Talk:Name of Ukraine/Archive 1

About the the again
Thanks, Michael Z., for providing sources from stylesheets! I am still not sure about the clause "because the name was conceived to be applied to a border region of Imperial Russia rather than to a separate political entity", so you rightly put that "citation needed" sign there. In my opinion, no normal westerner knows the etymology of Ukraine, so why should they think of Ukraine as a border region? If anything, people would think of Ukraine as a part of Russia, but from my experience then the word is not used at all (e.g. archeological artefacts from Odessa in the Roman-Germanic Museum at Cologne are marked "South Russia"). --Daniel Bunčić 16:36, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Linguistic transliteration
The "Etymology" section should use scientific transliteration (scholarly notation), like other linguistics topics (*kraj-, krajina, krajaty). But then the rest of the article should follow suit; would this be out-of-place? —Michael Z. 2005-12-28 17:19 Z 


 * Personally, I am always in for scientific transliteration. Go for it, as long as no-one objects! --Daniel Bunčić 16:38, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Often or not
Bunčić I will not delete the often comment, but you have to show your statistics/data; otherwise, we have to agree on a neutral word (if sometimes is not it); I will post this also at the Name of Ukraine discussion --Riurik 19:25, 28 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Dear Riurik, I do not think that it is for us two foreigners to decide how often (or how seldom) the word Ukraine is used with a definite article in English. All I said was: a) Google statistics are of no use here, and b) let English native speakers decide this. I do not care the least whether the eventual outcome will be "all the time" or "hardly at all". --Daniel Bunčić 15:44, 29 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Bunčić this is great! We have to continue to disagree (at least on item "b").  You think native speakers should decide this; I think they should not.  In fact, I do not think it matters whether you are native or not.  The important element is that whoever it may be: he or she must have their opinion supported with data (in our case, it is not possible due to financial limitations).  In the end, I concede to you the google point.  Maybe we'll run into one another on the wikispace again.  It was a pleasure arguing with you.  Regards, --Riurik 18:31, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

moved from user talks

 * The following discussion has been moved here from User_talk:Irpen and User_talk:Serhiy by Irpen.

Hi Serhiy. I think I owe you an explanation on that one. I take no position on which theory is "right" and which theory is "wrong". In fact, no one can know for sure although some theories may seem more convinsing than others to some readers/editors. But, and this is a very general statement, ''the encyclopedias don't reflect "truths". They reflect "knowledge".'' As such, the mainsteam accepted versions should be given as the main ones. In most cases, we can safely stop at that.

In some cases, and the Name of Ukraine may be the one, the criticism of the mainstream version is not a fringe conspiracy theory but an academic disagreement taken by some respected scholars. In such cases, it is OK to cite alternative versions as well, but also neutrally, without implying that they are more correct. Briefly speaking, we present the versions as they are accepted by the present day scientific community and not as which are right and which are wrong. I hope you agree with me. In no way I deleted anything you wrote, I just reorganized it somewhat. --Irpen 21:35, 6 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Irpen, for starters, please provide a reference to a reputable source confirming that "okraina" is the mainstream interpretation of the ethymology of the word Ukraina. Then let's discuss. For comparison, the interpretation which I offer is in line with opinions like, for example, this one: Zgadaty vse.., which are all in a very immediate way based on litopysy. Secondly, in providing your source, please keep in mind simple logic: the source may not rely on interpretation of Ukraina as "okraina" illustrating it as okraina of Poland or Russia in XVI etc century, because that is clearly much later than the word appeared, and so is irrelevant no matter how many academics etc support that view. The reference you will provide should explain the first know mentionings of the word, i.e. around 1187 and afterwards. Remember, the point here is ETHYMOLOGY of the word, i.e. its origin. In this sense the fact that Ukraine became an independent state 16 years ago (your reference to the word being "very young" in this sense) is also irrelevant, because Ukraine as a concept existed since almost 1000 years before. Finally, note that there is no contradiction (to which you refer) in the word Ukraina being used initially in reference to individual knyazivstva, and then later in reference to the country name as a whole: that transition was not related to the origin of the word Ukraina, it was related to changes in historic perception of statehood and people's selfidentification paradigms, as I explained in the text which you deleted from this page. Let's leave this page as it is now until the next weekend, and then depending on the references you provide and discussion thereof, we'll either keep it or change. If there are no references until the next weekend, I suggest we change it back to my text, and then discuss if references are forthcoming. Serhiy 21:56, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks! Will add refs. But I disagree with the strict rules you propose. You again start to discuss the merit while the first thing we should go by is their acceptance. That you find something illogical, with all respect, is insignificat. That other scholars find smth illogical, may be significant. That's called the "valid criticism of the mainstream version" which, if prominent, needs to be presented but in exactly this order and not vice versa. --Irpen 21:59, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Of course you need to look at merit, that's obvious. "Mainstream" vs. "non-mainstream" is relevant only when several interpretations are PLAUSIBLE, and it's just that no one really knows for sure which one it was. But if one interpretation is PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE (i.e., it explains the origin of a word by a theory which presumes that the word originated in the XVI or so century, while it is an established undisputable fact that the word actually originated about 500 years earlier), then that interpretation is of no relevance, no matter how many historians sing under it. They may be doing so because they like that interpretation, because it suits their political views, god knows for what reasons. But the point is, you and I are as well adept to interpret original sources as any of those historians, and it is the truth that matters, not the prevalent opinion, in cases when either the truth can be undisputably seen, or a false interpretation can be ruled out because of its obvious inconsistency with known undisputable facts. Serhiy 22:08, 6 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Serhiy, what you find is that when a breakthrough emerges that completely shocks the history that is commonly known, often it is extreamely frowned upon by those conventional historians, the theory has to be carefully blended into the article and carefully refrenced. That way the article will show the "conventional" theory and the new theories that challenge it leaving the reader to decide which is correct. --Kuban Cossack [[Image:Flag of the Russian Empire (black-yellow-white).svg|25px|]] 22:35, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Irpen, just to add another point on the above discussion (also because I noted you started a new template on "Mainstream"). All human knowledge falls into two categories: scientific and social. Scientific knowledge is the result of discovery of the surrounding world, and as such is a constatation of facts about "how the world is". Examples are - whether the Earth is flat or round, whether wales are fish or mammals, and so on. Social knowledge is a summary of the dominant social conventions. It was created by the society itself. Examples are - legal laws, human languages, cultural conventions and so on. Now, THE KEY POINT TO REMEMBER is that the concept of mainstream vs. non-mainstream interpretation is applicable only to the social knowledge. Example here is indeed the Kyiv/Kiev discussion that we've had, because that indeed is a question of current usage in the society. However, if a new scientific fact becomes unambiguously established, that fact takes full effect immediately and overrides any previously held views in the society on this subject - including all encyclopedia articles, although the society at large may still hold the previous outdated view for a long time (including many leading scientists - look what happens around the issue of evolution). Now, the point is, the question of the origin of the word Ukraina falls into the scientific knowledge category at least with respect to the timing of that origin. However mainstream, any theory attempting to explain the origin of the word must begin with the fact that the word already existed and was used in such and such way as early as 1187. Otherwise, such theory is contrary to an undisputable fact, and so is not true. Untrue theories can and should still be reflected in an encyclopedia article (and I had the "okraina" theory reflected in my text), but they may not be presented as the first/most authoritative theory, no matter how mainstream they are in the society at large (including the scholarly society). If it is the latter principle that you object rather than the plausibility of different theories per se, we'll have to go to polls on this.. Serhiy 22:51, 6 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Also I just noticed that the source you give is a newspaper article, be careful about that, because people might challenge its credebility. Instead try using thse ones for example from historical websites, make sure they are credible and already have refrences themselves. That way your perspective opponets will find it tougher to argue with you.--Kuban Cossack [[Image:Flag of the Russian Empire (black-yellow-white).svg|25px|]] 22:46, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

To Kuban Cossack: the article is not the source, it is another illustration of the source in addition to what I myself give you. The source is litopys of 1187 and all later litopysys, and logical interpretation of what's written in that source. The link to litopys is Litopys 1187 and other (it was also given in the main article that I wrote). Serhiy 22:51, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Well in that case ignore what I said (although you might as well keep the link I gave you) and rewrite the article carefully and concisely. Like the indroduction of Cossacks which openely challenges how the word originated and how it came into English language. --Kuban Cossack [[Image:Flag of the Russian Empire (black-yellow-white).svg|25px|]] 23:01, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Kuban Cossack, thanks for support, and also for pointing out such an interesting article to me! (By the way, we'll discuss it with you separately some time later :))) Serhiy 00:37, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Guys, as for the Cossack article, before getting to it, please take a look at it together with the History of Cossacks article. Before doing any major work they need to be reconciled. I am trying to do this in regard to the History section of Ukraine and History of Ukraine articles and this work progresses slowly.

