# Why are we now spelling it Kyiv? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 18, 2019, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932 "2019-10-18T03:18:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jebert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ec9cab/32.png) [@jebert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jebert)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/1 "2019-10-18T03:18:21Z")
Until just a few weeks ago I’ve always seen the capital of Ukraine spelled “Kiev”. Now all of a sudden I’m seeing numerous instances of “Kyiv.” What happened? ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/2 "2019-10-18T03:24:13Z")
Perhaps to distinguish the Ukrainian pronunciation of their capital city from the Russian pronunciation, of which either “Kiev” or “Kyev” would be an accurate transliteration. This is assuming that the Ukrainian pronunciation is different, a fact of which I am not in possession. ---
**Author:** ![Walken\_After\_Midnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/b487fb/32.png) [@Walken\_After\_Midnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walken_After_Midnight)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/3 "2019-10-18T03:30:04Z")
_Kyiv_ is the official name. The United States Board on Geographic Names started using _Kyiv_ instead of Kiev in June 2019. From [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiev#Name): > [@](#): > > _Kyiv_ is the romanized version of the name of the city used in modern Ukrainian. Following independence in 1991, the Ukrainian government introduced the national rules for transliteration of geographic names from Ukrainian into English. According to these rules, the Ukrainian Київ is transliterated as _Kyiv_. This has established the use of the spelling _Kyiv_ in all official documents issued by the governmental authorities since October 1995. The spelling is used by the United Nations, the European Union, all English-speaking foreign diplomatic missions, several international organizations, Encarta encyclopedia, and by some media in Ukraine. In October 2006, the United States Board on Geographic Names (or BGN) unanimously voted to change its standard transliteration to _Kyiv_, effective for the entire U.S. government, although Kiev remained the BGN conventional name for this city until June 2019. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/4 "2019-10-18T04:08:03Z")
That spelling has existed alongside Kiev for many years, not just a few weeks. It could simply be a difference in official Ukrainian versus Russian transliteration systems, as the link above suggests. In fact there are slight spelling differences between modern Russian and Ukrainian (in Cyrillic) so Kiev is not spelled identically anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/5 "2019-10-18T04:28:30Z")
So help me if this affects my herb-butter-stuffed breaded chicken cutlets. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/6 "2019-10-18T04:36:46Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > So help me if this affects my herb-butter-stuffed breaded chicken cutlets. You’ll just have to switch to Beijing Duck. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![RioRico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f04885/32.png) [@RioRico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RioRico)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/7 "2019-10-18T05:31:31Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > You’ll just have to switch to Beijing Duck. 😉 Delivered to the Tia Juana Jail. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/8 "2019-10-18T05:58:35Z")
Kyiv is closer to the Ukrainian pronunciation. ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/9 "2019-10-18T13:17:30Z")
I have a former colleague who is Ukrainian and gets really, really outraged at the “Kiev” spelling. Of course, he also gets outraged at the fact that the history professors at our university are not willing to teach students that Russians are inherently evil, and that another former colleague acted in a comedy play that he thought was about Russians (it isn’t), so he may not be … entirely _hinged_ about certain topics. ---
**Author:** ![Spiderman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spiderman/32/230_2.png) [@Spiderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiderman)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/10 "2019-10-18T13:43:23Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > You’ll just have to switch to Beijing Duck. 😉 No Pe(e)king at the recipe. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/11 "2019-10-18T14:27:06Z")
We shouldn’t be taking English spelling lessons from foreign governments regarding the English versions of names. “Kiev” has been common in English for a long time. We shouldn’t be changing the spelling based on the the preferences of the government of Ukraine. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/12 "2019-10-18T15:44:43Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > We shouldn’t be taking English spelling lessons from foreign governments regarding the English versions of names. “Kiev” has been common in English for a long time. We shouldn’t be changing the spelling based on the the preferences of the government of Ukraine. The “Kiev” spelling was based on the preferred pronunciation of the Russian Empire, was it not? ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/13 "2019-10-18T16:02:36Z")
