Sviatoshyn

Sviatoshyn Pond

In contrast to English speaking countries, the names of a city's suburbs in Ukraine, that belong to city councils areas, do not have so strict spelling rules, because their name do not play any significant roles in an official city's division to local districts (raions) or in the postal system.

The ethnographer Lavrentii Pokhylevych in his work "Tales of inhabited areas of the Kyiv province" in 1884 mentioned this place as "a woodland called Sviatoshyn".[11] There is a document "The report of the Committee to facilitate accomplishment of the villa area in the locality Sviatoshyn of the Kyiv province and district. Kyiv, 1903" existing.[12] At the beginning of the 20th century the dacha village was called Sviatoshyn (Святошинъ - in the Pre-reform Russian orthography).[13][14]

In the Soviet era there was a trend to change names of settlements, especially small ones, by putting the suffix "-o". So that since the 1930s on all maps of Kyiv, both Russian and Ukrainian languages, the suburb was marked as Sviatoshyno (Святошино).[15] Settlement names with the suffix "-o" are more typical of Russian language than Ukrainian, so sometimes the name Sviatoshyne (Святошине) was used in Ukrainian spelling.[16] Despite of that there is Sviatoshyn (Святошин) article included in Kyiv (Encyclopedic reference book) that was published by the Ukrainian Soviet Encyclopedia editorial office.[17]

Since the station of the Kyiv Metro, which is the suburb's landmark, was renamed Sviatoshyn (Святошин) station, this variant of suburb spelling has been started broadly used. Ukrainian linguists insist on using Sviatoshyn (Святошин) as the locality name.[18][19] In spite of this, sometimes the name Sviatoshyno (Святошино) has still been used, even in official documents of the Kyiv City Council.[20]

Zhyvopysna Street, a former name - the 5th prosika (cutting glade)

Before the Kievan Rus epoch it was a territory of Eastern Polans and approximately 10 kilometres to the west, on the left bank of the Irpin River, Drevlians' land began.[21]

At the time of Kievan Rus and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania the land belonged to the Principality of Kyiv.

It is alleged that in the 12th century the owner of this land was Nikola Sviatosha (Sviatoslav), the Prince of Chernigov, who donated it to the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra. Until the beginning of the 17th century this area belonged to Kyiv monasteries.[22]

The first mention of the area name Sviatoshyn was in 1619, when this land was a part of the Kyiv Voivodeship of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth after the Union of Lublin. At that time the king Sigismund III Vasa determined the metes and bounds of Kyiv's burgesses land possession in his charter. In particular it was said that Kyiv's citizens boundary went "through an oak grove to Sviatoshyn side".[8]

At the time of the Cossack Hetmanate, the present Sviatoshyn territory belonged to the Kyiv Regiment.

In the 1780s, at the time when this land was included into the Kyiv Viceroyalty of the Russian Empire, the Magdeburg rights of Kyiv were revoked so Sviatoshyn area went to the state ownership.

Until the end of the 19th century, that land had been mentioned like Sviatoshyn wood, grove or forest, and it was a part of the Bilychi volost of the Kyiv Governorate. There were no allusions about any permanent human settlements in there at that time.[23]

In 1897 the Sviatoshyn land, which had been occupied by a pine grove, was divided into 450 lots and leased for 99 years. Thus а dacha village (summer colony) was set up there.

A grid plan was implemented in the village. That area master plan is typical of dacha summer settlements. The core road of Sviatoshyn was Brest-Litovsky highway, now Peremohy Avenue, that went from east to west dividing the village into two unequal parts.

• A prosika (Ukrainian: просіка, Russian: просека, (old: просѣка)) means a narrow straight glade in a forest, in which trees have been cut down for further road laying or other business purposes.

The former dacha villa of I. Diakonov Kyiv mayor (1906-1916, 1918)

The villa projects were created by the Kyiv architects Alexander Krivosheiev and Alexander Khoinatsky. A lot of powerful, influential and rich people had villas there. In particular, villa owners were Kyiv University professors, three Kyiv mayors, businessmen including members of the "sugar magnate" Tereshchenko family.