Serhiy, to your objections, let me just say thay I fully agree with you that we neeed to stick to scientific theories not the societial perception. Flat earth is not a scientific theory at all. I am talking only about the scholarly debate not a debate between the amateurs and the scholars. If no scholar accepts the theory that the word Ukraine originates from the "Borderland" we should change the article. If most scholars think so, we need to start from this. If some respected scholars criticize it, this belongs to the article as well. I will do some research these days. And we, as wikipedians, are not qualified to judge which primary sources are more convinsing. We need to present the established interpretations and not provide our own, except, perhaps, when it is trivial. If something seems trivial to you and me but keeps deceiving the specialists, we have to step aside.

Finallly, the term is of course not 16 and not even 160 years old. But I disagree that either the term or the concept is 1000 years old as you present. The truth is somewhere in the middle, I think. This is indeed a hot debate and we don't have to engage into it yet. Regards, --Irpen 03:30, 7 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Irpen, let's be careful and methodical about this. There are two parts of the question. The first one is WHEN the word Ukraina appeared, and the second part is WHAT WAS THE ETHYMOLOGY OF IT. Of course, both parts have to be resolved scientifically, i.e. we need to look what expert community has to say about it. However, THERE IS NO AMBIGUITY in the scholarly community itself regarding the first known to us time when the word started to be mentioned regularly in litopysys etc, i.e., when the word came into existence in its current form. That time is 1187. I repeat, there is no ambiguity about this not just in my opinion, but objectively in the scholarly community at large there is full consensus on this. I will be surprised if you provide arguments to the contrary, and will be happy to consider and discuss in that case. Now, given that this first fact is firmly established, it then follows by simple logic that does not require any scholarly substantiation, that any theory attempting to exlain the ORIGIN of the word has to be consistent with the PROVEN TIME OF ITS ORIGIN. That's all I mean while asking you not to present any dominant or non-dominant theories that explain the origin of the word Ukraina by reference to "okraina of the Russian empire" or "okraina of the Polish state", because neither Russian empire nor the Polish state had not yet come into existence when the word Ukraina already did. And I am pretty sure that when we start looking at the properly timed theories only, the version of the article which I wrote will turn out to be representative of the mainstream view. Let's see. Serhiy 04:19, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Fine with me. I also emailed MichaelZ, who started this article and who has access to several sources asking him to interrupt his wikivation and give us some feedback. And I agree that the age of the name for the land and the age of the concept of the territory of the nation are two different things. It's about the latter I said that it is certainly younger than 1187, while certainly older than 160 years back from now. I will look around and we'll get back to the issue. Thanks! --Irpen 04:28, 7 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree with this last statement. As I said in my version of the article, the word originated at or before 1187 and was carried onwards without changes, but the meaning that people ascribed to that word was changing as the dominant self-identification paradigms were changing ("land of the King" becoming later "land of the people" and still later "country of the people" and "the nation"). This process was not unique to Ukraine, all European countries went through these changes from feudalism to statehood, while preserving in most cases original names they had and imparting new meanings of their contemporary age to those names. Let's wait till you have more news on this. Cheers, Serhiy 04:50, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

ukraina¹ and ukraina² as homonyms
There is one major problem with the form ukraina: Historically, as far as I can see, it is probably a homonym:
 * ukraina¹: The first word ukraina¹ with the etymology given first in this article dates back to at least the 12th century. The meaning 'region' of this word is so general that it could even be used for regions completely outside the East Slavic lands, cf. John 7:1 in the Peresopnytsia Gospel from the 16th century:
 * "Потомь пакь іс(усъ) перемешковаль в галилеи бо не хотѣль в оукраинахь жидовскых жити."
 * 'After this, Jesus stayed in Galilee, going from village to village. He wanted to stay out of Judea where the Jewish leaders were plotting his death.'


 * ukraina²: This word with the meaning 'marches, borderland' seems to have come up much later, probably in the 16th century. The meaning is apparent from several quotations, e.g. the following from Zakhariya Kopystenskyy's "Palinodiya" (Kiev 1621, quoted after Русская историческая библіотека, vol. 2, St. Petersburg 1878, column 1135):
 * "Княжа Острозское Василій Константиновичъ [...] пресловутого Володимира [...] власный потомокъ; [...] великій заступъ и потѣха всего народу Роского; муръ желѣзный на Украйнахъ; страхъ и трепетъ Татаромъ [...]"
 * 'Prince Vasyl Kostyantynovych of Ostrog, [...] famous Volodymyr's [...] direct descendent; [...] great advocate and consolation of the whole Rhossic people; iron wall on the borders; awe and trepidation to the Tatars [...]'
 * It seems obvious to me that it is this meaning that the modern name of the country is derived from, since the general meaning 'any borderland' seems to have narrowed even in the 16th century, where "the borderland" just meant 'the region around Kiev'. This was a very small region, and the Southern territories originally occupied by the Cossacks were not part of it, as the following quotation from a 1596 document by the king in the Архивъ Юго-Западной Россіи, vol. 3/I, p. 133:
 * "тежъ Запорожцовъ, абысте зъ Запорожъя на Украину, где бы ся выгребать хотели, не пушали, и противко нимъ, яко неприятелемъ короныымъ конъно, збройно повъстали [...]"
 * 'Also do not let the Zaporozhians from Zaporizhzhia to Ukraina, where they want to get, and resist against them as enemies of the Crown with horses and weapons.'
 * According to Wiesław Witkowski (Język utworów Joannicjusza Galatowskiego na tle języka piśmiennictwa ukraińskiego XVII wieku, Kraków 1969, p. 8), even in the 19th century the word Ukraina meant only the historical voivodships of Kiev and Bratslav, whereas all the western parts of the modern country were not yet Ukraina.
 * I doubt that this meaning 'borderland' can be directly derived from the earlier word meaning 'region in general'. It would work the other way round, but not this way. It seems far more probable to consider a parallel to Croatian krajina, i.e. the formation of a new word ukraina² with *kraj- 'border' that happened to be homonymous with ukraina¹.

Of course we cannot be sure whether the two words were completely homophonous. Maybe they originally  differed in stress, as Russian okraina (with stress on the second syllable) might suggest. However, the two homonyms are sure to have influenced one another, and the Polish stress on the last but second syllable will probably also have taken part in making the two words sound exactly the same.

-- Daniel Bunčić 08:36, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

RE: ukraina¹ and ukraina² as homonyms - Serhiy 15:58, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

 * Interesting analysis and may be plausible with respect to the fact the we indeed deal with two homonyms, but clearly not with respect to the origin of the name of the country.


 * The logic of the statement "It seems obvious to me that it is this meaning that the modern name of the country is derived from, since the general meaning 'any borderland' seems to have narrowed even in the 16th century, where "the borderland" just meant 'the region around Kiev'." is poor. It attempts to fit observed facts into the writer's preferred view, where the facts don't actually fit there. When someone calls by the name "Ukraina" the central regions of the land around Kyiv and not its far borders, it seems to me miles more plausible to infer from this that the homonym used in this case was NOT the homonym with the meaning of "border", instead of inferring what seems to me a bizzar conclusion that "the concept of borderland was narrowing to [gradually start denoting] only the most central region of the land around Kyiv".


 * Instead, it seems much more plausible and natural to infer that people referred to the central ancient region of the land by its old name back from the Kyiv Rus' times (homonym in the first sense, in the terminology of this discussion), while they referred to other newly inhabited areas close to Black see etc as the borderland. (Newly inhabited by people from "Ukraina" proper, i.e., from Kyiv and surroundings).


 * It appears that the reason why the author resorts to this illogical line of argument is his inability to explain how the name of the country could have possibly derived from what he considers to be an equivalent of a generic word "region" back in the Kyiv Rus times: (quote: "I doubt that this meaning 'borderland' can be directly derived from the earlier word meaning 'region in general'.") (by the way, as an aside, why does one have to be derived from the other at all?).


 * However, I strongly disagree with the interpretation of the homonym "Ukraina" in the first sense as "region", "any region, even a Non-Slavic region". From all we know from the historical evidence, the word was used only with respect to different parts, including the central parts, of Kyiv Rus. IN THIS SENSE, THE WORD ALREADY THEN WAS SYNONYMOUS WITH THE WORD - WELL, "UKRAINA" AS WE USE THE WORD NOW, I.E., "THIS SPECIFIC COUNTRY AROUND KYIV". In other words, "Ukraina" was used to denote "this country". To see why this is the case, we need to take into account that the concept of sovereignty (one of the defining characteristics of a modern nation-state) at the time of Kyiv Rus was NOT attributed to land. Instead, it was attributed TO THE KING, and that was the dominant self-identification paradigm that people used at the time. They would not possibly say "I am person from country such and such", because they did not yet have the concept of country in their minds. What they would say, would be "I am a person from the land of King such and such". This was typical not only for Ukraine but for all European countries at that time. Sovereignty of the king came first, and was later replaced by sovereignty of the country. When the king got replaced by several kings as part of land split between the royal sons of the Kyiv seat, the identification of sovereignty naturally became split itself, and started to refer to different parts of the whole - and indeed the very process of the split appears to have served as the immediate literal originator of the word. It COULD NOT be applied "equally to some Non-Slavic region" - the simple proof of that is that it WAS NOT.


