The Ukraine Portal - Портал України
Ukraine Україна (Ukrainian) | |
|---|---|
| ISO 3166 code | UA |
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the north; Poland and Slovakia to the west; Hungary, Romania and Moldova to the southwest; and the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov to the south and southeast. Kyiv is the nation's capital and largest city, followed by Kharkiv, Odesa, and Dnipro. Ukraine's official language is Ukrainian.
Humans have inhabited Ukraine since 32,000 BC. During the Middle Ages, it was the site of early Slavic expansion and later became a key centre of East Slavic culture under the state of Kievan Rus', which emerged in the 9th century. Kievan Rus' became the largest and most powerful realm in Europe in the 10th and 11th centuries, but gradually disintegrated into rival regional powers before being destroyed by the Mongols in the 13th century. For the next 600 years the area was contested, divided, and ruled by a variety of external powers, including the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the Kingdom of Poland, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Austrian Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Tsardom of Russia.
The Cossack Hetmanate emerged in central Ukraine in the 17th century but was partitioned between Russia and Poland before being absorbed by the Russian Empire in the late 19th century. Ukrainian nationalism developed and, following the Russian Revolution in 1917, the short-lived Ukrainian People's Republic was formed. The Bolsheviks consolidated control over much of the former empire and established the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, which became a constituent republic of the Soviet Union in 1922. In the early 1930s, millions of Ukrainians died in the Holodomor, a human-made famine. During World War II, Ukraine was occupied by Germany and endured major battles and atrocities, resulting in 7 million civilians killed, including most Ukrainian Jews.
Ukraine gained independence in 1991 as the Soviet Union dissolved, declaring itself neutral. A new constitution was adopted in 1996 as the country transitioned to a free market liberal democracy amid endemic corruption and a legacy of state control. The Orange Revolution of 2004–2005 ushered electoral and constitutional reforms. Resurgent political crises prompted a series of mass demonstrations in 2014 known as the Euromaidan, leading to a revolution, at the end of which Russia unilaterally occupied and annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula, and pro-Russian unrest culminated in a war in Donbas with Russian-backed separatists and Russia. Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. (Full article...)
In the news
- 5 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Russian strikes against Ukrainian infrastructure
- A series of Russian strikes targeting Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, Odesa, and Sumy Oblasts kills at least five people and injures 13 others. (Euronews)
- 3 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Attacks in Russia during the Russian invasion of Ukraine
- A massive fire is reported at an oil refinery in Sochi, Russia, following a Ukrainian drone attack on the facility. Smoke from the fire prompts Russian authorities to close Sochi International Airport. (BBC News)
- 2 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Attacks in Russia during the Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Ukrainian forces launch drone attacks on Penza Oblast, Samara Oblast, and Rostov Oblast in Russia, killing at least three people, according to Russian officials. (AP)
- The Ukrainian military targets the Ryazan Refinery in Ryazan Oblast, Russia, with drones and causes a fire at the facility. (Reuters)
- 1 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- United States and the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia–United States relations
- U.S. president Donald Trump orders the deployment of two United States Navy nuclear submarines near Russia for potential military action against Russian forces in response to statements made by former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev and current deputy chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation regarding Trump's previously-stated deadline for ending the war in Ukraine. (Reuters) (BBC News)
- 31 July 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Kyiv strikes, Attacks on civilians in the Russian invasion of Ukraine
Recognized content - 
Entries here consist of Good and Featured articles, which meet a core set of high editorial standards.