The popularity of the villa area was growing up because of a pine grove, a pond and a good transport infrastructure. Simultaneously with developing the land area, in 1898 a narrow-gauge railway was laid from Kyiv and it was used as a horsecar tram line then steam tram-cars operated there. In 1901 the village was connected to an electricity network so on 1 May that year electric trams were launched. In 1902 Kyiv - Kovel railway, which goes along the east edge of Sviatoshyn village, was finished up building and Sviatoshyn Railway Station was opened.

In 1911 one of the oldest Kyiv's cinemas Ekran ("screen") was opened at the corner of Brest-Litovsky Highway and the 3rd Prosika.

Between the village and Syrets suburb was Sviatoshyn Airfield where the pilot Pyotr Nesterov introduced his famous aerobatics flights.

In 1919 the village was included into the Kyiv City Council area.

• Some saved old villas
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The former military hospital, 1938, an example of Stalinist architecture

The monument of the academician Vernadsky, 1981, at the intersection of Peremohy Avenue and Academician Vernadsky Boulevard

The hotel and restaurant "Verkhovyna" at Sviatoshyn Pond, 2014

As a result of the Ukrainian–Soviet War (1917–1921) and the Polish–Soviet War (1919–1921) Kyiv City and its suburbs was finally captured by the Red Army. In 1921 Bolsheviks conducted the administrative subdivision reform, so Kyiv was divided into 5 raions (districts) and Sviatoshyn was included into the City Council area permanently.

The Bolshevik government was conducting the nationalisation policy so that many dacha villas were expropriated. The best villas were transferred to state and trade unions sanatoriums, boarding schools and Young Pioneer camps. Some other villas and cottages were converted to communal apartments. In practice it means that a house owner family was left just one bedroom, a rest of bedrooms were given to other families, which usually originated from the working class. A kitchen room and a bathroom were used by all families together, that lived in a house.

In the 1930s Sviatoshyn's St. Nicholas Eastern Orthodox church was demolished by Bolsheviks.[24] However, on the south-west edge of Sviatoshyn the Roman Catholic parish of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross was existing during the whole time of the Communist rule. It was only one the refuge for Roman Catholics in all Kyiv region.[25]

In 1941 during the Second World War, the general staff of the Kyiv Fortified Region was situated in place of present Kyiv secondary school No. 140.[26] and next to it, the operational team of the command post of the Southwestern Front was located at the modern address 80 Verkhovynna Street. In 1944-1945 the training centre of Soviet partisans (guerrillas) located in the house at 10 the 2nd Prosika. There are a complex of monuments at Soviet soldiers' graves who killed in battle of Kyiv in 1943 at the Sviatoshyn Cemetery.

At the end of the 1940s Sviatoshyn Airfield was passed to ownership of an aircraft serial production plant that since 1952 has been headquarters of Antonov state company. In 1988 the company produced the largest ever aircraft Antonov An-225 Mriya. Together with the aircraft factory development the new village Aviamistechko began being built next to the north-east edge of Sviatoshyn. The name Aviamistechko (Ukrainian: Авіамістечко, lit. 'Aviation town') Sometimes this locality has been called Novosviatoshyn (New Sviatoshyn) as well.

In 1947 the clothing factory "Kashtan" ("Chestnut") was launched;[27] it was one of the biggest producer of male shirts in the USSR.[28]

Late in the 1950s the new housing estate Akademmistechko was started building on the land of the former vegetable farm "Sviatoshyn", that had been located north of the neighbourhood. Besides residential buildings there have been numerous research institutes of Ukrainian Academy of Sciences situated in there. Therefore, the suburb got the name Akademmistechko (Ukrainian: Академістечко, lit. 'Academic town').

In 1971 Sviatoshyn(o) station of the Kyiv Metro was opened on the east edge of neighbourhood, next to the same name railway station.

At the beginning of the 1970s a new housing estate of tower blocks was begun erecting in the north-west part of Sviatoshyn and south-east part of Bilychi suburbs, for that all existing former dacha houses had been demolished in there. In 1979–1980 the Ukrainian poet and Soviet political prisoner Vasyl Stus was living in apartment building at 13-a Chornobylska Street in that housing estate.

In 1982 due to increasing number of traffic lanes of Brest-Litovsky Highway, Sviatoshyn tram line was dismantled.[29] Instead of trams, trolleybuses were launched to the neighbourhood.