 * In summary, in this sense the homonym "Ukraina" used around the XIIth century was NOT synonymous with the word "region", "any region". It was synonymous with the words "this country" as we understand the word "country" today. The trick here is that the word "country" in a generic sense itself DID NOT EXIST yet at that time, as a concept of entity excercising elements of sovereignty/the object of self-identification of the respective large group of people.


 * This clear synonymity between the word "Ukraina" and the words "country of the people living in the lands around Kyiv, who identify themselves with those lands" runs uninterrupted from the XIIth century to the present day. What was actually changing, was the generic word describing such lands (as opposed to the proper name Ukraina). First these were knyazivstva, then for a long time this was "land" etc and simply "Ukraina" without a generic descriptor because the land did not have a statehood, and finally it became "country", perhaps around the beginning of the XXth century (Central Rada, Soviet Union), and finally the "nation-state" from 1991.   Serhiy 15:57, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I am busy with other thnigs right now but just to let everyone know that I emailed MichaelZ who has access to more sources and I suggest we wait for his input. --Irpen 16:00, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Hi guys! I haven't read any serious works about the etymology. I greatly respect Daniel's opinion on the subject, but please remember that we're restricted to material which is supported by published sources (see WP:CITE, WP:V). Most of the #History section is simply my paraphrasing of Magocsi on the subject, with reference to Subtelny. —Michael Z. 2006-05-09 20:22 Z 


 * Thanks, Serhiy and Michael, for your comments to my text above. First of all, let me say that what I laid out there is indeed just my opinion. However, I was trying to make sense of the arguments put forward in favour of the two theories 'region' and 'borderland', both of which are clearly supported by lots of texts, and the only conclusion seems to be that there have to be two different words (i.e., homonyms). I do not know if anyone said this so clearly in existing literature, but I think most scholars would support this view.
 * However, the question then remains which of these words narrowed its meaning to 'Ukraine' in the sense we know the word now. As I am neither Ukrainian nor Russian and have great sympathies for both nations, I had no prejudice about this when I happened to do some research in the huge card index of the Словник української мови XVI—першої половини XVII ст. (ISBN 966-023231-4) at Lviv. I browsed through all the cards with ukrain- and came to the conclusion I have explained above on the ground of the quotations I found.
 * Serhiy, the region denoted by the word Ukraina in the 16th and 17th centuries was not at all central – see map 1. Ukraina at that time meant the województwo Kijowskie, województwo Bracławskie and, probably, the województwo Czernichowskie, i.e. the outer south-eastern corner of the Commonwealth and at the same time the most endangered part of the kingdom, constantly being attacked by both its southern and its eastern neighbours. (This region was not altogether so small, but it included neither the southern nor the western nor the most eastern parts of contemporary Ukraine, see map 2.)
 * Your statement, "It COULD NOT be applied 'equally to some Non-Slavic region' - the simple proof of that is that it WAS NOT", seems a bit risky against the background of the sentence "Потомь пакь іс(усъ) перемешковаль в галилеи бо не хотѣль в оукраинахь жидовскых жити" I quoted above. Do you consider Judea a Slavic region then?
 * The main flaw in your argumentation is that you mix up different times. What you say about "the land of the king" is perfectly right (although I know of no "king" in Kievan times, but this argument of course applies to the princes of Rus' just the same). However, the first signs of the meaning of ukraina changing in the direction of modern 'Ukraine' can be traced back no earlier than the 16th century. And at that time, the King (now a real one) was in Cracow (and later in Warsaw). So all your (rather hypothetical, but quite logical) reasoning about how the word 'region' might have come to mean 'Ukraine' would be fine if we had any evidence about this change of meaning from, say, the 14th century. But until the 16th century you can safely translate any incidence of ukraina with 'region' without losing anything. Only then does it change, so that e.g. "тот замокъ нашъ украинный Киевъ" (Cracow 1532, Архивъ Юго-Западной Россіи, 8/V, 7) does clearly not mean "our regional fortress Kiev" (especially taking into account that it is the King at Cracow speaking here) but "our border fortress Kiev".
 * Please do not take my criticism personally. This mistake is very typical of Ukrainian historiography and has been made even by the most famous Ukrainian historians: They trace Ukrainian history back to the times of the Kievan Rus' (typically calling it Русь-Україна) and then jump over some three centuries to Bohdan Khmelnytsky. The time in between is called the 'period of Polish occupation', and that's it. It is these mainstream historians that should take your argument about the "land of the king" seriously: Of course the people of the 14th–17th centuries did not care whether their ruler was a Pole, a Lithuanian or a Ruthenian, and this period was perhaps the most influential and most interesting period in Ukrainian history, because it was during the time of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth that Ukraine culturally became a Central European country different from Eastern European Russia, and, among other things, this is what made the Orange Revolution possible.
 * Michael, of course you are right and of course I never intended to use Wikipedia for publishing my original ideas. First, I did not consider them that original, second, if they were I would have written an article about it in some scholarly journal, and third, when I put these ideas on the discussion page rather than the article page I did so on purpose. It was really only an attempt to make some sense of the undisputable fact that there is textual evicence for both theories. Maybe someone else (you?) could try to get this idea about the two homonyms over into the article. The benefit would be that it would become clearer to the reader that the argument is not really about the meaning of ukraina in the old texts but about which of these meanings evolved into 'Ukraine'. What I added to this (and perhaps I shouldn't have) was the 'missing link' between the two homonyms and the modern word Ukraina. This, of course, has to remain on the discussion page because it is highly disputed.
 * -- Daniel Bunčić 08:28, 10 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I certainly didn't mean to imply that you were pushing your own ideas. Ukra′jina and Ukraji′na even sound like words with subtly different meaning to my Ukrainian ears.  But I don't have the knowledge or reference sources to put this idea forward for the article.  Even if no one has written specifically on the subject, perhaps there are works we can quote which refer to the concept?  —Michael Z. 2006-05-10 15:44 Z 

Recent changes
I'm a little concerned about the current shape of this article.


 * 1) It is getting repetitive: the sections “History”, “Etymology”, and “Alternative names” cover much of the same ground.
 * 2) It is becoming self-contradictory: some of the assertions directly supported by a reading of Magocsi have been replaced by others (1187: non-specific borderland, or 'princedom'?), with no references to support them.  Others have been supplemented with contradictory statements in another section (Cossocks: poetic notion of homeland, or land around Kyiv?).  It is fine to add a contradictory view with reference to its source, but not to mix things up without clearly citing sources.

When I have time, I'll try to add some more specific references to what Magocsi writes about the name. Serhiy, can you find references for some of what you've written? Thanks. —Michael Z. 2006-05-14 18:31 Z 
 * I am looking forwards for Michael's and Buncic's entries to this. Unfortunately, I am busy with other things. I thank Serhiy for his expansion even though I totally agree with the criticism above. Regards, --Irpen 19:55, 14 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I realize I may have sounded unappreciative, but that's not the case. Just thinking about how it can be improved further.  Thanks for all the work, Serhiy.  Cheers.  —Michael Z. 2006-05-14 21:16 Z 

By all means, let's tidy up the full article and provide sources etc. I am aware that the article as a whole may have lost somewhat in its consistency as a result of my change, but I do not regard this as a problem. What I tried to do was to make that specific section (Etymology of "Ukraine") internally fully consistent in itself. Now if that caused some repetitions with other sections, let's check what the best way to deal with that is (i.e. which section to edit). What I wrote is based on the extended discussion we had in the previous week on the talk page, and I am prepared to argue about the factual correctness of all I wrote. A lot of that is based on more extended arguments and sources now on the talk page, and some of those can be brought to the main article as necessary. I will be dealing with that over the coming weeks, gradually as time allows.

Just to begin this and respond to the change of the sentence that describes how the word "Ukraine" was used in the Chronicles of the XII-XIII centuries: I have no idea what basis Magosci has to write about his view on the usage of the word Ukraina in the chronicles. The source of my description is the Chronicle directly, and that source is clearly stated next to that sentence. Anyone can go to the text of the Chronicle on http://litopys.org.ua and easily see that what was written in the article previously does not correspond, factually, to what is in fact in the Chronicles.

I do not know anything about "poetic notion of homeland". My text about "land around Kyiv" is based on various quotations including those that Daniel Buncic provided on the talk page as part of our discussion. I will bring some of those as references to the main page.

