Ukrainian

Ukrainian is an East Slavic language related to Russian and Belarusian. It is spoken by forty million people throughout the world. It Is the official language of Ukraine, and also a spoken language in several European countries like Serbia, Slovakia, Poland, Croatia, etc. All existing dialects are divided into three groups: south-eastern (modern literary version), south-western and northern.

Historical background

Originally, Ukrainian is derived both from the Proto-Slavic and the Old East Slavic languages. It was also strongly influenced by the Polish and Slovak languages. The entire history of language formation is conventionally divided into two periods. The Old Ukrainian language was widely spread until the middle of the 18th century, and later the modern language began to develop. I.P. Kotlyarevsky and T.G. Shevchenko had a crucial role in the formation of the literary language.

The very term "the Ukrainian language" began to be used only after the collapse of the Russian Empire. Before that, it was called "Russian", "South Russian", or "Little Russian". Together with the name, the language secured final recognition as an independent one.

Curious Facts

The Ukrainian language contains words of Sanskrit origin. There is a theory suggested by Vasil Kobiluh that Ukrainian derived from Sanskrit. Thus, according to the theory, the Ukrainian language is about 3000 years old.

Unlike most Slavic languages, Ukrainian has the vocative case, which is common in Greek and Latin. When counting the synonyms, the scientists found out the curious fact that most of them are for the word "beat" – 45.

The names of the months, which determine a specific period of the year by natural phenomena, were also borrowed into Ukrainian from the Old Slavic language. For example, "luty" or February is associated with a hard frost, "traven" – with green meadows and fields, and "serpen" – with agricultural tools, which indicates the harvest. Generally, many of the contemporary words began to be used in the times of Tripolye culture.

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