-
The Bucha massacre (Ukrainian: Бучанська різанина, romanized: Buchanska rizanyna; Russian: Резня в Буче, romanized: Reznya v Buche) was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the fight for and occupation of the city of Bucha as part of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022, after Russian forces withdrew from the city. Verbal reports had been emerging since early March.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including nine children under the age of 18. Among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes, possibly related to the occupation. A memorial wall was installed in Bucha with 501 names of killed residents. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at close range. An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. In intercepted conversations, Russian soldiers referred to these operations involving hunting down people in lists, filtration, torture, and execution as zachistka ("cleansing"). Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed. The massacre was described by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as genocide. (Full article...) -
Borys Mykolaiovych Lyatoshynsky, also known as Boris Nikolayevich Lyatoshinsky, (3 January 1895 [O.S. 22 December 1894] – 15 April 1968) was a Ukrainian composer, conductor, and teacher. A leading member of the new generation of 20th century Ukrainian composers, he was awarded a number of accolades, including the honorary title of People's Artist of the Ukrainian SSR and two Stalin Prizes.
He received his primary education at home, where Polish literature and history was held in high esteem. After completing school in 1913, he entered the Faculty of Law at Kyiv University, and as a graduate was employed to teach music at the Kyiv Conservatory. During the 1910s, Lyatoshynsky wrote 31 works of various musical genres. During the 1930s he travelled to Tajikistan to study folk music and compose a ballet about the life of local people. From 1935 to 1938, and from 1941 to 1944, he taught orchestration at the Moscow Conservatory. During the war, Lyatoshynsky was evacuated and taught at the Conservatory's branch in Saratov, where he worked on arrangements of Ukrainian songs, and organised the transportation of Ukrainian musical manuscripts away to safety. (Full article...) -
The St. Michael's Golden-Domed Monastery is a monastery in Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, dedicated to Saint Michael the Archangel. It is located on the edge of the bank of the Dnipro river, to the northeast of the St Sophia Cathedral. The site is in the historical administrative neighbourhood of Uppertown and overlooks Podil, the city's historical commercial and merchant quarter. The monastery has been the headquarters of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine since December 2018.
Built in the Middle Ages by the Kievan Rus' ruler Sviatopolk II Iziaslavych, the monastery comprises the cathedral church, the Refectory Church of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian, constructed in 1713, the Economic Gate, constructed in 1760, and the bell tower, which was added in the 1710s. The exterior of the structure was remodelled in the Ukrainian Baroque style during the 18th century; the interior retained its original Byzantine architecture. (Full article...) -
The Vorontsov Palace: the northern entrance façade. The stone was mined locally as part of a conscious effort to blend the building with its mountainous surroundings.
The Vorontsov Palace (Ukrainian: Воронцовський палац, romanized: Vorontsovs'kyi palats; Russian: Воронцовский дворец, romanized: Vorontsovskiy Dvorets) or the Alupka Palace is a historic palace situated at the foot of the Crimean Mountains near the town of Alupka in Crimea. The Vorontsov Palace is one of the oldest and largest palaces in Crimea, and is one of the most popular tourist attractions on Crimea's southern coast.
The palace was built between 1828 and 1848 for the Russian Prince Mikhail Semyonovich Vorontsov for use as his personal summer residence at a cost of 9 million roubles. It was designed in a loose interpretation of the English Renaissance revival style by English architect Edward Blore and his assistant William Hunt. The building is a hybrid of several architectural styles, but faithful to none. Among those styles are elements of Scottish Baronial, Indo-Saracenic Revival Architecture, and Gothic Revival architecture. Blore had designed many buildings in the United Kingdom, and was later particularly well known there for completing the design of Buckingham Palace in London. (Full article...) -
The Lviv pogroms were the consecutive pogroms and massacres of Jews in June and July 1941 in the city of Lwów in German-occupied Eastern Poland/Western Ukraine (now Lviv, Ukraine). The massacres were perpetrated by Ukrainian nationalists (specifically, the OUN), German death squads (Einsatzgruppen), and urban population from 30 June to 2 July, and from 25 to 29 July, during the German invasion of the Soviet Union. Thousands of Jews were killed both in the pogroms and in the Einsatzgruppen killings.
