Ukrainian Place Names: How Villages Changed Through History

Why Place Names Matter in Genealogy

In Ukrainian genealogy, identifying the ancestral village is the single most important breakthrough a researcher can make. Without the village name, research in Ukrainian archives is virtually impossible -- church records, census documents, and land registers are all organized by parish or administrative district, and you need the village name to know which records to search.

But finding the village is only half the battle. Ukrainian place names have been spelled, transliterated, and renamed so many times over the centuries that a village your great-grandmother called by one name may appear under completely different names in historical records, modern maps, and immigration documents. A single village might be known by its Polish name in one set of records, its German name in another, its Russian name in a third, and its modern Ukrainian name on today's maps -- and each of these names might be romanized (transliterated into Latin script) in multiple different ways.

This article will help you navigate this complexity. By understanding how and why village names changed, and by learning to use the tools available for cross-referencing old and new names, you can identify your ancestral village even when the name you inherited from family tradition does not appear on any modern map.

Names Under the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

Before the partitions of Poland (1772-1795), much of what is now western and central Ukraine was part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Under Polish rule, village names were recorded in Polish, and many place names that appear in early documents reflect Polish spelling conventions.

Polish Spelling Conventions

Polish uses the Latin alphabet with several distinctive features that affect how Ukrainian place names were recorded:

• "w" is pronounced like English "v" -- so a village spelled "Wolica" is pronounced "Volitsa"
• "cz" represents the "ch" sound -- "Borszczow" is pronounced "Borshchov"
• "sz" represents the "sh" sound -- "Szumsk" is pronounced "Shumsk"
• "rz" represents a sound similar to "zh" -- "Brzezany" is pronounced approximately "Bzhezany"
• "l" with a stroke is pronounced like English "w" -- so names containing this letter may be rendered differently in different systems

Examples of Polish vs. Ukrainian Village Names

Understanding Polish spelling conventions is essential for anyone researching ancestors from Galicia, as Polish-language records and maps dominate the archival landscape for this region from the 14th century through 1939.

Names Under the Austrian Habsburg Empire

After the First Partition of Poland in 1772, Galicia became part of the Austrian Habsburg Empire (later Austria-Hungary). Austrian administrators imposed their own naming and mapping conventions on the province, introducing German-language versions of place names alongside the existing Polish and Ukrainian ones.

German Naming Conventions

The Austrian administration created official gazetteers and maps that recorded village names in German. Some villages received entirely new German names, while others were simply transliterated according to German phonetic conventions. Austrian-era records -- particularly official government documents, military maps, and cadastral (land registry) maps -- use these German names.

The Austrian Cadastral System

One of the most significant legacies of Austrian rule for genealogists is the cadastral map system. Beginning in the early 19th century, Austrian surveyors created extraordinarily detailed maps of every village in Galicia, showing individual plots of land, buildings, roads, rivers, and the boundaries of each commune. Each village received an official name in the cadastral register, and these names became the administrative standard.

The cadastral system also assigned a unique number to every plot of land, creating a reference system that linked land ownership records to specific parcels. For genealogists, this means that once you identify a village, you can potentially trace your ancestor's exact plot of land through the cadastral records.

Multiple Names in Austrian Records

Austrian-era documents frequently list village names in multiple languages: German, Polish, and sometimes Ukrainian (Ruthenian). Census records, for example, might list a village as "Bohorodczany (Bogorodchany)" with the German administrative name followed by the local name in parentheses. This multilingual practice, while confusing, is actually helpful for genealogists because it provides cross-references between naming systems.

Names Under the Russian Empire

Central and eastern Ukraine were part of the Russian Empire from the late 18th century until 1917. Under Russian rule, place names were recorded in Russian Cyrillic script, and many Ukrainian place names were Russified to conform to Russian phonetic and grammatical patterns.

