Levchenko, Mykhailo

Levchenko, Mykhailo [Левченко, Михайло; Levčenko, Myxajlo], b 1830 in Kyiv, d 9 October 1891 in Kyiv. Lexicographer. His Opyt russko-ukrainskogo slovaria (An Attempt at a Russian-Ukrainian Dictionary, 1874) was one of the first dictionaries of its kind. It contained approximately 7,600 Russian and 9,000 Ukrainian words (including synonyms). The Ukrainian vocabulary was derived mostly from the southeastern dialects. In spite of its small range, the dictionary played an important role in normalizing literary Ukrainian (see Standard Ukrainian). Levchenko also contributed articles on Ukrainian terminology and place-names to Osnova (Saint Petersburg) (1861).

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]