Ukrainian militia as well as Ukrainian residents and to a lower degree Poles targeted Jews in the first pogrom, which was triggered by the discovery of thousands of bodies in three Lviv prisons of victims of the Soviet NKVD prisoner massacres, which were widely blamed on "Jewish Bolsheviks". The subsequent massacres were directed by the Germans in the context of the Holocaust in Eastern Europe. The pogroms have been widely debated in the historiography, including the extent to which Ukrainian nationalists played a central or complicit role. (Full article...) -
The Taras Shevchenko Memorial is a bronze statue and stone relief-adorned wall located on the 2200 block of P Street NW in the Dupont Circle neighborhood of Washington, D.C., United States. It is one of many monuments in Washington, D.C. that honor foreign heroes who symbolize freedom in their native countries. Sculpted by Leo Mol, the memorial honors Taras Shevchenko (1814–1861), a Ukrainian poet and artist who influenced the development of modern Ukrainian literature.
The committee to build the memorial included former U.S. President Harry S. Truman as the honorary head. Opposition to the memorial's installation was led by The Washington Post. It was dedicated in 1964, the 150th anniversary of Shevchenko's birth. Dignitaries at the dedication ceremony included prominent Ukrainian Americans, former U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, members of the U.S. Congress, and Hollywood actors. (Full article...) -
The history of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1569–1648) covers a period in the history of Poland and Lithuania, before their joint state was subjected to devastating wars in the mid-17th century. The Union of Lublin of 1569 established the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, a more closely unified federal state, replacing the previously existing personal union of the two countries. The Union was largely run by the Polish and increasingly Polonized Lithuanian and Ruthenian nobility, through the system of the central parliament and local assemblies, but from 1573 led by elected kings. The formal rule of the nobility, which was a much greater proportion of the population than in other European countries, constituted a sophisticated early democratic system, in contrast to the absolute monarchies prevalent at that time in the rest of Europe.[a]
The Polish–Lithuanian Union had become an influential player in Europe and a significant cultural entity. In the second half of the 16th and the first half of the 17th century, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth was a huge state in central-eastern Europe, with an area approaching one million square kilometers. (Full article...) -
Since Ukraine declared independence from the Soviet Union on 24 August 1991, many populated places and administrative divisions in the country have had their names changed as part of the derussification of toponyms (placenames) in Ukraine. These changes have involved the removal of placenames connected to people, places, events, and organizations associated with Russia and Russian imperialism as well as the restoration of historical placenames that had been changed earlier in Ukraine's history by the Russian or Soviet government with the intention of removing local heritage. Derussification has also included the respellings or rewordings of names to match standard spelling and word usages in the Ukrainian language. The official names of populated places and raions (districts) in the country are determined through legislation passed by the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine's parliament, typically at the request of local authorities; urban districts are named by each city's municipal council. During the Soviet period, particularly in the 1920s and 1930s, officials engaged in a significant renaming campaign to promote Bolshevism, replacing thousands of historical placenames in the country of both Russian and Ukrainian origin with generic propaganda toponyms based on prominent communist symbols and figures. In the 1980s, following the Soviet adoption of the liberalizing policies of glasnost and perestroika, Soviet Ukrainian and local governments carried out amongst the first limited derussification as they gained greater autonomy, returning some historical placenames and modifying others, notably with the renaming of the city and oblast of Rovno to Rivne on 11 June 1991 to bring it in line with Ukrainian language standards. After independence, derussification efforts were sporadic, with most name changes in the initial decades post-independence resulting from the restoration of pre-Soviet names through local efforts. Following the months-long Euromaidan protests and beginning of the Russo-Ukrainian War in 2014, hundreds of placenames dedicated to communist figures and the Soviet Union were changed as major decommunization legislation was enacted in 2016. However, most Russian names not directly associated with communism or included in the decommunization legislation continued to stay in place as derussification remained less popular than decommunization.
After Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, derussification gained widespread public support for the first time – even among Russian speakers and residents who had previously disapproved of decommunization – and became part of the Ukrainian government's announced decolonization policies. On 14 March 2023, multiple non-governmental organizations and other groups signed a petition calling for the adoption of derussification laws. In response, the Ukrainian parliament passed on 21 March the law On the Condemnation and Prohibition of Propaganda of Russian Imperial Policy in Ukraine and the Decolonization of Toponymy, the country's first comprehensive derussification legislation, officially prohibiting placenames considered to promote Russian imperialism or the Russification of Ukraine. An official list of placenames not conforming to the Ukrainian language was published on 30 June 2023 by the National Commission on State Language Standards, followed on 3 August by a separate list from the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory of placenames associated with Russian imperialism. Local authorities of affected places were given six months from the publication of each list to submit new name proposals to parliament; localities that did not submit name proposals were renamed directly by parliament based on the Institute's or Commission's recommendations. For certain localities that have placenames that are potentially applicable to renaming, such as the village of Krasnopil in Zhytomyr Oblast, whose name is derived from the color red (a symbol of the Soviet Union) but also dates as early as 1601, name changes are not required. (Full article...) -
Gregory Alchevsky (Ukrainian: Алчевський Григорій Олексійович; 1866–1920) was a Ukrainian composer. Alchevsky was born in Kharkiv, Ukraine, then in the Russian Empire, the son of the wealthy industrialist and banker Aleksey Alchevsky, and his wife Khrystyna Alchevska, a teacher who was a prominent activist for national education in Imperial Russia. Their six children were all musically gifted.
Alchevsky graduated from the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of Kharkiv University in 1887 and went on to study at the Moscow Imperial Conservatory. He was the friend of several Russian composers, including Sergei Rachmaninov, Alexander Scriabin and Alexander Goldenweiser. Alchevsky was a late Romantic movement composer. His most popular works were romances and settings of folk songs, which perpetuated the use of Ukrainian folk music into the 20th century. He worked as a music teacher and a singer, activities which acted to limit his output as a composer. He wrote a symphonic poem, Alyosha Popovych, while his work Breathing Tables for Singers and their Application to the Development of the Basic Qualities of the Voice, first published in 1908, remains in print. (Full article...) -
Vsevolod Mikhailovich Eikhenbaum (23 August [O.S. 11 August] 1882 – 18 September 1945), commonly known by his pseudonym Volin, was a Russian anarchist intellectual. He became involved in revolutionary socialist politics during the 1905 Russian Revolution, for which he was forced into exile, where he gravitated towards anarcho-syndicalism.
He returned to Petrograd following the February Revolution of 1917 and propagandised for anarcho-syndicalism in the Russian capital. In the wake of the October Revolution, which he criticised for bringing the Bolsheviks to power, he left for Ukraine, where he became a leading figure in the Makhnovshchina. During this time, he developed a theory of synthesis anarchism, which advocated for collaboration between anarchists of different tendencies, and spearheaded the intellectual development of Ukrainian anarchism, as leader of the Nabat and chair of the third Military Revolutionary Council during the civil war. (Full article...) -
Prince Jeremi Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki, nicknamed Hammer on the Cossacks (Polish: Młot na Kozaków), was a notable member of the aristocracy of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Prince of Vyshnivets, Lubny and Khorol in the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland and the father of the future King of Poland, Michael I.
A notable magnate and military commander with Ruthenian and Moldavian origin, Wiśniowiecki was heir of one of the biggest fortunes of the state and rose to several notable dignities, including the position of voivode of the Ruthenian Voivodship (today Poland and Ukraine) in 1646. His conversion from Eastern Orthodoxy to Roman Catholicism caused much dissent in Ruthenian lands (part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth). Wiśniowiecki was a successful military leader as well as one of the wealthiest magnates of Poland, ruling over lands inhabited by 230,000 people. (Full article...) -
The Bolokhovians, Bolokhoveni or Bolokhovens (Romanian: Bolohoveni; Old Slavic: Болоховци, Bolokhovtsy) were a 13th-century ethnic group that resided in the vicinity of the principalities of Galicia, Volhynia and Kiev, in the territory known as the "Bolokhovian Land" centered at the city of Bolokhov or Bolokhovo (not identified yet). Their ethnic identity is uncertain. Archeological evidence and the Hypatian Chronicle (which is the only primary source that documents their history) suggest that they were a Slavic people. Romanian scholars, basing on an interpretation of the ethnonym, identify them as Romanians (who were called Vlachs in the Middle Ages). Their princes, or knyazes, were in constant conflict with Daniel, the prince of Galicia–Volhynia, between 1231 and 1257. After the Mongols sacked Kiev in 1240, the Bolokhovians supplied them with troops, but the Bolokhovian princes fled to Poland. The Bolokhovians disappeared after Daniel defeated them in 1257. (Full article...)
