Nestor Ivanovych Makhno[a] (Ukrainian: Нестор Іванович Махно, pronounced [ˈnɛstor iˈwɑnowɪtʃ mɐxˈnɔ]; 7 November 1888 – 25 July 1934), also known as Bat'ko Makhno (Ukrainian: Батько Махно [ˈbɑtʲko mɐxˈnɔ], lit. 'Father Makhno'),[b] was a Ukrainian anarchist revolutionary and the commander of the Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine during the Ukrainian War of Independence. He established the Makhnovshchina (loosely translated as "Makhno movement"), a mass movement by the Ukrainian peasantry to establish anarchist communism in the country between 1918 and 1921. Initially centered around Makhno's home province of Katerynoslav and hometown of Huliaipole, it came to exert a strong influence over large areas of southern Ukraine, specifically in what is now the Zaporizhzhia Oblast of Ukraine. Anarchists have cited him as an inspiration during his life and into today.
