Gnedich, Nikolai

Gnedich, Nikolai or Hnidych, Mykola [Гнедич, Николай; Гнідич Микола; Gnedič, Nikolaj; Hnidyč], b 13 February 1784 in Poltava, d 15 February 1833 in Saint Petersburg. Russian writer and translator of Ukrainian descent. He was educated at a theological seminary in Poltava, Kharkiv College, and Moscow University. He translated a collection of modern Greek folk songs (1825), Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller’s Die Verschwörung des Fiesko zu Genua, and Voltaire’s Tancrède, but is best known for his translation in hexameters of Homer’s Iliad (1829). Gnedich dedicated a number of poems, such as ‘Lastivka’ (The Swallow), to Ukraine, and wrote some poetry in Ukrainian. His poetry, plays, and prose works contain elements of classicism and sentimentalism.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 2 (1988).]