-
Simón Radowitzky (Yiddish: סימאָן ראַדאָוויצקי; 1891–1956) was a Ukrainian-Argentine anarchist militant, known for his assassination of Buenos Aires police chief Ramón Lorenzo Falcón.
Born into a poor Ukrainian Jewish family, he was radicalised into revolutionary politics from an early age. After being imprisoned for his involvement in the Russian Revolution of 1905, he emigrated to Argentina, where he found work as a mechanic and joined a local Jewish anarchist group. After witnessing a police massacre of workers during the Red Week of 1909, Radowitzky assassinated Falcón, whom he held responsible for the massacre. He admitted to the murder, but as he was a minor, he could not be sentenced to death and was instead imprisoned indefinitely. He was transferred to a prison in Ushuaia, where he spent two decades of his life. (Full article...) -
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designates World Heritage Sites of outstanding universal value to cultural or natural heritage which have been nominated by countries that are signatories to the UNESCO World Heritage Convention, established in 1972. Cultural heritage consists of monuments (such as architectural works, monumental sculptures, or inscriptions), groups of buildings, and sites (including archaeological sites). Natural heritage is defined as natural features (consisting of physical and biological formations), geological and physiographical formations (including habitats of threatened species of animals and plants), and natural sites which are important from the point of view of science, conservation or natural beauty. Ukraine officially adopted the UNESCO Convention and became an independent member on 12 October 1988, while still officially being a Union Republic of the Soviet Union (prior to its dissolution in 1991).
As of 2023[update], there are eight World Heritage Sites listed in Ukraine, seven of which are cultural sites and one of which, the Ancient and Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathians and Other Regions of Europe, is a natural site. The first site listed was "Kyiv: Saint-Sophia Cathedral and Related Monastic Buildings, Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra", in 1990. The most recent site listed was the Historic Centre of Odesa, in 2023. The site was immediately listed as endangered because of the 2022 Russian invasion, the sites of Kyiv and Lviv were added to the endangered list as well later in the same year. Three sites are transnational: the Wooden Tserkvas are shared with Poland, the Struve Geodetic Arc is shared with nine countries, and the Ancient and Primeval Beech Forests are shared with 17 countries. In addition, Ukraine has 16 sites on its tentative list. (Full article...) -
Brave Bunnies (Ukrainian: Хоробрі зайці, romanized: Khorobri zaitsi) is a Ukrainian children's animated television series for preschool children aged 2 to 5. In the series, two rabbit children show their courage when they meet and befriend other animals. Creator Olga Cherepanova sought to encourage respect for diversity and to promote healthy childhood development.
The series has been broadcast in more than 80 countries. The first season was produced by Glowberry and Ánima Kitchent in partnership with distributor Aardman Animations, and premiered in December 2020. Production of the second season was interrupted by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and resumed in December 2022 after WildBrain acquired a majority ownership of the property. A second season was distributed by WildBrain in 2023. (Full article...)
.png)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.png)
Featured pictures
These are Featured pictures that the Wikimedia Commons community has chosen as the highest quality on the site.