The same goes for other consistency points, I'll be working on them gradually. Serhiy 13:18, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Dear Serhiy, I think the main problem is that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. No-one of us is supposed to enter their original thoughts (please read WP:OR for further information on what that is). It's fine if you think that your argument is backed by "the Chronicle directly", but then please write an article on this in some scholarly journal, not in Wikipedia.  Once you have written this article, we can cite it as an opinion held by 'some scholars' (i.e. at least one).  Therefore Michael Z.’s Magocsi quotations were really more encyclopedia-like than your orignal (and maybe even better) arguments.
 * (And just as an aside: As a slavicist who has been studying, among other things, how to interpret old Slavonic texts for twelve years now — and who wouldn't dare to say he understands them anything like completely —, I doubt that anyone can just make conclusions from "the Chronicle directly" without any training.)
 * --Daniel Bunčić 16:21, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Dear Daniel, why don't you edit the article youself? I think as a specialist in the field you are the best person to rewrite it. --Irpen 16:54, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Dear Daniel, for the lack of time as of now let me make just two comments:


 * 1. Do I understand correctly that one of your key points is this: If the Chronicle plainly says something was white, but someone has published an article saying that the Chronicle speaks of black, you go with the latter because that's a "published source", and the Chronicle itself is NOT, in your view, a published source? That sounds plain silly to me.


 * 2. Let's take a specific example which is the intro to the article. The article now says about the word Ukrayina in the XIIth century: "but is used here and in other chronicles of Rus’ to describe a non-specific borderland, and not a particular place". Now, when you actually open the section of the Chronicle when the word was first mentioned, you can see it was mentioned (a) to denote Pereyaslav Ukrayina; and (b) Galician Ukrayina. Both at the time to which the mentionings refer were strong Princedoms of the Kiev Rus. And you are still telling me that these mentionings should indeed be interpreted as "non-specific borderland, and not a particular place"?!!!!!!! As I said, that sounds plain silly to me, and I don't care how long you had to study to come up with this "valuable conclusion".

Serhiy, re your point 1. If an established scholar says something, it is us, wikipedia authors, who can't claim that he calls the black as the white, unless we can find another scholar who says the opposite. As Wikipedia authors we have exactly zero credibility to provide our own complex interpretation of things. Once you establish your ideas in the special literature, you add them to Wikipedia and refer it to your papers, not the other way around. --Irpen 17:57, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Irpen', I repeat, and you have not given the answer:

Let's take a specific example which is the intro to the article. The article now says about the word Ukrayina in the XIIth century: "but is used here and in other chronicles of Rus’ to describe a non-specific borderland, and not a particular place". Now, when you actually open the section of the Chronicle when the word was first mentioned, you can see it was mentioned (a) to denote Pereyaslav Ukrayina; and (b) Galician Ukrayina. Both at the time to which the mentionings refer were strong Princedoms of the Kiev Rus. And you are still telling me that these mentionings should indeed be interpreted as "non-specific borderland, and not a particular place"?!!! --Serhiy


 * All I want is to see scholars who make the connection betweem the modern name of the country having its origin in this chronicle. You make a sensible point but even if you were a professional historian, like Daniel, you have to establish things outside Wikipedia, that is in peer reviewed publications and than add the ideas here referring them to those publications. I repeat, as wikipedians you, myself and even Daniel have no credibility to make complex inferences. Even Daniel, a historian, when he is writing as a Wikipedian has to refer to the published works (perhaps of himself, but published somewhere where jerks like us don't decide what's right and what's wrong, but rather his peers review his work and allow it in). --Irpen 20:09, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I completely agree with this.


 * Dear Serhiy, please understand that the chronicles you are quoting are written in a foreign language that you have never learned and, what’s more, a foreign language that even the best scholars have not yet completely understood. The misleading thing is, these texts look so familiar.  That's the just reason why Russians think of Kievan Rus’ as 'Russia':  it's written there, plainly — "russkaya zemlya", that’s "Russian soil", isn’t it?


 * But there's no use going into details about specific examples. There's a reason much more important why the state the article is in now is not satisfactory: it simply does not comply with Wikipedia’s No Original Research policy.  If you do not agree with this official policy, this talk page is not the place to discuss it.  Go to Wikipedia talk:No original research, for example.  Perhaps you can change the policy.  But you have to change it first and then write according to the new policy, not vice versa.


 * Irpen, of course you’re right. I know I should take part in tidying up and expanding the article, but give me four weeks’ time, and then I’ll do it.  Before, I just have much more important things to do that earn my bread, and as I said, to make a good article about this takes more than five minutes.  Sorry!


 * For the time being, I would suggest to do the following:
 * revert the article to the version before Serhiy’s major edits, just as Ghirlandajo proposed;
 * ask Serhiy to copy-paste the additions he has made to the article to a separate chapter that clearly states that this is a different theory;
 * try to find sources for this theory (which, I’m sure, will not be so difficult).
 * In my opinion, this approach would provide for more clarity for the reader without deleting Serhiy’s well-meant and time-consuming additions.
 * --Daniel Bunčić 20:26, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

I thoroughly support Daniel's proposal and I am calling on Serhiy to heed to it. We are extremely lucky to receive a commitment, even an uncertain one, from a real Slavist scholar to rewrite this article based on the modern scholarly point of view. Not many articles have such luck and are instead written by people like myself, Serhiy or Michael, hobbiests who try our best to do well. Also note that even Daniel would have to be restricted to the same rules of Wikipedia as anyone. He won't be able write from his own POV as a Wikipedian or even as a historian, he will have to rewrite using what's established outside of Wikipedia. Serhiy, your work is appreciated but I suggest we paste your version to talk and restore the article to the version Daniel is suggesting. We can even tag the chapter, if you insist, to make sure there is currently no agreement and refer the reader to talk. I don't want to do it myself for now since you put a significant effort here and I would prefer that you accept a temporary solutuion and implement it on your own rather than have it imposed on you by the Wikipedia policy after you spent so much time trying your best to improve the article. --Irpen 21:53, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Irpen, as you can see, I have changed all edits that I made previously. They are all now thouroughly sourced, every single sentence in them, citing published works of academic scholars. So, should you choose to remove any of those, it will be you who will be in violation of the WP policy, with all consequences. Now, if anyone thinks that there is some additional interpretaion of sources that I cited, or can provide other sources, he is of course welcome to do so and edit the article in any way he deems appropriate - as long as the evidence that I presented remains properly reflected.


 * That's the formal part of the answer. Informally - Irpen, if you want me to listen to what you say, the talk to me! I gave you and Daniel and everyone a very simple example - the usage of the word Ukrayina in the XII century chronicles. It is incomprehendable to me how, when a litopysets' speaks about Pereyaslav Ukrayina which "moans" the death of its Prince who has just returned dead to his capital city of Pereyaslav, this can be interpreted to say that "on this specific occasion the word Ukrayina was used in the sense of a borderland, any borderland but not some specific place". Explain this to me, here, on the talk page - show the logic of how this can be possible! It is not enough to just cite some author saying something utterly stupud, and keep silent behind that. Do you really believe that yourself, having read all the different evidence we've been discussing here? If not, why not change what we say in the article to reflect the simple logic of the events, which is also reflected in so many scholarly articles? Etc etc. This works the other way around as well - if you show me how what you say about "borderland" in the XII century Pereyaslav can be true - I am not saying IS true, at least how it CAN be true, as just one option - I hope you understand by now that I will listen.  Serhiy 22:24, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Dear Serhiy, I very much appreciate your quotation of sources. This is really much better now than it used to be. The problem is that the previous version (before your edits) was much clearer about there being at least two major theories. Now there seems to be only one. That's what I meant when I supposed to restore the old version and put all your additions in one chapter about that theory, while the original information about the 'borderland' theory remains in another chapter, nicely separated. Couldn't you do that for us, please?
 * Okay, one last time let me try to explain to you why your direct conclusions from the Chronicles are built on sand: There is no meaning whatsoever indicated in the text.  We have to make conclusions from a lot of different sources and try to see what all these different contexts a word is used in might have in common.  I, personally, never said that ukraina in the place you quote meant 'borderland', I would prefer the meaning 'region' (but not 'country') — but how do we know? "The whole country wept for him", "The whole region wept for him", "The whole borderland wept for him", "The whole town wept for him", "The whole population wept for him", "The whole capital district wept for him", "The whole upper class wept for him" — none of these sentences is agrammatical, is it?  How should we tell from this one context that any of them is nonsense?  It's very difficult to provide arguments for just one of them being a correct interpretation.  Apart from all the other sources we have, one might then draw on external arguments, too.  For example, if ukraina has to do with krajati 'to cut', then this would be an etymological parallel to Latin sector and section from secare 'to cut'.  So what if we said, "The whole sector wept for them"?
 * What I'm trying to say is: this whole stuff is just so complicated that scholars have been arguing about this for decades without finding an overall accepted solution — why should we Wikipedians find one? Irpen has played on my being a "professional" very much.  That's not what I intended, I'm not more qualified to make a decision than anyone else.  What I do know a lot about, however, is how difficult historical linguistics is.
 * --Daniel Bunčić 06:46, 16 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Why don't you edit the article yourself instead of leaving it to nationalists to expostulate their fringe theories there? -- Ghirla -трёп-  07:35, 16 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Because I don't think Wikipedians should call each other names and because perspectives held by Hryhorij Pivtorak and Vitalij Skljarenko are not fringe theories. --Daniel Bunčić 08:49, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Cleanup
Dear all, I have started to clean up the article now, as you wished. Please don't make big edits or reverts in the History and Etymology sections until I've finished the cleanup. Thanks! --Daniel Bunčić 11:46, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I've finished the cleanup, so you can make changes again. As I don't have more time at the moment, a few things remain to be done: --Daniel Bunčić 19:09, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
 * One should drop a few names of supporters of what I termed "Theory A" and "Theory B".
 * I marked the sentence "From the late 16th and throughout the 17th century the word ukraina also becomes increasingly used by the local people as the source of the ethnic self-name Ukrayintsi (Ukrainians)" with the tag. I have not found the word ukraincy in the whole card-file of the Slovnyk ukrajins’koji movy XVI—peršoji polovyny XVII st. (Lviv 1994—, ISBN 966-02-2705-1), so I would be really interested in finding such sources.
 * I didn’t know if it was wise to provide any arguments in favour of one of the two theories; and where to put them if it was. Maybe one should refer the interested reader to this discussion page?

