Kyi, Shchek and Khoryv - the founders of Kyiv

Kyi, Shchek and Khoryv are the three brothers whom the Primary Chronicle names as the founders of Kyiv. The chronicle mentions their sister Lybid alongside them. The story is short: the eldest brother settled on the hill later called Kyivytsia, the middle one on Shchekavytsia, the youngest on Khorevytsia, and the city took its name from the eldest.

Did they actually exist

Archaeology confirms only that a settlement on Starokyivska Hill really did exist, and its oldest layers are dated to roughly the 6th century. Whether Kyi was a living person is another matter. Some researchers suggest he was a real prince of the Polianian tribe. Most, however, regard all four as purely mythological figures.

The mechanism behind it is fairly transparent. Next to Kyiv stand the hills of Shchekavytsia and Khorevytsia and the river Lybid - and each of those names was duly given an owner. This is a classic eponymous myth: first comes the place name, then the ancestor who supposedly bestowed it. Dozens of peoples have done the same, before us and after.

Where the names come from

The most widespread theory derives "Kyi" from a Turkic word meaning "high river bank" - which describes the hilly right bank of the Dnipro, where the oldest settlement stood, rather well. Hence the hypothesis that the site of Kyiv was for a time a Khazar outpost.

The name Lybid is linked to the presence of Hungarians south of Kyiv before their migration to the Danube at the end of the 9th century: early Hungarian chronicles call the lands between the Don and the Dnipro "Levedia", where Magyar tribes lived from the late 7th to the late 9th century. Shchek is sometimes traced to the Bulgar ruler Shek, who campaigned in the Dnipro region in the early 9th century. And "Khoryv" may be biblical in origin: it is the Slavic form of Mount Horeb, also known as Sinai.

None of these theories has been settled - which is precisely why all of them are still around.

Where to see the brothers in Kyiv

The best-known monument to the founders of Kyiv stands on Naberezhne Shose, in Navodnytskyi Park: a boat carrying the three brothers and their sister. It was unveiled in 1982 for the city's official 1500th anniversary - a date derived from that same chronicle legend. The sculptor was Vasyl Borodai.

A second, almost identical composition appeared later on Maidan Nezalezhnosti. The two are regularly confused, so if you are looking for "the one in the boat above the Dnipro", head for Naberezhne Shose.