-
Photograph: AmakuhaThe burning of the Trade Unions Building—used as the headquarters of the Euromaidan movement—during the 2014 Ukrainian revolution, following a failed attempt by the Ukrainian police to capture the building. After the fire, the damaged building was covered with large canvas screens on two sides with the words "Glory to Ukraine" printed on them in large letters. -
Photo credit: Peter DuhonUkrainian fashion model Nataliya Gotsiy modeling for Cynthia Rowley, Spring 2007 New York Fashion Week. She was the winner of the Ford Supermodel of the World 2004 search. She has appeared on the cover of French Elle and Italian Marie Claire and modeled for Behnaz Sarafpour, Christian Lacroix, Diane von Furstenberg, Dior, Dolce & Gabbana, Dries van Noten, Gucci, Oscar de la Renta, Valentino, and Vivienne Westwood, among others. -
Artist: William Simpson; Restoration: NativeForeignerThe 6th (Inniskilling) Dragoons and 5th Dragoon Guards engage the Russians in this lithograph of the "Charge of the Heavy Brigade", a short engagement during the Battle of Balaclava during the Crimean War. Russian cavalry had attacked the British camp, but in roughly ten minutes of fighting, they suffered 40 to 50 killed and more than 200 wounded and were forced to retreat. -
Photograph credit: Max AlpertKombat (Russian for 'battalion commander') is a black-and-white photograph by Soviet photographer Max Alpert. It depicts a Soviet military officer, armed with a TT pistol, raising his unit for an attack during World War II. This work is regarded as one of the most iconic Soviet World War II photographs, yet neither the date nor the subject is known with certainty. According to the most widely accepted version, it depicts junior politruk Aleksei Gordeyevich Yeryomenko, minutes before his death on 12 July 1942, in Voroshilovgrad Oblast, now part of Ukraine. The photograph is in the archives of RIA Novosti, a Russian state-owned news agency. -
Photograph: George ChernilevskyThe ChS8 is an electric mainline passenger locomotive used in Russia and Ukraine. Built between 1983 and 1989, it was developed for pulling long passenger trains (28–32 carriages) at speeds of 100 kilometres per hour (60 mph) or faster. Since 2010 Russia has switched to more energy-efficient designs, such as the EP10 and EP20. -
Painting: UnknownThe Adoration of the Shepherds is a common subject in the Nativity of Jesus in art. The scene, based on the Biblical account in Luke 2, depicts shepherds as near witnesses to the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem, arriving soon after the actual birth. It is often combined in art with the Adoration of the Magi, in which case it is typically just referred to by the latter title. The example here comes from 17th-century Ukraine and is currently held at the Ivan Honchar Museum. -
A map showing caesium-137 contamination in Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine (in curies per square kilometer) in 1996, ten years after the Chernobyl disaster struck the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. The disaster contaminated 162,160 square kilometres (62,610 sq mi) of land and is widely considered the worst nuclear power plant accident in history. -
Photo: Noodle snacksMushrooms of Armillaria hinnulea, a species of honey fungus (or "pidpenky", from Ukrainian). Honey fungi are parasitic fungi that live on trees and woody shrubs. As a forest pathogen, it can be very destructive because unlike most parasites, it does not need to moderate its growth in order to avoid killing its host, since it will continue to thrive on the dead material. Honey fungi are long lived and form some of the largest living organisms in the world, including one that covers more than 3.4 sq mi (8.8 km2) and is thousands of years old. The mushrooms are edible, but can be easily confused with poisonous Galerina species, which can grow side-by-side with Armillaria. -
Map credit: Nicolas de FerA 1691 French map of Kamianets-Podilskyi, Ukraine, depicting the city's old town neighborhood and castle, surrounded by the winding Smotrych River. It was originally part of Kievan Rus' and annexed into the First Polish Republic, but at the time of the map's creation, the city was part of the Ottoman Empire. It shortly returned to Poland and later became part of the Russian Empire with the Second Partition of Poland in 1793. -
Artist: William Simpson; Lithographer: Edmond Morin; Restoration: NativeForeignerA tinted lithograph, titled "Embarkation of the sick at Balaklava", shows injured and ill soldiers in the Crimean War boarding boats to take them to hospital facilities. Modern nursing had its roots in the war, as war correspondents for newspapers reported the scandalous treatment of wounded soldiers in the first desperate winter, prompting the pioneering work of women such as Florence Nightingale, Mary Seacole, Frances Margaret Taylor and others. -
Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Joseph Stalin sitting together at the Yalta Conference, which took place February 4–11, 1945. The so-called "Big Three" met to discuss the re-establishment of the nations of Europe following World War II. Although a number of agreements were reached, Stalin broke his promises regarding Poland, and the Soviet Union annexed the regions of Eastern Europe it controlled, or converted them to satellite states. -
Photograph: Anatoly ShcherbakThe Royal Kurgan is a 4th century BC kurgan (burial barrow) located near present-day Kerch, Crimea. The mound is almost 20 metres high and its base perimeter is about 250 metres. It holds a burial chamber with a square floor plan which gradually merges into the circular shape of a corbelled dome ("false vault"). It is assumed that the Royal Kurgan was the final resting place of a ruler of the Bosporan Kingdom.