Russification of Place Names

The Russian Empire systematically imposed Russian-language names on Ukrainian settlements. While many village names were simply transliterated from Ukrainian into Russian (which uses a slightly different alphabet and phonetic system), some underwent more substantial changes:

• Ukrainian "h" was replaced by Russian "g" -- so "Horodok" became "Gorodok"
• Ukrainian "i" was often replaced by Russian "e" in certain positions
• Ukrainian word endings were adapted to Russian grammatical patterns
• Some villages were renamed entirely to honour Russian officials, military victories, or religious figures

Administrative Divisions

The Russian Empire organized territory into guberniia (provinces), which were subdivided into uezdy (districts), which were further divided into volosti (administrative areas roughly equivalent to a township). Village names in Russian-era records must be understood in the context of these administrative divisions, because the same village name could exist in multiple guberniia. To uniquely identify a village, you need the village name and the uezd or guberniia.

Key Guberniia for Ukrainian Genealogy

Names Under Polish Interwar Rule (1918-1939)

After World War I, western Ukraine (Galicia and western Volhynia) became part of the Second Polish Republic (1918-1939). The Polish administration restored and reinforced Polish-language place names, often reverting to the names used before Austrian rule or creating new Polonized versions.

Impacts on Genealogical Research

The interwar period is significant for genealogists because many Ukrainian immigrants to Canada left during or just before this era, and their memories (and documents) may reflect Polish-language place names. When an immigrant told Canadian officials they came from "Stanislawow," they were using the Polish name for the city now known as Ivano-Frankivsk. When they said "Lwow," they meant Lviv.

Interwar Polish records -- including civil registration documents, military records, and land records -- are held in both Polish and Ukrainian archives. The Polish State Archives (Archiwum Panstwowe) retain many records from the interwar period for territories that were then part of Poland but are now in Ukraine.

Names Under the Soviet Union

After World War II, all of Ukraine was incorporated into the Soviet Union. The Soviet administration undertook a systematic renaming campaign that affected villages across Ukraine.

Types of Soviet Renaming

• Ideological renaming -- villages were renamed after Communist figures, revolutionary events, or Soviet ideals. A village once named after a saint might be renamed "Zhovtnevoe" (October), "Pervomaiskoie" (May Day), or "Leninskoie" (Lenin). These ideological names were imposed particularly during the 1920s-1930s and again after World War II.
• Consolidation -- the Soviet policy of consolidating collective farms (kolkhozy) sometimes led to the merger of neighbouring villages under a single name. Small hamlets were absorbed into larger settlements, and their original names ceased to appear on official maps.
• Ukrainianization -- paradoxically, the early Soviet period (1920s) briefly promoted Ukrainian-language place names as part of the korenizatsiia (nativization) policy. Villages that had been Russified under the Tsarist era were given back their Ukrainian names. This policy was reversed under Stalin in the 1930s.
• Russian-language standardization -- Soviet-era maps and official documents recorded Ukrainian place names in Russian, using Russian spelling conventions. This created yet another layer of naming variation.

Post-WWII Changes in Western Ukraine

When western Ukraine (formerly under Polish and Austro-Hungarian rule) was absorbed into the Soviet Union after 1945, many place names underwent dramatic changes. Cities and towns that had been known by their Polish names for centuries were officially renamed with Ukrainian equivalents: Lwow became Lviv, Stanislawow became Stanislav (and later Ivano-Frankivsk in 1962), and Tarnopol became Ternopil. Villages underwent similar changes, often reverting to Ukrainian forms that had been used colloquially but never officially.

Names in Modern Independent Ukraine

Since independence in 1991, Ukraine has conducted a major program of place name reform, replacing Soviet-era names with Ukrainian names -- either restoring historical names or creating new ones. This process, known as decommunization, accelerated dramatically after 2015 with the passage of laws banning Soviet-era symbols and names.

Decommunization Renaming

Thousands of settlements were renamed under the decommunization laws. Villages named after Lenin, Communist Party leaders, or Soviet-era concepts received new names, often drawn from local geography, history, or pre-Soviet traditions. For genealogists, this means that the name a village bears today may differ from the name it carried in Soviet-era records, which in turn differs from its pre-Soviet name.

The 2020 Administrative Reform

In 2020, Ukraine implemented a major administrative reform that reorganized the country's administrative divisions. The old system of approximately 490 raiony (districts) was replaced with approximately 136 larger districts. While village names were not changed, the district to which a village belongs may have changed. This is important for genealogists who use district names to locate records in archives.

