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4th Century BCE Archaeological evidence shows Jewish life in the Greek colonies in the Crimea.
737 CE The Arabs defeat the Khazars in the Caucasus, which leads to influx of Jews in the Crimea and Dnieper region.
1156 Karaites of Kiev are mentioned for the first time.
1240 Jews banished from Kiev but are later re-invited, after they go to Halych-Volynia.
1367 The Polish King expands the rights of Jews in his kingdom, which includes Volynia but 19 years later another Polish King cancels these rights.
1388 Rights extended to Jews in Lithuania
1495 The Grand Duchy of Lithuania expels Jews from Kiev and Lutsk but their rights are reaffirmed in 1503.
1529 Jewish rights are maintained with notable exceptions, including the ability to testify at trial, poossess Christian slaves, proselytize, utilize Christian women as nurses, wear gold or silver on their clothing. Men had to wear yellow hats (think of the yellow star of David the Nazis required Jews to wear).
1530s-1550s Jewish communities founded in Vinnitsia, Bar and Bratzlav, Ukraine.
1576 A blood libel and pogrom provoked by Jesuits, occurs in Lviv.
1620s-1630s Pogroms are carried out in the Dnieper region in 1621, 1630, 1637, and 1638.
1648-1654 - Chmielnicki Massacres occur. Many thousands of Jews are killed and expelled from Ukraine.
1654 Ukraine and Moscow reunited. Cossack-Muscovite forces occupy cities in Ukraine and almost totally exterminate the Jewish population.
1664 A pogrom is carried out in Lviv. About 100 Jews were killed in 200 wounded.
1667 Jews in Poland are allowed to reestablish their communities and those baptized by force are allowed to return to Judaism; their economic and civil rights are reaffirmed by kings until the mid-1730s.
1721 Russian Emperor Peter I orders the expulsion of all Jews from the Ukraine as does Empress Elizabeth Petrovna in 1742.
1734-1768 The Haidamack Uprising results in pillaging and murder of many Jews.
1740 Medzhibizh becomes the center of Hasidism founded by Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer, known as Baal Shem Tov or Besht.
1764 Russian Empress Catherine II allows Jews to temporarily come to the Ukraine and found Jewish agricultural settlements in Novorossia.
1770s-1790s Poland is partitioned and parts of Ukraine, Podolia and Volhynia are annexed by Russia.
1794 Catherine II allows Jews to settle in several regions in the Ukraine. Double taxation of Jewish subjects is introduced.
1804 Russian Emperor Alexander I establishes the Pale of Settlement, which includes 8 Ukrainian provinces. Some Jewish merchants entrepreneurs, artists and craftspeople are allowed to visit temporarily outside the Pale with special passports.
1817 Alexander I forbids anyone from blaming Jews for ritual murder without evidence. Jews are allowed to study in schools and institutions of higher education within the Pale.
1821 A pogrom occurs in Odessa where local Greeks blame Jews for the death of the Orthodox patriarch in Istanbul.
1844 Jewish kahals (communities) are abolished and Jews pass under the control of local authorities.
1846 A reform synagogue opens in Lviv.
1860s Odessa becomes the center of the Jewish press for Russian, Hebrew and Yiddish texts.
1867 Jews are emancipated in Austria after a new constitution is introduced in 1849.
1881-84 Pogroms take place in more than 150 Ukrainian cities and towns.
1882 Following initiation of laws prohibiting Jews from settling in rural areas, mass Jewish emigration from the Russian Empire begins.
1897 Census records 1,870,000 Jews living in the Ukraine or 9% of population of Ukraine.
1890s-1900s Political activity grows among Jewry in the Ukraine and Austrian Galicia and various Jewish political movements appear.
1905-07 The first Russian revolution breaks out, unleasing about 600 pogroms, mostly in the Ukraine. Jews begin to organize politically.
1911-13 The Beilis blood libel occurs in Kyiv
1914 WWI begins. Hundreds of thousands of Jews escape westward. Pogroms occur in Lviv.
1915 The Russian army is defeated in Galicia and Poland and Jews are forced to move eastward.
1917 After the February Revolution, the Russian Provisional Government abolishes the Pale of Settlement and all anti-Jewish legislation. Jewish parties are legitimized and a position representing them established in the government.
November 7, 1917. After the Bolshevik takeover, the Ukrainian Peoples Republic is established in Kiev. Complete equality of rights, including democratic and social rights, is declared.
1918-1920 After Ukraine declares independence, the Russian Civil War breaks out, and approximately 1500 pogroms take place all over Ukraine resulting in considerable Jewish casualties: 75,000-200,000 dead, 200,000 wounded and thousands raped.
1920-1930s Jews in Soviet Ukraine go through a process of accelerated Sovietization: village councils and Jewish national districts are established, including 3 in Ukraine and 2 in Crimea. Education is in Yiddish. However, anti-religious activity breaks out, including closing of religious institutions and mock tribunals of the Judaic faith. Mass emigration from the former Settlement of the Pale leads to a decrease in the Jewish population in the Ukraine from 1,750,000 in 1926 to 1,532,000 in 1939.
1921 Eastern Galicia and western Volhynia become part of Poland. Approximate 530,000 Jews gain complete equal civil rights.
June 22, 1941 Nazi Germany invades the Soviet Union. Ukraine is divided into several administrative districts.
July 25, 1941 Pogroms in Lviv.
September 29-30, 1941 More than 33,000 Jews are exterminated in the Kiev suburb of Babi-Yar; and more than 150,000 Jews are killed there during the war.
1941-44 During the German Occupation, approximately 1.4 million Ukrainian Jews are exterminated by the Germans and local collaborators.
1944-46 Jews return to their homelands in Poland and Romania.
September 7, 1945 A pogrom takes place in Kiev.
1959 840,000 Jews in Ukraine, or 2% of the population.
1970 Census 777,000 Jews, 1.6% of the population of Ukraine.
1979 Census 634,000 Jews, 1.3% of the population 0f Ukraine
1989 About 150,000 Jews emigrate from Ukraine, most of them to Israel, Germany and the US.
1991-6 Ukraine gains independence. The constitution guarantees full rights to the Jews.
Summarized from Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora, 2009
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