_(B%2526W).jpg)
Did you know (auto-generated)
- ... that in August 2022, Igor Mangushev spoke on a stage in a Russian nightclub with what he said was the skull of a Ukrainian soldier killed in the Azovstal Iron and Steel Works?
- ... that DeepStateMap.Live, an interactive map of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, received up to 120,000 visitors in 30 minutes during the Battle of Izium in the 2022 Kharkiv counteroffensive?
- ... that 1920s belles-lettres books published by the State Publishing House of Ukraine sold out more rapidly than similar books published elsewhere in the Soviet Union, despite the higher average price?
- ... that one of the earliest Ukrainian science fiction novels, written in 1918 by Mykola Chaikovsky, features solar power and a radiotelephone?
- ... that following the energy price shock caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Turkish government intervened to have the country's renewable energy subsidise coal and gas?
- ... that Ukrainian Sheriffs went to summer school after being shot?
More did you know -
- ... that although the secular music of Mykola Leontovych was well known in the twentieth century, the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom was little known because of a ban on sacred music in the Soviet Union?
- ... that journalist Savik Shuster who used to work for Russian TV channels now prefers to work for the Ukrainian TV because he felt the Russian Government was limiting his journalistic freedom?
- ... that the neo-classical Verkhovna Rada building in Kyiv features a hundred-tonne glass dome over the chamber where the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine convenes to enact legislation?
- ... that among many historic landmarks at the Andrew's Descent in Kyiv, there is a medieval Gothic style castle that locals call the "Castle of Richard the Lion Heart" due to the legend the 12th century King of England had visited the building?
- ... that Vasyl Avramenko is often referred as "The father of the Ukrainian dance"?
- ... that the longest of the Kiev bridges, the 1,543 metres long Paton Bridge over the Dnieper River, constructed in 1953 was the first fully welded steel construction of such length at that time?
Selected article -
Sviatoslav or Svyatoslav I Igorevich (Old East Slavic: Свѧтославъ Игорєвичь, romanized: Svętoslavŭ Igorevičǐ; Old Norse: Sveinald; c. 943 – 972) was Prince of Kiev from 945 until his death in 972. He is known for his persistent campaigns in the east and south, which precipitated the collapse of two great powers in Eastern Europe, Khazaria and the First Bulgarian Empire. He conquered numerous East Slavic tribes, defeated the Alans and attacked the Volga Bulgars, and at times was allied with the Pechenegs and Magyars (Hungarians).
Following the death of his father Igor in 945, Sviatoslav's mother Olga reigned as regent in Kiev until 962. His decade-long reign over the Kievan Rus' was marked by rapid expansion into the Volga River valley, the Pontic steppe, and the Balkans, leading him to carve out for himself the largest state in Europe. In 969, he moved his seat to Pereyaslavets on the Danube. In 970, he appointed his sons Yaropolk and Oleg as subordinate princes of Kiev and Drelinia, while he appointed Vladimir, his son by his housekeeper and servant Malusha, as the prince of Novgorod. (Full article...)
