Talk:Kiev Pechersk Lavra

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Contents

[edit] Category:World Heritage Sites

OwenBlack, I've reverted your edit to this page because the category Category:World Heritage Sites in the Ukraine was misnamed by you. My country is called just Ukraine, not the Ukraine (which is rather insulting). Please keep this in mind and do not try to populate or link this category again. Moreover, since I couldn't delete it, your moral obligation now is to raise a deletion procedure and keep the category from filling by others.

I've created a new category with a proper name Category:World Heritage Sites in Ukraine. You can use it if you want. Best wishes, AlexPU

See User talk:OwenBlacker and CFD for further discussion. — OwenBlacker 20:48, Feb 19, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Ilya Muromets

Reportedly houses the remains of Ilya Muromets. Does anyone have a reference for this? -- Sy / (talk) 21:11, 27 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Well, I've been there and saw the remains. Who knows if it's really his remains? the look is quite unimpressive - was he a small man? Ilya K 20:09, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Name in Ukrainian

Since I don't know the coding of the letters, I can't do anything about it, but the Ukrainian name for it is incorrect. Києво, would be the Russian name, but using cyrillic letters, and Київо would be the Ukrainian version, would it not? --June 16, Nathan

Ukrainian name is correct. The noun is "Київ". But for the adjective form, the letter ї mutates є to "Києво-Печерська Лавра". Maybe I did nit explain it well. I am not an expert in linguistic terminology, but you can rest assured, that Ukrainian name here is correct. -Irpen 17:22, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)

Just adding my own two cents to this - it's kind of correct. Kind of because the English translation, (Kiev Pechersk Lavra) is not correct if doing a translation from Russian or Ukrainian. In fact, The English name seems to come more from Russian than from Ukrainian: Kiev is the Russian way to spell the city name, although it's been widely accepted internationally; Pechersk is incorrect in either language - in Ukrainian it would be Pechers'ka (the apostrophe indicates soft sounding 's') - in Russian it would be Pecherskaya (without the soft sounding 's'); I can't comment on whether Lavra is Ukrainian or Russian, because I honestly never thought of that word before. Some thought leads me to believe it's a Ukrainian word because I've never heard a church (or similar) be called a 'Lavra' in Russia, but again, I'm not sure. Now, this point is weakened by the fact that on the official website, they spell the name as 'Kiev-Pechersk Lavra'. In Ukrainian and Russian versions of the page, they spell it correctly. Another pont, it's actually the Uspens'ka Kievo-Pechers'ka Lavra (or Uspens'ka Kiyivo-Pechers'ka Lavra). Mno 6 July 2005 01:04 (UTC)


Hi Mno, you are NOT wrong of course. There is just a convention more or less established by now that calls for this name to be used. If you have time, please read the discussion on how we arrived to where we are at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ukrainian subdivisions#How the city name Днiпропетровськ is spelled in English and chapters after that. You may also look at other talk pages.
For this particular name the possible questions are:
1a. Why Kiev- rather than Kyiv-?
1b. Why Kiev- (or would be Kyiv-) rather than Kyivo- ?
2a. Why Pechersk rather than Pechers'k?
2b. Why Pechersk rather than Pecherskaya or Pechers'ka?
3. Why Lavra?
1a cannot be answered to make everyone happy of course. We will get to it if we have to. 1b and 2b are because noun forms were desided to be used (at least that how it was desided for Oblasts names: (Kiev Oblast, Kharkiv Oblast, etc). Also we are using the noun form of the name that was agreed before for whatever reasons (part of the answer to 1a). Besides 2a is because in simplified UA transliteration (most commonly used BTW) the soft sign is dropped. So it is comes from UA=Pechers'k. That it is the same as RU-Pechersk is a coinsidence. Finally, "Lavra" is a term in Eastern Orthodoxy and some time ago I even created an article for it (see Lavra). There are Lavras in other countries too. I hope you will now find the name "correct". Cheers, -Irpen July 6, 2005 03:54 (UTC)


Hi Irpen. Thanks for the explanation. I think deep down we'll always hear people complaining about this or that, and I think the decision to use the most widely used spelling is best. As a suggestion, place all other ways to spell it as links to the most common one. I've already seen this done for some articles.
In all honesty, I don't really have a problem with doing it this way, especially now that I read over the discussion you linked to and (a lot of) other. mno July 6, 2005 04:16 (UTC)

[edit] English name with "caves"

Mikka, are you sure about your correction of "Kiev Monastery on the Caves"→"Kiev Cave Monastery". I think I've seen the first variant but not the one to which you corrected. --Irpen 19:58, July 19, 2005 (UTC)

First, google is your best friend. Second, "cave monastery" is a common term, and they exist in many places. Third, I am sure you could have seen "on the Caves" as a literal translation of the Ukrainian expression "na pecherah", but I doubt it entered any of mainstream English. Finally, I believe the opinion of the Encyclopedia of Ukraine. mikka (t) 20:33, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
Encyclopedia of Ukraine you mention is a good source of factual info, but it is not a reliable source of preferred terminology, being a rather Ukrainophile writing (for understandable reasons). Google test is useful, but it means much only when the difference is overwhelming because it has a huge statistical error. Finally, take a look at the most authoritative encyclopedia (EB, of course). From the Kiev article there:
At the southern end of this district is the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra (Monastery of the Caves), founded in the early 11th century, one of the most famous and important monasteries in the history of the region.
I agree, the "on" was wrong. I will replace it by "of the caves" as per Britannica. And that's what I have probably seen and got confused with "on" because long time has passed. I hope you find this agreeable. --Irpen 20:52, July 19, 2005 (UTC)

Current version:

Kiev Pechersk Lavra or Monastery, also known as Kiev Monastery of the Caves, Kiev Cave Monastery, or Kiev Caves Monastery (Ukrainian: Києво-Печерська Лавра; Russian: Киево-Печерская Лавра), is..

