Names and names in history


1. What historians can learn by name?

Time has preserved for us a valuable historical source – “Register of the Army of Zaporizhia in 1649”, sealed with the handwritten signatures of Hetman Bogdan Khmelnitsky and the general clerk Ivan Vygovsky and the state seal. On 808 yellowed pages of this document contains a list of the names of forty thousand Cossacks. The most common at that time were the surnames of Andrienko, Vasilenko, Gritsenko, Ivanenko… In the register you can come across such rhyming names and names that are characteristic in the national language: Ivan Movchan, Protas Mukotryas, Matvey Postii, Andrukh Glukh, Matvei Zamorius.

Many names reflect the folk humor, wit, goodwill of Ukrainians, in particular such as Okonko, Zolotko, Zozulka, Pysanka, Golubchik, Chudoma.

And how many there are evidence of the richest possibilities of Ukrainian word-building! For example, in the register you can count about six dozen surnames formed

from the word nose: Nose, Beznos, Krivonos, Lupinos, Netrinos, Perebinos, Nosach, Krasnosnenko, Nositsky… The register also shows the diversity of synonyms of the then Ukrainian language: Balakalo, Govor, Gutarenko, Rozmova, Povidailo.

2. Texts about names and titles

A) People make history. Everyone has a name. The historian can not do without knowledge about what were the names in the gray antiquity, how they changed. In ancient times, the name was chosen depending on the circumstances of the child’s appearance. So, a girl who was born in winter, could call Winter. Sometimes parents, giving a name, expressed their attitude to a new member of the family – a child whose birth was eagerly awaited, gave the name Zhdanko, Lyubko. And how many could tell the names of appearance and disposition! Among the ancient Ukrainians were Dribki, Svetliki, Dobryny, and Gordyn. Our ancestors believed in the magical power of the name, considered it an amulet. Therefore, they often called children Wolves, Bears, believing that such names scare away evil spirits.

Our ancestors and complex names-Borislav,

Dobroslav, Slawomir, Svyatopolk, Yaropolk, etc., used these names. Such names were common, as a rule, in princely families. Therefore, they are called princely.

B) At different times the largest river of Ukraine had several names – the Dnieper, Slavuta, Borisfen… How did they come about, which one is the oldest? Today, scientists are unanimous that the name Dnepr is the oldest. The root of the Don – with the meaning “water” is known in the names of many rivers: Don, Donets, Dniester, Danube…

3. What names in your hometown are reminiscent of the past?

According to the testimony of foreign travelers, the construction of the Armenian street was one of the best in Lviv. The decoration of the street and the city was the Armenian Cathedral of the Assumption of the Virgin, built in 1363 by means of wealthy Armenian merchants. Armenians settled in Lviv in the second half of the 13th century. According to archival sources, 60 families of Armenians lived in the city at that time.

The chronicle “The Tale of Bygone Years” has preserved a legend explaining the name of the city of Pereyaslav: here was a duel between the Pecheneg giant and the boy-boy who lived in this locality. The stranger was thrown to the ground by our hero, “shouted and ran the Pechenegs, and the Rusich pursued them, beating them, and drove them away, but Vladimir rejoiced and laid the city near the ford of that and called him Pereyaslav, because the boy took the glory.” The second part to the name was added in 1943 to perpetuate the memory of the events of the National Liberation War of the mid-17th century. There are Pogiaslav-Khmelnytsky and Bogdan Khmelnitsky Square, and the Pereyaslavsky Rada Square, where in 1654 the hetman assembled the Cossack Council, which made a decision on military alliance with the Moscow Tsar.


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Names and names in history