In the news
- 5 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Russian strikes against Ukrainian infrastructure
- A series of Russian strikes targeting Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, Odesa, and Sumy Oblasts kills at least five people and injures 13 others. (Euronews)
- 3 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Attacks in Russia during the Russian invasion of Ukraine
- A massive fire is reported at an oil refinery in Sochi, Russia, following a Ukrainian drone attack on the facility. Smoke from the fire prompts Russian authorities to close Sochi International Airport. (BBC News)
- 2 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Attacks in Russia during the Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Ukrainian forces launch drone attacks on Penza Oblast, Samara Oblast, and Rostov Oblast in Russia, killing at least three people, according to Russian officials. (AP)
- The Ukrainian military targets the Ryazan Refinery in Ryazan Oblast, Russia, with drones and causes a fire at the facility. (Reuters)
- 1 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- United States and the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia–United States relations
- U.S. president Donald Trump orders the deployment of two United States Navy nuclear submarines near Russia for potential military action against Russian forces in response to statements made by former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev and current deputy chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation regarding Trump's previously-stated deadline for ending the war in Ukraine. (Reuters) (BBC News)
- 31 July 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Kyiv strikes, Attacks on civilians in the Russian invasion of Ukraine
Selected anniversaries for August
- August 2, 2025 — Airborne forces day
- August 17, 1649 — Treaty of Zboriv was signed after the Polish army was defeated in the Battle of Zboriv by the Cossacks, led by Bohdan Khmelnytsky.
- August 22, 2006 — An aircraft crashed near the Russian border over eastern Ukraine while en route from Vityazevo Airport (Anapa) to Pulkovo Airport (St. Petersburg)
- August 24, 1991 — Ukraine declares independence from the Soviet Union
Photo gallery
-
-
Trinity Church and Monastery in Chernihiv, Ukraine -
-
Zbarazh (Ukrainian: Збараж, Polish: Zbaraż, Yiddish: Zbarj) is a small city in the Ternopil Oblast (province) of western Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Zbarazh Raion (district), and is located in the historic region of Galicia. The major attraction of the city is the Zbarazh Castle that played a key role during the Khmelnytsky Uprising, the heroic defense of which eventually led to change of momentum and extinguishing the Cossack revolt. -
An 1691 French map of the city of Kamianets-Podilskyi, located in western Ukraine.
-
Streets of Mukacheve in the old part of town -
-
A view of Lviv Old Town from the High Castle. -
St Andrew's Church of Kyiv (1749–1854) -
Interiour view of the Pochayiv Lavra in Ukraine. -
Potemkin Stairs in Odesa, Ukraine. The higher perspective allows a person to see both the stairs and landings. -
The square in front of the theater in Chernivtsi. -
View on the lower fortress of the Kamianets-Podilskyi Castle -
The Swallow's Nest is one of the Neo-Gothic châteaux fantastiques near Yalta; it was built in 1912. -
-
A view of Lviv -
A wooden bridge leads to the entrance to the Khomutovska Steppe in Donetsk Oblast.
_2007.JPG)
_16.jpg)
Related portals
Religions in Ukraine
Post Soviet states
Other countries
Topics
Categories
Select [►] to view subcategories
WikiProjects and collaborations
Associated Wikimedia
The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:
-
Commons
Free media repository -
Wikibooks
Free textbooks and manuals -
Wikidata
Free knowledge base -
Wikinews
Free-content news -
Wikiquote
Collection of quotations -
Wikisource
Free-content library -
Wikiversity
Free learning tools -
Wikivoyage
Free travel guide -
Wiktionary
Dictionary and thesaurus
New articles
Ukrainian editions of Wikimedia projects
Discover Wikipedia using portals
