of scientific studies in various contexts of the museum work is also increasing among Transcarpathian scientists. However, today it is possible to state the absence of a comprehensive scientific work that would consider the preconditions, stages of formation, and the first steps of developing the museum work in Transcarpathia in the 20th century. There are also no particular historiographical works or historiographical reviews of this problem.