Talk:Principality of Galicia

This is not a coat of arms — it is a mystification

Contemporary drawing – it is a mystification. Here are the originals from the coat of arms of Galicia.

• 
  Władysław Opolczyk seal. 1379
• 
  Władysław Opolczyk seal (fragment).
• 
  Coat of Arms of The Kingdom of Galicia-Volhynia, 1313.

--Лобачев Владимир (talk) 11:35, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

coat of arms problem

@User:Aleksandr Grigoryev What is a source of this coat of arms?

• image do not reffers to the time of Halycian Prinsipality of XII- XIV centuries — Preceding unsigned comment added by Roman Frankiv (talk • contribs) 13:58, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

Sources?

This article is entirely unsourced. Not sure how to post notification. 173.77.75.164 (talk) 14:01, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Name of Halych/Galicia

I wondered if there was a connection between the name Galicia in Spain and Galicia in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. There is a connection, and it is not a coincidence. It comes down to salt mining and the Celts. See https://books.google.com/books?id=xNEaD1g7XScC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Kurlansky,+Mark+ salt+googlebooks&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAGoVChMI09WRivSayQIVSB0-Ch1QjwzY#v=onepage&q=Galicia&f=false

Even Halle, Germany, has a connection to salt!

Take a look at the first of the four pages.

I urge that there be some discussion of how Halych/Galicia as the name came to be, other than what is already on the page since this explanation is very different.

Mr. Posen (talk) 11:47, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

• Moreover, Spanish and Ukrainian people pronounce "G" the same way. See "Southern Russian dialects" ("fricative /ɣ/ instead of the Standard and Northern /ɡ/"). I thought that in the case of the Spanish language it was an Arabic influence, but I'm not sure.
  But thankfully, Spanish, unlike Ukrainians, don't rush around Wikipedia changing "G" to "H" in all the anthroponyms and toponyms, messing up the etymology. [An example just below: #Requested move 25 May 2026. Come on, in the case of 'Galicia" they don't even need to do anything, it is already pronounced with /ɣ/.]
  P. S. Actually, I've looked at "Ukrainian language#Phonology", and it appears that the /ɡ/→/ɣ/ switch is more pronunced in Ukrainian than in the Southern Russian dialects. Apparently, in Ukrainian, /ɡ/ becomes /ɦ/. --Moscow Connection (talk) 10:40, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

"Halychian Rus'"

I removed the "Halychian Rus' version from alternative names. It is rather a marginal title even in Russian/Ukrainian language scholarship, and it is very rarely attested in English, and not in major works on the subject. Should it be kept that way or reversed back? It does have a source, albeit unimportant one. DoctorWhutsup (talk) 12:18, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

The term "Halychian Rus'" or "Galician Rus'" is not as popular as just "Galicia" or "Halych", but is well attested in scholarship on the subject. I do not intend to push it, and if there's no quorum in employing it, so be it, but you cannot just go around removing sourced content just because you do not like it, particularly if it's sourced. As for the term in itself, profesor Wolff's book, centred on the evolution of Galicia/Halych as a political idea, takes it from the 19th century work of a Ukrainian Catholic priest (who wrote in Polish), and in fact uses the term in quotes, which, however, is neither an attempt to distance himself from it, nor an endorsement, for in his own "preferred voice" Wolff uses Galicia, and uses quotes for all other versions. The term is more explicitly employed by the authors in a recent work published by Springer (Cultural Heritage..., 2021), which, in a section devoted to the Lemkos, they speak about "Halychian [...] Rus'" when enumerating principalities annexed by Poland. What both this and Wolff's use of the term have in common is that they seem to come from Polish.

This is not the case, however, for all the examples of its use, especially for the more widespread (but politically frowned upon in the current geopolitical climate) "Galician Rus'". It is the preferred term employed by Paul Robert Magocsi in several of his works, it's also used by Serhii Plokhy on Unmaking Imperial Russia (2005) and on The Origins of the Slavic Nations (2006) [side not: Plokhy is too prolific for me, I can't keep up], by Olha Kozubska in her contribution to Segregation – Integration – Assimilation... (2016), and Laurentiu Radvan in At Europe's Borders (2010). Outside the strictly medieval context, it is also employed by Faith Hillis (Children of Rus', 2013), by Natalia Yakovenko in her contribution to A Laboratory of Transnational History (2009), and by Valentyna Myronova in Latinitas in the Polish Crown... (2014) [both this and the previous work dealing with widespread use of Latin in Galicia/Halych well into the 15th and 16th centuries!]. For more modern times, of less interest to us (and more in line with Wolff's work), the term has been widely employed by John-Paul Himka.