What is said about the Ukraine in cronicles.

 * Ипатьевская летопись (1187) в отношении приграничного со степью Переяславского княжества:

«И плакашеся по нем все переяславци, бо любя дружину, и злата не сбирашеть, имения не щадяшеть, но даяшеть дружине, бе бо князь добр и крепок на рате и мужьством кригеком показася, всякими добродетельми наполнен, о нем же украина много по стона».


 * Ипатьевская летопись (1189) в отношении степного приграничья Галицкого княжества:

«И еха и Смоленьска в борзе; и приехавшю же емоу ко оукраине Галичькои, и взя два города Галичькыи, и оттоле поиде к Галичю».


 * Ипатьевская летопись (1213) о пограничьи Волынской земли, порубежьи с Польским государством :

„Данило … с братом забрал Берестий, и Угровск, и Верещин, и Столпье, и Комов, и всю Украину“.


 * Хроника Литовская и Жмудская под 1256 и 1263 годами говорит про „краины руские“ от Вильна до верховьев Немана:

„По смерти Радивиловой Миксайло, сын его, вступил на князство Новгородское и Подляское, также и всъ краин русские от Вильна аж до жродел Неманов отчистим держал правом.“.


 * Хроника Литовская и Жмудская под 1332 годом об южном порубежье Литовского княжества:

„Вси краины русские с Подольем поручил… сыновцам своим“.


 * Псковская I летопись:

„И по сем Андреи с полочаны и своея оукраины пригнавше без вести и повоеваша неколико селъ“.

„В лето 6856 (1348 г.) месяца июня 24, на Иванъ день, посадник псковскыи Илья со псковичами отъехаша къ Орешку городку в помощь Новгородцемъ противу свейского короля Магнуша. А в то время Немци развергоша миръ съ псковичи и, перехавше Норову, повоеваша села псковская. И пакы по том, съ иныя оукраины пришедше, воеваша Островскую и Изборскую; и, приехавше подо Псковъ, пожгоша Завеличье и, много зла починивше и пожегъше волости изборскыя…“.

В 1481 г. на „государевой украине“ „Украина за Окою“.


 * В „Повести о двух посольствах“:

„В наши украины и на наши городы войною учнутъ ходити“ (при царе Иване Васильевиче).


 * „Летопись о многих мятежах и о разорении Московского государства от внутренних и внешних неприятелей“:

„Приидоша на государеву Украину царевичи Крымские безвестно на Рязанские и на Каширские и на Тульской земле и воеваху те места и разоряху“.


 * В „Росписи городов“ 1652 г. упоминаются „украинские“ города Тула, Кашира, Калуга, Коломна, Переславль, Рязанский Ярославец и другие, всего 37 городов . «Калуга и другие украинские города» «В Туле и в иных украинных городах».


 * В «Росписи городов» 1663 г. говорится про «Украйные Севские города», «Украйные Польские города».


 * В «Росписи городов» 1674 г. «Малороссийских городов жители приезжают в Московское государство и в украинные городы».


 * Imperial Russian legal code seems a bit irrelevant here. Do you know of any quotes showing how fifteenth-century Cossacks used the word? —Michael Z. 2006-11-23 17:26 Z 

For User:Mzajac. Usage in Russian language is not so irrelevant here because the official languages in Muscovy and Grand duchy of Lithuania were close. And Old Pre-Ukrainian language of literati too.

Unfortunately I could not find term "Ukraine" in old Cossack cronicles (but I will try to find them). Moreover, it was common even in 17 and 18 century in Cossack cronicles and Ukrainian goverment documents to use word "Little Russia" or like without derogatory connotation. Russianname 18:42, 23 November 2006 (UTC) Also it is necessary to say that the first traces of Cossack`s existence are found in late 15 century. They did not wrote chronicles in this period. So now we need to find out when the word "Ukraine" became widely used in Ukrainian folk song, it seems that unfortunately we do not have other sources of Pre-Ukrainian folk language. Russianname 18:46, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

The oldest Ukrainian songs

 * http://www.pisni.org.ua/songs/6720547329.html The song uses "Russian land" (not Ukraine), it refers to the times of princes.
 * http://www.pisni.org.ua/songs/1044608.html The first song that uses "Ukraine". As we can understand it was written in period of active struggle against Turks and Tatars and active Cossack movement, 16 or 17 century (the first Tatar raid to Ukrainian lands was in 1482).
 * The next Ukrainian song that knows "Ukraine" tells about times of Catherine the Great (18 century) : http://www.pisni.org.ua/songs/133293321.html 217.9.0.30 19:08, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Theory A: Modern country name derived from ‘region, country’
This is a POV of 1 person, Pivtorak himself. The 2nd was Shekukhin. They are alone. No one dares support this version seriously.


 * If it was published or prominently discussed, then I guess the article should simply mention whose theory it was, and the fact that it doesn't have many supporters. —Michael Z. 2006-11-18 22:08 Z 


 * Also please pay attention that Pivtorak gives 5 or about versions of what meant "Ukraine". This is incredible. Why should we keep this mess in the article? Russianname 19:15, 23 November 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm not familiar with the literature, so I can't judge. But if it has no support at all, then at best it warrants a sentence or two of description, and not to be presented as one of two major alternatives. —Michael Z. 2006-11-23 19:31 Z 


 * I think you are right, the theory of Pivtorak seems to be very dubious. Russianname 17:08, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

NA vs V
I've seen in Russian press with my own eyes that:
 * 1) they consider "na" to be "proper usage" (exant quotation)
 * 2) when criticized by some readers who point towards Ukrainian decision that "V" should be used, the Russuan paper answered that UA has no authority over RU-lang.

That I can't bring up this citation, may be enough for a "fact" tag until I or someone else finds a quote, but pls don't remove it from the article.

--Irpen 17:27, 2 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Okay, but the citation needed tag shouldn't be left in the article indefinitely. It's ugly on purpose (I've tried to change it, but consensus won't allow that), because it's meant to encourage quick replacement of a citation or removal of the unverifiable fact.  Since this isn't in dispute, I'll leave it in with a comment, but remove the tag.  —Michael Z. 2006-02-02 18:46 Z 


 * I'm native russian speaker. Yes, it's true, that in russian it seems to say correctly "on Ukraine", not "in Ukraine" (russian word "na" means "on", "v" -- "in"). I.e. we use the same word for Ukraine, as for some island. But at the same time it does not associated with some lowered status. We use the same substitution for other sites, depending not on their states, but on their language form. For example, we can call name "Brianskaya oblast" and then say "in". This means for us some oblast with some adjective. And we can use for the same site slightly naive name - "Brianshina" and then say for it "on". "Brianshina" means something like "briansk-hood" (like childhood). So, we say "in Briansk oblast" and "on Briansk-hood", while the country is same in both cases. Yes, ukrainians ask us to use "in" for thier country. This doesn't appears as some language violence, no. It appears as making name "Ukraine" senseless identifier (removing "hood" sense). So, it seems to me, that we shoud easily say as they want. Excuse my English! :) Dims 20:57, 15 August 2006 (UTC)


 * In Russian two words (Ukraine, Rus'= Ruthenia) meaning country are used with "on", not "in". It is Russian grammar rule. But is this rule unique for Russian? Is it present in Slavonic languages?


 * In Polish "on" is in use for the Ukraine, Ruthenia, Belorussia, Lithuania, Latvia, Hungary. For Crimea, Saxonia "on" is used also. All countries listed are adjacent with Poland. Why? Hungary is not adjacent! Latvia - not! Crimea, Saxonia - there is no this countries! But Polish grammar reflects geopolitical realities of XVI century, when it was established. Slovakia only in XX century divided Hungary and Poland. Latvia, Lithuania, Belorussia, Ukraine were creating common with Poland country Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Ukraine, Ruthenia were synonyms in this period (first one was new, second one - old name). And Crimean Khanate was Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth southern neighbour, Saxonia - western.


 * In Lithuania in late 1980's - 1990's was established official opinion: using "on" is illegal, in Polish language Poles have use "in". Poles are the main native (not immigrant) minority in Lithuania (6%), concentrated in Eastern Lithuania, where they are dominant. Lokal Polish speaking press was compeled to use "in", but this never changed Polish language grammar rules in Poland and the rest of the world.


