Kyiv

Kyiv is the capital of Ukraine, a city on both banks of the Dnipro River in the north of the country. Its name recalls Kyi, the eldest of the brothers Kyi, Shchek and Khoryv of the founding legend, who with their sister Lybid are shown on a monument by the river. Saint Sophia Cathedral and the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra monastery together form a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

A settlement stood on the hills above the river by the 6th century, and from the late 9th century it was the capital of Kyivan Rus. Grand Prince Volodymyr adopted Christianity in 988 and had the people of the city baptized in the Dnipro. His son Yaroslav the Wise raised the Golden Gate as the main entrance of the walled city in the 11th century. Kyiv received Magdeburg rights of self-government in the 15th century and later passed to Poland-Lithuania and then to the Russian Empire. It became the capital of an independent Ukraine in 1991.

Antonov designs and builds transport aircraft, among them the An-124 Ruslan. Roshen, based in Kyiv, makes chocolate, candy and cakes. Obolon brews beer and kvass and bottles mineral water. Grammarly, the writing assistant, was started in Kyiv by Ukrainian developers.

St Andrew's Church, a baroque church designed by Bartolomeo Rastrelli in the 18th century, stands on a hill above the old trading quarter. Dynamo Kyiv won the European Cup Winners' Cup in the 1970s and 1980s under the coach Valeriy Lobanovskyi. The writer Mikhail Bulgakov grew up in the city and set his novel The White Guard in its streets. The painter Kazimir Malevich, creator of the Black Square, was born in Kyiv. Igor Sikorsky built his first aircraft in Kyiv before he moved to the United States and designed the first mass-produced helicopters.