As for scholarship in Russian or Ukrainian, it has been more used than you think, even if seems to have lost some currency in the latter. On the old side, Omelyan Terletsky wrote an essay titled "Політичні події на Галицькій Русі в 1340...", and Ivan Lynnychenko wrote Суспільні верстви Галицької Руси XIV-XV в.. Closer to us in time, the recently deceased Mykola Kotlyar used the term extensively and I probably don't need to go around fishing for that. As for Russian, a quick search for "Галицкая Русь" will bring a lot of hits, and if you can avoid the propagandistic, nationalistic and overly dramatic ones, you'll find that some are for good, reputable material. There is probably a case to be made for consulting Polish material, but my brain is already fried.

TL;DR - I think the term, particularly Galician Rus', has some merit as an alternative. Considering the current political situation, going for the Russian-based version would be problematic and insensitive, thus at least keeping the Ukrainian-derived version made sense to me. Some of the aforementioned books suggest that the use of the term was closer in time to events than we believe. This all being said, perhaps the best situation would be adding it to the article on Galicia/Halych instead, but you already read what I believe would happen to me if I did that. Ostalgia (talk) 13:43, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

Ok, this term DOES have more credibility in English scholarship that I was initially aware of.

Well, this seems reasonable. I will stop editing it unless I have a better case. DoctorWhutsup (talk) 08:04, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 12 June 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. Moved as an uncontested request with minimal participation. If there is any objection within a reasonable time frame, please ask me to reopen the discussion; if I am not available, please ask at the technical requests page. (closed by non-admin page mover) BilledMammal (talk) 21:11, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

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Principality of Halych → Principality of Galicia – Per WP:COMMONNAME, see Ngram as an example. The Latinized name is also used in Principality of Volhynia and Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia. This is also a name used in English-language works by Ukrainian historians, which reflects the historical name for the region. Mellk (talk) 16:53, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Language?

Apparently there is a language called Halychian, but I can't find any documentation about it, is there any evidence of its exitance or whether or not it is real in the first place. 86.4.137.121 (talk) 17:12, 26 August 2025 (UTC)

Requested move 25 May 2026

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. Consensus is that "Halych" has not overtaken "Galicia" as the WP:COMMONNAME. The page title can be reevaluated later if the the usage of "Halych" over "Galicia" takes hold. (closed by non-admin page mover) ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 20:58, 1 June 2026 (UTC)

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Principality of Galicia → Principality of HalychPrincipality of Halych – this is a more appropriate name of the principality, as it is named after the city of Halych and not after Galicia, those are two different entities, there’s also a lot more resources and maps calling it principality of Halych rather than Galicia, it is also worth mentioning that according to Google ngram “Principality of Halych” is rapidly becoming more popular . Scenic town (talk) 14:03, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

• Oppose. The article was just recently moved in the opposite direction, based on the opposite rationale.
  If "Halych" is "becoming more popular", it is just because of Ukraine wanting to "Ukrainize" everything.
  The region was historically called "Galicia" and still is. The city of Galich (Галич) is spelled "Halych" only because of Ukrainian-pronunciation-based romanization rules employed in present-day Ukraine. ---Moscow Connection (talk) 14:24, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  It is actually not completely true, the town of Halych has always been called that way and Galicia is just a latinized version that is used to describe a historical region, it’s not about the spelling, the principality isn’t named after a historical region of Galicia, it was named after the city of Halych( which is what stated in most references pinned on this article) so unless you can prove otherwise, also stating that it is now popular just because of “Ukraine wanting to Ukrainize” is just your opinion not a fact, what is a fact is that it’s rapidly becoming more popular, see ngram and that’s what matters more Wikipedia:COMMONNAME. Scenic town (talk) 14:47, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  • You don't and can't really know how the town was called "always", as in "in the times when the kingdom existed". Yes, the Old East Slavic (a.k.a. Old Russian) probably had the "fricative /ɣ/ instead of the Standard and Northern /ɡ/" (see "Southern Russian dialects"). But the Ukrainian language didn't exist back then, and the present-day Ukrainian-English transliteration rules don't apply. You have no idea what the town's name sounded like phonetically. --Moscow Connection (talk) 15:03, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

    yes I don’t know what the town was called back then, no one knows, those are only guesses, but Wikipedia isn’t some kind of historical artifact, modern names are used here, and by the way Halych isn’t a modern transliteration, it has been around for a long time, and it isn’t something unique to Ukrainian, if you look closely at how the page Halych translated into every language most of them(including English) use this form, and if you also look at the references you will see that all of them mention “Halych” as a city, it is almost never Galicia(which is just a Latin version of Halych) but the word Galicia is used rather to describe the historical region in western Ukraine and eastern Poland, which exists to this day, it’s not a political entity or something, it’s just a historical name of the land, that’s why the city’s name matters here more and it’s not my opinion, it’s a fact that when one name falls out of use it gets replaced by another one, it’s a general practice that I observe across a lot of Wikipedia articles. Also I noticed that in your reply you’re slightly pushing an agenda (stating something about southern Russian dialects and saying that Ukrainian language didn’t exist back then, none of the Slavic languages we know today existed back then in their modern form so there’s no need to specifically pinpoint each one and being condescending about it.Scenic town (talk) 15:14, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