 * In Polish, where "on" for the countries is more widely used, this "on" idea is clear: it is used for ajacent counries. In the same period (XVI), East Slavonic languages already divided, Ukraine for Russians was neighbour. And it's historical name Ruthenia has this sign also. Bogomolov.PL 15:43, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

RE: The origin of the country name Ukraina Serhiy 13:43, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
Daniel, thank you for the previous response. I think we are getting there, but some more discussion would still be useful. Before I go into the subject matter, one comment on "other" terminology. When I say "king" in application to Kyiv Rus, I mean a generic "sovereign ruler". Another equivalent term could be "monarch". I know that in English the Slavic word Князь is typically translated as Prince, and do not dispute that generally. However, these differences are only naming differences, and for the purposes of the present discussion I wanted to highlight the fact that such rulers were sovereigns at their respective lands (inclreasingly so as the process of disintegration of Kyiv Rus was progressing). "Prince" does not convey that meaning fully as, in English for a general reader, it probably implies that there is a king above the prince. All this matters only tangentially for our main discussion.

Turning now to the main topic.

You disagreed with my interpretation of the usage of the word Ukraina around 1187 in the meaning synonymous to "this country", "our country" - i.e., as the proper name for the respective sovereign parts of the Kyiv Rus. You stated that you interpreted that word to be synonimous with the word "region", which could equally be applied to non-Slavic lands, i.e. was generic rather than proper. However, as a proof of your interpretation you cited a source not from that period, but from a much later period:


 * John 7:1 in the Peresopnytsia Gospel from the 16th century: "Потомь пакь іс(усъ) перемешковаль в галилеи бо не хотѣль в оукраинахь жидовскых жити."

I agree that in this citation the word used here is a synonym with a generic "region". However, this is NOT the word that was used in the Chronicles of the XIIth century, i.e., it was not used here in the same meaning. You can call it the 3rd homonym, or perhaps it was a single word with multiple meanings - the difference is purely linguistic and doesn't really matter, the point itself matters.

For comparison, here is how the word was used on its first known mentioning in the Chronicle of 1187:


 * "...и возвратишасѧ во своӕси на томъ бо поути разболѣсѧ Володимеръ Глѣбовичь . болѣстью тѧжкою ѥюже скончасѧ . И принесоша и свои градъ Переӕславль на носилицахъ . и тоу престависѧ..." ... "ѡ нем же Оукраина много постона❙". (ПСРЛ. — Т. 2. Ипатьевская летопись. — СПб., 1908. — Стлб. 652-673).

Had we been saying a similar message today, we would be saying "And the country mourned about him" - not "the region", because we speak here about a return of the sovereign ruler to his people/land, and the reaction of the people of that land to the death of their king. The word could not be possibly used in this sense with respect to "оукраинахь жидовскых". Indeed it is only in this latter case in a Chronicle of some 400 years later that the word is used in the meaning of "a region". But that is a different word, or a different meaning of the same word, or whatever one may call this. Please also note another aspect that also confirms the same distinction: the word Ukraina is capitalised when it is used synonymously to "the country", "this/our country"; and it is written lower-case when it is used synonimously with "a region".

Similarly, there existed still another meaning in which the same word was used at different historical periods, and that meaning is as you correctly quoted "borderland".

'''Now to summarise. We know that the word Ukraina was at different historical times used in three distinctly different meanings:'''

1. "The country/this country/our country" - around the XIIth century, in application to different sovereign parts of the formely united Kyiv Rus.

2. "A region" - around the XVIth century, broadly speaking.

3. "A borderland" - around the XVIth century, broadly speaking.

'''The question that we are discussing now is which of the three meanings/homonyms etc is the one on which the usage of the current country name "Ukraine" is based.

We do know that the current usage of the word Ukraina is absolutely unambiguously in the sense of "this country/our country" - i.e., it is a proper name of a sovereign entity with the capital in Kyiv etc.

'''It seems to me that, absolutely unambiguously and directly, this means that the country name "Ukraina" now is used in the same meaning as the word number 1 from the list of three above - and this answers fully the question about the etymology of the contemporary country name "Ukraine". The fact that similarly written and sounding word (or indeed the same word in its different meaning, doesn't really matter) was used, in long intermediate historical periods, in different meanings, is irrelevant for answerign the question about the origin of the contemporary country name. It is, however, of course relevant to consider all those other historical usages and reflect them in this encyclopedia as well fully - but not in answering the question of what was the origin of the current country name'''.

Having finished with that, as an aside comment, my personal view is that in practice at all periods and especially in those mirky XVIth century and around it, the same word was used by different people in different situations in different meanings of the three discussed above.

For peasants, inhabitants of small towns etc on what was just a few centuries ago clearly Kyiv Ukraina, Pereyaslav Ukraina etc, it would be very natural to keep calling their land as their fathers and grandfathers did, i.e. in the first meaning.

Then at the same time, as the land was invaded/merged etc with different surrounding countries that had their sovereignty and for the time being did not allow Ukraine its own one (making the land their province), it is plausible to imagine how the rulers of those other countries might have started using the same name that they heard from the local people (Ukraina), but without pondering much over what the origin of that word was, and instead just attributing it with an immediate natural and convenient for them meaning - "borderland" of their own countries.

As that was happening, it is also quite plausible to imagine that authentic inhabitants of the land called Ukraina, inhabitants of its villages and towns who lived there for centuries, while still continuing to use as a self-name the word Ukraina, might have become influenced by the new interpretation of that name by their new rulers - as "borderland", and use the word now even themselves in that meaning - or maybe not. The point is, we don't really know, and will probably not know until the time travel is invented, in what exactly sense a peasant in some village near Kyiv called his land Ukraina somewhere, say, in the XIVth or XVth or XVIth century - although coming closer to our times, e.g. the XIXth century, it becomes quite clear again that the usage of the word was increasingly becoming in the first sense, i.e. proper name of the land. This resurfaced fully and became again the proper name of the country at the time of the revolution of 1917 and Central Rada.

But all this is the history of Ukraine and the evolving nature of the usage of its name - but not the origin of that name, which is clearly the one from the XIIth century. Serhiy 13:39, 11 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Just four comments:
 * I know that the theory you argue in favour of is very popular in contemporary Ukraine. I just consider it false, but this does not mean that it should not appear in the article, as long as it is not the only theory mentioned.
 * What you say about the capitalization of ukraina when it means 'Ukraine' cannot be true. There are no capital letters in the ancient texts at all, not even at the beginning of sentences, because they were written either in ustav or poluustav. (Or maybe one had better say that there were no small letters yet, which amounts to the same.) If you find capitalization in the editions, this is the editor's interpretation.
 * In the quotation you give in order to support your interpretation of оукраина as 'country', I hope you are aware that the 'country' meant here is Pereyaslav and its immediate surroundings. This becomes especially clear if you take the full co-text, which shows that the reasons given why people should cry about Volodimer's death are relevant only for the people directly governed by him:
 * В лѣт̑ ҂s҃х҃ч҃е. [...] [There are wars among the East Slavic princes, and on the way back from his campaign Volodimer Glebovič, the prince of Pereyaslav, dies.] и принесоша и во свои градъ · переяславль на носилицахъ · и тоу престависѧ мс̑ца априлѧ · во · и҃ı дн҃ь и положенъ бъıс̑ во црк҃ви ст҃го михаила · и плакашасѧ по немь вси переяславци · бѣ бо любѧ дроужиноу · и злата не сбирашеть · имѣния не щадѧшеть · но даяшеть дроужинѣ · бѣ бо кнѧзь добръ · и крѣпокъ на рати · и моужьствомъ крѣпкомъ показаясѧ · и всѧкими добродѣтелми наполненъ · ѡ нем же оукраина много постона ·
 * I'm not sure if Pereyaslav is really correctly called a country.
 * Even if we admit that in the 12th century the word meant 'country', you still make a big jump from there to the 19th century when the modern meaning evolved. What about the period in between? How could a modern meaning evolve from a meaning a word had five centuries ago?
 * --Daniel Bunčić 17:39, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Daniel, regarding capitalisation - maybe, I have not seen the original lithographs but only printed editions, and I trust you on this.

Regarding the interpretation of Pereyaslav Knyazivstvo vs. country. I am not saying that the former was the latter. At the time, the notion of country did not exist yet, in the sense of a sovereign entity. Self-identification of people was with the king, not with the land. It was the king who embodied sovereingty at the time (Pereyaslav knyaz', in this example), in a similar way as today the country does. And it is in that sense that the usage of the word in 1187 and today is comparable - far more comparable than the usage of Ukraine today and the word "borderland".

