Dumy are a genre unique to Ukrainian culture. They took shape in the 16th–17th centuries in the Zaporizhian Sich and Cossack lands. They were performed by blind kobzars accompanied by kobza or bandura, as the singers traveled from fair to fair.
Famous dumy: Marusia Bohuslavka (a captive who helps liberate her countrymen from Turkish bondage), The Duma of Kozak Holota, The Escape of Three Brothers from the City of Azov, Marko Berezhansky. The form is a free recitative, where every performer could improvise, adding their own phrases. In 2024 the safeguarding programme of the kobza and wheel lyre tradition was added to UNESCO's Register of Good Safeguarding Practices. Today they are revived by Taras Kompanichenko, the Shevchenko Bandurist Chorus, and young authentic-performance artists.