Romanization Challenges

Even when you know the correct name of a village in Ukrainian, converting it to Latin script (romanization) creates additional complications. There is no single standard for romanizing Ukrainian place names, and different systems produce different spellings.

Major Romanization Systems

• Official Ukrainian system (2010) -- used by the Ukrainian government for passports, road signs, and official maps. This system produces spellings like "Kyiv" (not "Kiev"), "Lviv" (not "Lvov"), and "Kharkiv" (not "Kharkov").
• Library of Congress system -- used by libraries and academic institutions in North America. Produces slightly different spellings, particularly for soft consonants and the letters "ye" and "yu."
• BGN/PCGN system -- used by the US Board on Geographic Names and the Permanent Committee on Geographical Names (UK). This system appears on many English-language maps.
• Historical Polish romanization -- the de facto standard in many older reference works and genealogical databases, since Galician place names were originally recorded in Polish Latin script.

Practical Impact

The same village might appear as:

• Borshchiv (modern Ukrainian romanization)
• Borshchev (Russian-based romanization)
• Borszczow (Polish spelling)
• Borschtschow (German spelling)

When searching databases, you must try all plausible spellings. A search for "Borshchiv" will not find records indexed under "Borszczow," and vice versa.

Common Village Naming Patterns

Understanding the patterns behind Ukrainian village names can help you interpret unfamiliar names and identify potential connections between villages.

Topographic Names

Many villages are named after geographic features:

• -rivne / -rivnia -- from "rivnyna" (plain) -- a village on flat ground
• -horod / -gorod -- from "horod" (fortified settlement, city)
• -pole / -pil -- from "pole" (field)
• -lisy / -lisne -- from "lis" (forest)
• -potik / -potok -- from "potik" (stream)
• -ozero / -ozerne -- from "ozero" (lake)
• -hora / -hirne -- from "hora" (mountain)

Names from Personal Names

Many villages are named after their founder or a prominent landowner:

• -ivka / -ivtsi -- patronymic suffixes (e.g., Petrivka = Peter's village, Ivanivtsi = Ivan's people)
• -yntsi / -intsi -- another patronymic suffix indicating descendants (e.g., Fedorintsi = descendants of Fedir)
• -shchyna -- indicates a territory associated with a person (e.g., Khmelnychchyna = Khmelnytsky's land)

Religious Names

Villages named after churches or saints:

• Bohorodchany -- from "Bohorodytsia" (Mother of God)
• Mykolaiv -- from "Mykolai" (St. Nicholas)
• Ivanivka -- from "Ivan" (St. John) -- though this could also be a patronymic

Occupational Names

• Kovalivka -- from "koval" (blacksmith)
• Honcharivka -- from "honchar" (potter)
• Bondarivka -- from "bondar" (cooper / barrel maker)

Tools for Finding Old Village Names

Several online tools and databases are specifically designed to help genealogists identify old village names and cross-reference them across different naming systems.

Shtetl Seeker

Shtetl Seeker (available at JewishGen.org) is one of the most powerful tools for finding villages in Eastern Europe, despite being originally developed for Jewish genealogy. The tool allows you to search for a place name using Daitch-Mokotoff Soundex, which matches names that sound similar regardless of spelling. This is ideal for Ukrainian genealogy because it accounts for the multiple transliterations that a single village name might undergo.

To use Shtetl Seeker:

1. Enter the village name as you know it (any spelling)
2. Select the search type: "Exact," "Sounds Like" (Soundex), or "Begins With"
3. Choose the country or region to narrow results
4. Review the results, which show the village name in multiple languages along with latitude/longitude coordinates and the administrative district

JRI-Poland Database

The JRI-Poland database covers the historical region of Galicia in great detail. It cross-references Polish, German, Ukrainian, and Yiddish place names and links them to specific archival collections. Even for non-Jewish genealogists, this database is invaluable because Galician church records -- whether Catholic, Greek Catholic, or Orthodox -- were all part of the same administrative system.

Gesher Galicia Map Room

The Gesher Galicia organization provides access to historical maps of Galicia, including Austrian-era cadastral maps. Their online map room allows you to locate villages on detailed historical maps and compare their positions with modern geography.