Regarding the historical usage of the word in intermediate times etc, I think it will be best if I now write a version of that section as I see it per this discussion, and then if you think something is not presented in a balanced way, please comment and we'll make changes or discuss it further. Serhiy 09:36, 12 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Go ahead! --Daniel Bunčić 15:46, 12 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Is anyone even sure that "ѡ нем же оукраина много постона" actually meant that "the country mourned a lot"?
 * And if it did, could it mean "nearby villages", outside the border(fortifications) of the "градъ"?
 * And I see only one - "оукраина".
 * --JAlexoid 21:05, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

My reverts
First: In the sixteenth century, the only specific ukraina mentioned very often in Polish and Ruthenian texts was the south-eastern borderland around Kiev, and thus ukraina came to be synonymous with ‘the voivodship of Kiev’ and later ‘the region around Kiev’.

User:Szac changed ukraina to Ukraina. However, the word is used here as a common noun (meaning "region"/"borderland"), not a proper one, so it shouldn't have a first capital letter, as it doesn't in the rest of the article.

Second: Szac added this to the "borderland" theory section: The word for border is not kray but gran* related to hranit' - defend or care. Even the montain range a kind of natural border is named as grań or granie. This is an awkward OR-ish attempt to refute the theory. The fact that the word for border is not kray but gran* (what's this asterisk anyway?) is irrelevant, because it doesn't change the fact that the word okraina means something like "peripheral region" or "borderland", and the probability of "kray" (edge) leading to this meaning is not reduced. gran* is not related to hranit' - defend or care. While Ukrainian does turn "g" into "h", Proto-Slavic and Old Russian did not, and both Russian and most other Slavic languages clearly differentiate between the "gran" root (граница) and the "hran" root (хранить).

In English, the country was formerly usually referred to with the definite article, that is, the Ukraine (as in the Netherlands, the Gambia, the Sudan or the Congo), and sometimes still is. User:Dcandeto replaced "English" with "written English". I see no reason to assume that spoken English did not use the same form as written English. If they wrote "the Ukraine", it seems likely that they said "the Ukraine", too.--91.148.159.4 10:38, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

"The Ukraine" or "Ukraine" (?)
This is the English language Wikipedia. Yet there are comments on this Talk page in what appears, to this native-language English Wikipedia author and editor, to be in other languages. without translation. This is a violation of Wikipedia policies and it needs to be quickly corrected.

Editors and contributors: kindly provide a translation of your non-English words, or remove them.

Furthermore, there is a primary error in the direction of this article. The article name is "Name of Ukraine". Yet the article fails to address in the opening paragraphs one of the most central contemporary issues, of how native English language speakers should describe this current country, or this past historical region -- however you describe it -- this article fails to say how and when and where and why English-language speakers should describe this country / historical region / whatever.

Please, people: provide some clear and direct guidance for English-language speakers at the opening of this article -- regarding when, where, and how we should use of the definite article. Or not.

From a quick scan of the article and comments, I am aware there are longstanding issues around how Ukraine / the Ukraine is described. However, those issues are secondary to most native English-language speakers and writers. And you are writing on the English-language Wikipedia.

Do your job, folks. Kindly include in your opening paragraph a helpful, NPOV explanation for anyone seeking guidance on the primary issue(s) which draw English-language speakers to this article. An explanation -- not a political statement.

And kindly write in English on this Talk page. You're on the English language Wikipedia. It is not just inappropriate to write here in French, Cantonese, or Urdu. It is wrong. And you are in the wrong if you choose to do so.

Kindly stop.

cheers, Madmagic (talk) 08:39, 6 December 2008 (UTC)


 * There appear to be references copied to this talk page, for translation and inclusion into this article. Which policies does this violate?


 * And if you see something missing in this article, then of course you are welcome to improve it. Regards. —Michael Z. 2008-12-06 15:35 z 

"In English, the country was formerly usually referred to with the definite article"

This is not former usage, it's actually also current usage. The Ukraine is the more common form many English speakers still used. It is far from obsolete.--MacRusgail (talk) 15:45, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Ukrajna - Ugriana/Oguria
You should check an other, more simple possibility. This version doesn't start out from slavic language, therefore maybe it's not gonna be a popular etimology here. But this will be, for sure, by far the simplest possible origin of the name of Ukraine. You actually know everything as I see from the sources an facts, but some way you just cannot put the pices together. It happens maybe because you are trying to start the etimology form slavic language. How do you know it's name is slavic? Actually, you cannot know, you just think. What you surely know, are the sources cited above in this discussion page: the first mentioning of the name Ukrajna is from the XI.- century, and scholars agree that the original form was Ukrajna or Okraina and this name was mentionmed first in chronicles in the XI. century. You - we - dont know, what was the name of this land before. It is because it was not a united land, many kind of people lived here, and it hasn't got a name as one land. To find the origin of the name you should think like this: just before the XI. century (you need to find as close as possible) which nations occupied the territory for at least a few decades. Countries are named after people. ALL countries are named after people. No exceptions. THis is why "borderline" is the least probable version. More than that, you can close people out among the possible name givers, who lived here but their names cannot be the one that can distort into Ukraine. You will find very soon, there are sources that say that, the builders of the Kiev fort were hungarians (not the city, only the fort, check this on Kiev page) and Kiev - just like most of the territory that we call today Ukraine - was on the hand of hungarians (before they occupied the Carpathian Basin) at the end of the IX. century. Note that hungarians were called Ogurs/Ugrians by contemporary chronicles. It is not too much thinking from this to see the possibility that chronicles in the XI. century could easily call this land after its former occupiers, the Ogurs. F.e. Oguriana, Ugriana or just simply Ugria or Oguria. Maybe some say this is brave thinking, but I think it has at least a solid basis of historical facts, not like other versions f.e. "borderland" and the other ones, with no bvasis at all. It's no wonder there is so huge debate around this name. Tons of versions and no one knows the truth, neither do I. But come on, show me an other country with such a name like "borderland"...I dont think anyone could find one, because countries usually get their names from their inhabitants. Just because the word "borderland" can be traced back from slavic languages as one of the few possible meanings, it doesn't prove any more that, words sometimes can coincidentally resemble to other names from other languages. These are my thoughts and I dont allege anything, and I dont want to convince anyone about anything. It's your country you name it the way you want, and you find meaning for that as you like. But I think you need to think about every possible solutions, and I didn't find this one on this page, that's why I wrote to you guys to show you a different possible etimology. Cheers.188.142.254.84 (talk) 20:44, 18 June 2012 (UTC)
 * We are reflecting reliable sources only. If the conception you provided has a strong support in reliable sources we have add it to the article as one of the Ukraine name etymology versions. Bogomolov.PL (talk) 04:28, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

Ukraine vs the Ukraine revision
Somebody undid my revisions to the 'ukraine vs the ukraine' section claiming it was 'too POV laden.' I'm sorry, but no. The current section starts with the RIDICULOUS and over vague assertion that 'in the past, the term 'the Ukraine' was ALWAYS used' or something to that effect and then backslides into a very weak discussion of dictionary usage. What I did is far from perfect - sourcing, transliteration, and wording need work. But it is DEFINITELY not 'POV laden.' There is zero to near zero POV ladenness in there and the issue is presented evenly. I also included a far more rigorous and correct discussion of when 'the' is used with place names in English.

I have restored my edits. Maybe somebody more thoughtful or unbiased than our mad hacker deleter will be kind enough to improve and refine what I have started rather than leaving the wholly unsatisfactory section in there.

86.26.12.110 (talk) 20:46, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Revert by Iryna Harpy
Hello, Iryna. Yes, I rewrote the history section by adding a lot of reliable sources and important information. But I also kept good and suitable old text parts. Please note that grammar mistakes are not a reason to remove important information. You can correct them or ask me to correct them. Also, I didn't offend you in any way.--Shervinsky (talk) 07:21, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

I am trying to outline the difference between the versions. Lets discuss the differences one by one Alex Bakharev (talk) 08:05, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Old history paragraph
Old version:
 * The word ukraina is first recorded in the fifteenth-century Hypatian Codex — a copy of the twelfth and thirteenth-century Primary Chronicle — whose 1187 entry on the death of Prince Volodymyr of Pereyaslav says “ukraina groaned for him”, (o nem že ukraina mnogo postona). The term is also mentioned for the years 1189, 1213, 1280, and 1282 for various East Slavic lands (for example, Galician Ukrayina etc.), possibly referring to different borderlands (Vasmer 1953–1958, Rudnyc’kyj and Sychynskyj 1949) or to different principalities of Kievan Rus' (cf. Skljarenko 1991, Pivtorak 1998), therefore the 'Ukrayina'/'Ukraina' could be construed to demarcate areas 'within the borders' of Kievan Rus'.

New version:
 * The oldest mention of the word ukraina dates back to the year 1187. In connection with the death of the Vladimir Glebovich, the ruler of Principality of Pereyaslavl which was Kiev's southern shield against the Wild Fields, the Hypatian Codex says “ukraina groaned for him”, (o nem že ukraina mnogo postona). In the following decades and centuries this term was applied to fortified borderlands of different principalities of Rus' without a specific geographic fixation: Halych-Volhynia, Pskov, Ryazan etc.