I just think that so many names is too much clutter here. I would prefer to have less names. One thing is when inter-ethnical rivarlies make listing several names in row the only peaceful solution (even then there are battles for the order within the sentence). The word order between Caves/Cave and Monastery as well as the prepositions is devoid of politics. So, I don't see the reason for clutter. Google count with the results 146:209:300 is too close and not statistically significant enough. We should just choose one version based on established usage and the authority of the users and redirect the rest, I think.

Britannica and Americana use "..of the caves". LexisNexis 24-month search of major papers only (I excluded the rest to make sure I only check sources with some consistent editorial policy) gives two "K.M. of the caves" uses (THE DAILY TELEGRAPH and The Herald (Glasgow)) and one "caves monastery" in the Independent (there are some non-anglicized uses with Lavra too)

Unless, of course, anyone really insists on having all versions in one sentence, as far as I can see, "..of the caves" is the preferred one. But I will only deal with this when I get to the article with more info, hopefully soon. --Irpen 02:30, July 20, 2005 (UTC)

To be honest, as long as we redirect the other names to the same article, I don't really see a point for listing all of them. If there really are that many, add a subsection somewhere titled 'Other Names' or something of the sort. -- mno 04:04, July 20, 2005 (UTC)

Other names, especially significantly differing in spelling, not just 1-2 letters, is an important piece of info for identification purposes, especially for people who have never heard about the subject. I find it a bit troubling that experienced wikipedians insist on removal of pieces of info, which are not some useless trivia, kind of "Michael Jackson is going to visit Lavra". I would understand a person with political idiosyncrasies, but in this case I would suggest to rethink your notion of editing. I do not question the idiotic transliteration "Kiev Pechersk", but removal of more correct transations, even if they are far less used, is ridiculous. mikka (t) 17:25, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Mikka, I removed a whole bunch of names from the lead only because the lead looked akward being too much cluttered. And I created redirects for each of them to help the "people who have never heard about the subject" get to the article. I agree with you, that simply moving other names down in the article (as you did) was a better idea. Note, though, that I acted only after the the proposal above was at talk page for a week and no one objected. The better idea of yours was not voiced and didn't reach me, so I acted accordingly. Finally, I think that having one anglicized alternative in the very top, serves some good purpose, and Britannica's "of the caves", seems preferable. I don't mind listening and following the positive ideas but I simply assumed that this was an agreeable solution because no one objected for a week. --Irpen 17:40, July 26, 2005 (UTC)
As for your comment on "idiotism" of "Kiev Pechersk Lavra" name for the article, I really appreciate this, thanks. In any case, the name was chosen only because it follows the convention of the most common name in English. And, BTW having "Pechersk" in the article name, rather than "caves" was chosen by you when you created this article as a stub under the Kiev Pecherski Monastery name, which I some time ago moved to "Kiev Pechersk Lavra" (after I created the Lavra article, a particular type of a monastery and a valid separate term for an article in English WP). And I miss in what way this is "idiotic". When I was writing a "Desyatinnaya Tserkov'" article, I named the article "Church of the Tithes" because the translated rather than transliterated version is more common for it. If you changed your mind since the time you created the article and want to move it under one of the "cave" names, I will not fight much for the current name. We will have to see what others would feel about that but in any case, I don't see the reason to have such a protracted dispute about names (much hotter namings were and are still being dicussed) and I don't understand the fuss. There are no politics and national sensitivities here whatsoever (that's of course until someone brings up Kyiv here with zeal and persistence) --Irpen 17:46, July 26, 2005 (UTC)

Just two cents from a random wikipedian: in English scholarly sources this establishment is best known as "Monastery of the Caves" (yes, without Kiev), in more popular writings it's usually "Pechersk Monastery" (without Kiev again). Beit Or 20:57, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Caves

Since it is a CAVE monastery, the total absence of the caves from the article is misleading. I realize that a separate article on the caves is planned for the future, but meanwhile, it's a stump. --dunnhaupt 14:00, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The problem with cases like this is that its an article that has to have about 50 or so redirects, because of the different variations. Do help to create them, but for me I think Pechersk Lavra are the key terms. --Kuban Cossack 14:21, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Expand

Ladies and Gentlemen, let's expand this article? Project of the month? --Irpen 23:24, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm all for it! There is a lot we can do... and IMO it should have been done a long time ago. I'll try and start on the Pechersk caves sometime during the week, although I may not have enough time... —dima/s-ko/ 03:19, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Added a section on museum exposition. -asmadeus 23:15, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Pechersk Lavra Template cleanup

Please see a proposed cleanup of the currently bulky navigation box in Template_talk:Pechersk_Lavra.
-asmadeus 23:50, 26 February 2007 (UTC)