Recently, I started learning Ukrainian to facilitate my trips to western Ukraine and it has been striking to me how much in fact Ukrainian differs from Russian.

So what differences and similarities have I noticed between Russian and Ukrainian?

History of the Russian and Ukrainian languages Both Russian and Ukrainian are Slavic languages from the Indo-European family. Russian is an official language of Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kirgizstan, while Ukrainian is the sole official national language of Ukraine. Due to a common history, Russian is widely spoken in Ukraine (also as an official regional language), Latvia, Lithuania, Georgia and many other ex-Soviet countries.

Russian is the largest native language to Europe but the modern language was formed only in the 18 th century following the reforms of Peter the Great. In 1783 the first Russian dictionary appeared.

Ukrainian on the other hand has its origins in the medieval federation of Kievan Rus and after this was conquered by the Tatars, the language became known as “Ruthenian”, which was a mix of East Slavic languages. Modern written Ukrainian was first used in the 17 th century during the heydey of the Cossack Hetmanate. At that time the first Kiev Mogila Collegium appears and it became the centre of cultural and language development of Ukraine.

western Ukraine was for a long time part of the Rzeczpospolita (Polish State). So today we can see these two influences on Ukrainian as it has both Polish and Russian versions of many words. Later on, Ukrainian was forbidden in the Russian Empire and refered to derogatorily as “Little Russian” while Russian was the official language. Ukrainian also became influenced a lot by Polish because of its geographical and political situation asRzeczpospolita

In the 19 th century, Russian was still mostly spoken in urban areas, while the rural part of Russian Empire and later of the Soviet Union kept using their own local languages.

Although the USSR did not have an official state language, Russian was an official language in most of the Soviet republics so Russian was the country’s lingua franca and not Ukrainian (or the other languages of the USSR’s republics).

Today many consider Russian and Ukrainian to be very similar languages. However, Russian people usually don’t understand pure Ukrainian. So while Russian and Ukrainian have impacted each other during the times of Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, there is still clearly a big difference that makes mutual comprehension difficult.