In this engaging discussion, historian Kateryna Dysa uncovers the origins of the myth that frames Kyiv as a Russian city, tracing its roots to 19th-century imperial propaganda. She explores how early Russian travelers viewed Kyiv through a superficial lens, focused on pilgrimage rather than history. Dysa highlights Nikolai Karamzin's pivotal role in promoting Kyiv's significance and the romanticized narratives that followed. Listeners will learn about the architectural misinterpretations and the varied comparisons made by travelers, alongside the emergence of Ukrainian counter-narratives.
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History Becomes A Political Tool
Nineteenth-century Russian interest in Kyiv grew as history became a discipline and Romanticism prized medieval roots.
Karamzin popularized the idea of Kyiv as the cradle of Russian statehood and Christianity, fueling later appropriation.
insights INSIGHT
From Indifference To Romantic Obsession
Eighteenth-century Russian travelers were largely indifferent to Kyiv beyond pilgrimage to monasteries.
Interest shifted dramatically within a few decades as Romanticism made searching for medieval origins fashionable.
insights INSIGHT
Architectural Projection Shapes Memory
Russians projected later medieval architectural ideals onto Kyiv rather than reconstructing its authentic 11th–12th century appearance.
This shaped a nostalgic, anachronistic image aligning Kyiv with Russian medieval narratives.
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Russian propaganda claims that Ukraine is not a separate nation, but merely a “preliminary form” of Russia. Today’s Kremlin ideology seeks to annex Ukrainian history in order to justify its territorial aggression. But this myth has a birth certificate. It emerged in the 19th century, when the Russian Empire started inventing its “ancient” medieval roots. Before that, Russian travellers in Ukrainian lands showed little interest in such historical questions.
In this episode, we trace the genealogy of the myth that Kyiv is a “Russian city” and that its history somehow belongs to Muscovy.
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Explaining Ukraine is a podcast by UkraineWorld, an English-language media platform about Ukraine, run by Internews Ukraine.
Host: Volodymyr Yermolenko, a Ukrainian philosopher, editor-in-chief of UkraineWorld, and president of PEN Ukraine.
Listen on various platforms: https://li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine
UkraineWorld: https://ukraineworld.org/en
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Guest: Kateryna Dysa, a Ukrainian historian and Associate Professor at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. She has been a visiting fellow at Harvard, Stanford, Paris, and Oxford, and a visiting professor at the University of Basel. Currently, she is researching how the image of Kyiv was constructed in travel literature from the late eighteenth to early twentieth centuries.
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CONTENTS:
00:00 Kateryna Dysa, a Ukrainian historian and associate professor at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy.
00:15 Where and when did the myth of Kyiv belonging to Moscow actually begin?
02:05 How did 18th-century Russian travelers initially view Kyiv, and why was their interest superficial?
04:05 How did the rise of history as a discipline change Russia's perception of Kyiv?
12:17 Why did the French philosopher Madame de Staël describe Kyiv as a "semi-Tatar" or nomadic place?
15:17 What were the two extreme ways Westerners described Kyiv?
21:04 When did the annexation of the past become an "aggressive policy" and a part of Russian imperial ideology?
35:03 Why were Russian travelers unwilling to communicate with locals, stressing that Ukrainians were "the other"?
38:07 Why did Russian travelers consistently feel "not at home" in a place the Empire claimed as its "cradle"?
39:16 What aspects of Kyiv's social and cultural history in the 19th century still remain "understudied"?
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This episode is made in partnership with Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and under the framework of the project “HER-UKR: Challenges and opportunities for EU heritage diplomacy in Ukraine”, co-funded by the EU within the ERASMUS+ Jean Monnet Policy Debate action.
Explaining Ukraine 