This is one of those things that annoys me. It seems like the news services don’t want to admit to or acknowledge changes, or admit ignorance, so things like this get swept under the rug, without acknowledgment. OK, I’ll grant that a lot of people may have been using “Kyiv” for years and _years_, and to some people, with, I am sure, excellent reasons, hold it to be the proper or preferred spwlling. But the customary spelling in the US for as long as I call recall, has been “Kiev”. If you’re suddenly going to hit us with “Kyiv”, you owe us a statement about it and an explanation. Similarly, “Niger” was, for my entire life, pronounced “NIGH -jer” in US news and media. Then a couple of years ago, it was “Nee-ZHER”, without any sort of warning, or anyone saying “pardon us,m we’ve been saying it wrong all these years.” There are plenty of other examples. But don’t go telling us that we’ve got it wrong when, for years, we’ve been getting our pronunciation and spelling cues from you. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/14 "2019-10-18T16:03:47Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > The “Kiev” spelling was based on the preferred pronunciation of the Russian Empire, was it not? I don’t think we did it because the Czar asked us too. These are exonyms. They shouldn’t be changed at the request of governments. ---
**Author:** ![Icarus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icarus/32/72_2.png) [@Icarus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icarus)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/15 "2019-10-18T16:04:15Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > We shouldn’t be taking English spelling lessons from foreign governments regarding the English versions of names. “Kiev” has been common in English for a long time. We shouldn’t be changing the spelling based on the the preferences of the government of Ukraine. We shouldn’t be spelling a persons name the way they want it spelled. We should spell it like we have always spelled it. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/16 "2019-10-18T16:22:50Z")
> [@Icarus](#): > > We shouldn’t be spelling a persons name the way they want it spelled. We should spell it like we have always spelled it. Names of places aren’t comparable to names of people. As I said, there’s a concept called an “exonym,” that is, “something that people who aren’t from here called this place.” It’s a valid concept, and it’s not a violation of an individual person’s humanity. Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Netherlands, Germany, Spain, Italy, Austria, etc., all are exonyms, for example. This is a transliteration/translation situation. A Ukranian speaker shouldn’t be telling an English speaker how to speak or write or spell in English. (Additionally, sometimes we do spell people’s names like we have always spelled them, so that’s not an absolute rule. For example, we transliterate from the Cyrillic script. Do you even know how Christopher Columbus spelled his name?) ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/17 "2019-10-18T16:27:21Z")
> [@Icarus](#): > > We shouldn’t be spelling a persons name the way they want it spelled. We should spell it like we have always spelled it. Trying to claim that the name of a city is equivalent to the name of a person is dishonest. Cities don’t have feelings to hurt, and there’s a longstanding tradition of geographical entities having multiple names in multiple languages, as any German or Finn would know. Names are arbitrary and only have value to the extent they are comprehensible to the people being spoken to, not some other people who speak a different language entirely and are, therefore, not involved in the conversation. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/18 "2019-10-18T16:43:03Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > We shouldn’t be taking English spelling lessons from foreign governments regarding the English versions of names. “Kiev” has been common in English for a long time. We shouldn’t be changing the spelling based on the the preferences of the government of Ukraine. It’s not especially about spelling, it’s about how it is pronounced in the native language (instead of the former conquering country’s language). So many English versions of foreign place names were established by people who heard the names wrong and/or who had no idea how to transliterate accurately into English. So what if those errors have been enshrined into our ignorance for years? If you found out you had been pronouncing your neighbor’s foreign name wrong for years, would you refuse to correct it? And what makes you think this is being done at the request of governments? Perhaps it’s just common politeness, an effort to try to get it right after all these years of having it wrong. I really can’t imagine why you are so resistant to this kind of change. Why is it so much skin off your nose? ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/19 "2019-10-18T16:52:45Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > We shouldn’t be taking English spelling lessons from foreign governments regarding the English versions of names. “Kiev” has been common in English for a long time. We shouldn’t be changing the spelling based on the the preferences of the government of Ukraine. On the contrary, I think in this day and age we should probably drop the “Latinized” names for certain cities. Why should we keep calling München “Munich” or Köln “Cologne,” when apparently nobody needed to come up with a Latin name for Düsseldorf or Stuttgart? Ditto Italian cities like Firenze and Napoli. ---
**Author:** ![furryman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/furryman/32/99_2.png) [@furryman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furryman)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932/20 "2019-10-18T17:00:27Z")
On one hand it would be nice if we actually pronounced the name of the place the way the natives do. On the other hand nearly every language on earth spells Shakespeare differently, why not get even?😉 [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-now-spelling-it-kyiv/841932.md?page=2)