I do not see much difference in the text but the references are completely different. Can we merge the text? Can we merge the sources? Vasmer seems to be a pretty authoritative source for the East Slavic Etymology. His dictionary is available online can we use it as a source?
 * Hello Alex. Thank you for your pragmatic mediation. I already use Vasmer in my sources in the latter paragraphs. I'm strongly against the last sentence in the old version since it is a strange and confusing hybrid of two versions. As far as I know, Pivtorak and Sklyarenko competely deny any relationship to "borderland" ("Україна - це не окраїна"). Moreover, I've presented lots of evidence that their theory is not scientific mainstream. Therefore, we shouldn't increase their significance by mentioning them in one line with the academic version as equal. --Shervinsky (talk) 11:50, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Polish rule and cossaks
Old version:
 * In the sixteenth century, both Polish and Ukrainian sources used the word Ukraina with specific reference to the large south-eastern Kiev Voivodeship, including the voivodships of Bratslav after 1569 and Chernihiv after 1619.


 * Seventeenth-century Zaporozhian Cossacks used the term in a more poetic sense, to refer to their 'fatherland'. Western cartographers, including Guillaume Le Vasseur de Beauplan and Johann Baptiste Homman, drew maps of "Ukraine" as the "land of the Cossacks". But the name seems to have been in common use when the Swedish army entered Ukraine in October 1708. The Swedish officers wrote in their diaries that the Desna river was the border between Severia and Ukranien, and further "the city of Baturin, that was the capital of Okranien and Field Marshal Matzeppa's residence" and when Mazepa entered the Swedish headquarters he brought some "distinguished Ukrainian cossacks".


 * After the decline of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the word fell into disuse. The Cossack state became the autonomous Hetmanate owing fealty to Muscovy, and eventually became the Russian imperial guberniya of Little Russia (Malorossija). The name Ukraine stuck to the Cossack territories near Kharkiv, alternatively known as the Sloboda Ukraine.

New version:
 * As Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary tells, after the South-Western Rus' was subordinated to the Polish Crown in 1569, a particular part of its territory from eastern Podolia to Zaporozhie got the inofficial name Ukraina due to its border function to the nomadic Tatar world in the south. The Polish chronist Samuel Grądzki who wrote about the Khmelnytsky Uprising in 1660 explained the word Ukraina as the land located at the edge of the Polish kingdom. Thus, in the course of the 16th-18th centuries Ukraine became a concrete regional name among other historic regions such as Podolia, Severia, or Volhynia. It was used for the middle Dnieper territory controlled by the Cossacks. . The people of Ukraina were called Ukrainians (українці, українники) . This term had no ethnical meaning since it was also used for Polish soldiers who were on duty in this territory . Later, the term Ukraine was used for the Hetmanate lands on both sides of the Dnieper although it didn't become the official name of the state.

Look like two different stories. Can we just merge them together? Alex Bakharev (talk) 08:09, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * The old version consists merely of selective examples that don't contradict the new text. I suggest to keep the new text because it analyzes and explains the evolution of the naming situation in general. Examples of the old text reduce, in my opinion, the concision and the clarity of the new text and raise questions about their selectivity. The claim about Sloboda Ukraine is wrong, it was not the only region in the Russian Empire which kept this inofficial name. --Shervinsky (talk) 12:01, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Russian empire and independence
Old version:
 * During the nineteenth century a cultural and political debate arose among Ukrainians and others about their national status, in both Imperial Russia and Austro-Hungarian Galicia. The 'Russophiles', who saw Moscow and St. Petersburg as the centres of East Slavic culture considered themselves ethnic Little Russians (Malorossy), part of the "Russian" (i.e. East Slavic) people.  The 'Old Ruthenians' in Galicia saw themselves as inheritors of the heritage of Kievan Rus’ through the Galician-Volhynian Kingdom. They stuck to the traditional self-appellation Ruthenians (Rusyny, as opposed to Russkije 'Russians', both words being cognates of Rus’).
 * However, others saw themselves as an independent nation of East Slavs, south of Russia and stretching between Poland and the Caucasus. In the 1830s, Nikolay Kostomarov and his Brotherhood of Saints Cyril and Methodius in Kiev started to use the name Ukrainians (Ukrajinci).  Their work was suppressed by Russian authorities, and associates including Taras Shevchenko were sent into internal exile, but the idea gained acceptance.  It was also taken up by Volodymyr Antonovych and the Khlopomany ('peasant-lovers'), former Polish gentry in Eastern Ukraine, and later by the 'Ukrainophiles' in Galicia, including Ivan Franko.  By the beginning of the twentieth century, Ukrajina superseded Malorossija in popularity and came to be applied to the whole of modern-day Ukraine, minus the Crimea.
 * After the Russian Revolution of 1917, the word ukraina finally became a country name by being applied to a specific geographic territory. The Ukrainian People's Republic (later incorporating the West Ukrainian People's Republic), the Ukrainian State under Skoropadsky's Hetmanate, and the Bolshevik Party which created the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic by 1920 (helping found the Soviet Union in 1922, and renamed Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, transposing the second and third word, in 1936), each named their state Ukraine.  In 1991, Ukraine became an independent state.

New version:
 * From the 18th century on, the term Ukraine becomes equally well-known in the Russian Empire as the official and ecclesiastic term Little Russia. With the growth of national self-consciosness the significance of the term rose and it was perceived not only as a geographic but also as an ethnic name. In the 1830s, Nikolay Kostomarov and his Brotherhood of Saints Cyril and Methodius in Kiev started to use the name Ukrainians.  Their work was suppressed by Russian authorities, and associates including Taras Shevchenko were sent into internal exile, but the idea gained acceptance. It was also taken up by Volodymyr Antonovych and the Khlopomany ('peasant-lovers'), former Polish gentry in Eastern Ukraine, and later by the 'Ukrainophiles' in Galicia, including Ivan Franko. The evolution of the meaning became particularily obvious at the end of the 19th century . At the turn to the 20th century the term Ukraine became independent and self-sufficient, pushing aside regional self-definitions  In the course of the political struggle between the Little Russian and the Ukrainian identitites, it challenged the traditional term Little Russia ("Малороссия") and ultimately defeated it in the 1920s during the Bolshevik policy of Korenization and Ukrainization..

The old version has no references that is not good at all although the facts were not challenged and I guess the references can be provided. Are there any irreconcilable differences in the story? Alex Bakharev (talk) 08:18, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * I took over parts of the old text (Kostomarov, Khlopomany) that I consider important. I think, Galicia is not very relevant in this terminologic issue, because it was pretty the last region that went over to the name Ukraine und Ukrainians. In think, we can additionally consider the mentioning of the choice of the term Ukraine for the short-lived states of Skoropadsky and Petlyura. --Shervinsky (talk) 12:12, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Historical/Alternative interpretation as ‘region, country’
The difference in the section title. The old version uses word Historical the new version uses word Alternative Both titles denigrates the alternative version: Historical denigrates it a little bit stronger (nowdays nobody uses it), alternative is a little bit more polite (not a mainstream but an alternative). What is better?

The new version also adds the following paragraph with the criticism of the theory:
 * Claims of Pivtorak, Shelukhin and other promoters of Ukraine's alternative etymology have faced critical feedback for methodological inaccuracy.

I think it is a good idea if we formulate a theory as only historical or alternative to include some references to the criticism. Alex Bakharev (talk) 08:27, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Full support. --Shervinsky (talk) 12:12, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Is a journalist  a reliable source?  According to he was graduated in the field of industrial electronics. Smirnoff 80 (talk) 13:06, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Untitled
Please expand with material from Ukraine. —Michael Z. 2005-12-28 07:07 Z 

Other Links
Ghirla this is not original research, please see also other sourse:
 * Ivan Ohienko НАШІ НАЗВИ: РУСЬ — УКРАЇНА — МАЛОРОСІЯ
 * Jaroslav Rudnyckyj, Volodymyr Sichynskyi НАЗВА УКРАЇНА in "Encyclopedia of Ukraine" --Yakudza

Term Ukraine in Polish sources

 * В 1596 г. польный гетман С. Жолкевский пишет о восстании Северина Наливайко:

«Вся Украина показачилась для измены, шпионов полно. Обязательно нужно, обычно, тщательно заботится об этой Украине».


 * В 1650 г. в сочинение «Описание Украины» инженер Гийом де Боплан пишет в посвящении польскому Яну-Казимиру:

«Я осмеливаюсь предложить Вашему Королевскому Величеству описание этой обширной пограничной украины, находящейся между Московией и Трансильванией».


 * Самуил Грондский, польский автор истории Хмельниччины (около 1660 г.):

«Латинское margo (граница, рубеж) по-польски край, отсюда Украина — как бы область, расположенная у края королевства».

Prep for assessment
I'd like to hear more opinions on the Theory A and Theory B business. A citation is needed for the third theory about “carving out the land.” The entire section Name of Ukraine looks like WP:OR, and has no supporting citations.

If these can't be resolved in a few days, I'll move them to the talk page. I'd like to improve this article's assessed status. —Michael Z. 2008-11-19 05:59 z