Genealogical Gazetteers

Several published gazetteers (geographical dictionaries) are essential references for identifying Ukrainian villages:

• Slownik Geograficzny Krolestwa Polskiego (Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland, 15 volumes, 1880-1902) -- the most comprehensive gazetteer for Galicia and other formerly Polish territories. Available digitized online, it lists every village with its administrative location, population, church, and other details -- all in Polish.
• Gemeindelexikon der im Reichsrate vertretenen Konigreiche und Lander (Austrian census gazetteers) -- published after each Austrian census, these volumes list every settlement in Galicia with population, administrative district, and church affiliation -- in German.

Cadastral Maps for Village Identification

Austrian cadastral maps are among the most valuable tools for identifying ancestral villages in Galicia. Created between 1817 and 1861, these large-scale maps show every building, road, river, field boundary, and geographic feature in each village.

What Cadastral Maps Show

• Individual buildings -- houses, barns, churches, taverns, mills
• Plot boundaries -- each parcel of land is numbered and corresponds to an entry in the cadastral register that identifies the owner
• Roads and paths -- including the routes between neighbouring villages
• Waterways -- rivers, streams, ponds
• Village name -- clearly labeled, usually in German or Polish
• Neighbouring villages -- identified at the map edges

Where to Find Cadastral Maps

• Central State Historical Archives of Ukraine in Lviv (TsDIAL) -- holds cadastral maps for most of Galicia
• Austrian State Archives (Osterreichisches Staatsarchiv) in Vienna -- holds copies of Galician cadastral maps
• Gesher Galicia -- has digitized and made available online a growing collection of cadastral maps
• Mapire.eu -- an online portal that hosts historical Habsburg-era military maps overlaid on modern mapping, allowing direct comparison

Using Cadastral Maps for Genealogy

Once you identify your ancestral village on a cadastral map, you can cross-reference the plot numbers with the cadastral register (Grundbuch) to identify who owned each parcel of land. In some cases, it is possible to identify the exact plot that your ancestor farmed -- and, combined with church records and census data, to reconstruct the family's life in the village with remarkable precision.

Practical Research Strategy

Given the complexity of Ukrainian place name changes, here is a practical step-by-step strategy for identifying your ancestral village:

1. Record the name exactly as your family remembers it. Do not correct or standardize it. The family's pronunciation and spelling, however "wrong" it may seem, is your primary clue.
2. Check immigration records. Ship manifests, border crossing records, and naturalization papers often record the village of origin. The spelling will reflect the language of the recording official (English, German, or sometimes Polish). Note every variant you find. For help navigating these records, see our guide to map resources for Ukrainian genealogy.
3. Search Shtetl Seeker using the "Sounds Like" option. Enter the name as you have it and review all results within the plausible geographic area (Galicia, Volhynia, etc.).
4. Consult the Slownik Geograficzny. If you have a Polish-form name, look it up in this comprehensive gazetteer. The entry will tell you the district, population, churches, and often the neighbouring villages -- all of which help confirm identification.
5. Locate the village on a historical map. Use Mapire.eu, Gesher Galicia's map room, or digitized Austrian military maps to find the village geographically. Confirm that the location matches what your family history suggests (correct region, correct distance from known landmarks).
6. Cross-reference with modern maps. Once you have identified the village on a historical map, find the same location on Google Maps or OpenStreetMap. Note the modern Ukrainian name -- this is the name you will need when contacting Ukrainian archives or ordering records.
7. Check for multiple villages with the same name. Common names like "Ivanivka" or "Mykhailivka" appear dozens of times across Ukraine. Use the administrative district, neighbouring village names, and church affiliation to distinguish between them.
8. Verify through church records. Once you have a candidate village, search for its church records (through FamilySearch, the Lviv archives, or the relevant oblast archive). If you find your family's names in the parish register, you have confirmed the identification.

The complexity of Ukrainian place names is one of the most challenging aspects of Ukrainian genealogy -- but it is also one of the most rewarding puzzles to solve. Every layer of renaming and transliteration reflects a chapter in Ukraine's rich and turbulent history. When you finally identify your ancestral village, linking the name your family preserved through generations of oral tradition to a specific dot on a map, you have accomplished something remarkable: you have reconnected a broken thread of memory that stretches across an ocean and a century.

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