    The word Galicia is used rather to describe the historical region in western Ukraine and eastern Poland, which exists to this day.
    – Right here, you said it yourself! It is the same thing, the region and the kingdom this article is about. Until the region becomes known as "Halychinia" or "Halychia", there's no reason whatsoever to rename this article. --Moscow Connection (talk) 15:41, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

    Nope, you’re trying to reinterpret my words, I may be wrong but I suspect you don’t really understand the difference between Galicia and Halych, those are different things (with the same word origin) Galicia is a general term to describe a certain part of land between Poland and Ukraine, while the word Halych is the name of the city which the principality was named after, and Galicia is just a Latin name of Halych which refers to both the region and the city(which by the way Latin based languages don’t even use to describe the city). Scenic town (talk) 15:52, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

    • "Halych is the name of the city which the principality was named after."
      – Galicia is the name of the region which the principality was named after. Or, rather the principality and the region are (were) the same thing. --Moscow Connection (talk) 16:01, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

    • Stating something about southern Russian dialects.
      – Ha, I've just noticed that! :-) You react too sharply. Which makes me think that you are actually "pushing a [Ukrainization] agenda" here, even if "just slightly".
      A better link would be "Old East Slavic" or "Old Church Slavonic", but I looked for a phonetical description (and for the /ɡ/→/ɣ/ shift in particular), and those articles didn't have anything about that. --Moscow Connection (talk) 16:40, 25 May 2026 (UTC)
    • I've just noticed that this very article says: "Old East Slavic: Галицкоє кънѧжьство, romanized: Galickoje kǔnęžǐstvo)". Which implies that back then it was actually "Galicia" and not "Halychinia", "Halychyna" or whatever. --Moscow Connection (talk) 17:18, 25 May 2026 (UTC)
    • As I've said to you elsewhere, just think what country would you prefer to visit, Principality of Galicia (wow, that must be a great place!) or Confusing Sequence of Seemingly Random Characters? These names, like Lodomeria, Ruthenia, came from very clever people who knew what looks good. We should appreciate the work of those great people and should not rename articles for the sake of political expediency.. --Moscow Connection (talk) 19:29, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

      I think nom has already conceded the point below. Further discussion about etymology of East Slavic language toponyms is irrelevant anyway; all we are concerned here is what the WP:COMMONNAME in English literature is. Greetings, NLeeuw (talk) 22:41, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. No evidence provided that "Halych" is more often used than "Galicia" to refer to the principality. Mellk (talk) 15:32, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  I’m not trying to start any conflict here so I’m going to just provide google ngrams that shows “Principality of Halych” rapidly growing in use which is exactly whatWikipedia:COMMONNAME is about, and to be honest there’s too much Galicias, so if there is an option to make it less ambiguous then why not considering the fact that principality of Halych is just as much used and is becoming more popular, even the references mentioned on this page referred to it as “principality of Halych” Scenic town (talk) 15:57, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  This is more accurate (case insensitive). Either way, this is recentism. Google Scholar also indicates that "Galicia" is used much more often than "Halych" when referring to the principality (even if we arbitrarily limit results to the last few years). Mellk (talk) 16:04, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  @Scenic town I'm sorry, but this proposal is coming too early. Yes, Halych is increasing in use, but does not yet clearly outperform Galicia. We can't know whether Halych will soon overtake Galicia though, so per WP:CRYSTAL, we can't implement this move yet. NLeeuw (talk) 16:06, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  Yeah, I guess I was too hasty, but what motivated my request is that a lot of reliable outlets in google search mention it as “Principality of Halych”, but anyway, thanks for being reasonable, have a nice day! Scenic town (talk) 16:31, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

• Soft oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. Although I am seeing evidence that Principality of Halych is indeed becoming more frequent in scholarly literature in English in recent years, it has not yet overtaken Principality of Galicia. Google Ngrams. If the trend continues, I expect that an RM will be successful in the future, but for now, this is too early. Greetings, NLeeuw (talk) 16:04, 25 May 2026 (UTC)
• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:35, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.