Editing Crimea (section)

==Name==
In English, the omission of the definite article ("Crimea" rather than "the Crimea") became common during the later 20th century.{{citation needed|date=November 2014}}

The spelling "Crimea" is from the Italian form, {{Langx|it|la Crimea|label=none}}, since at least the 17th century<ref>Maiolino Bisaccioni, Giacomo Pecini, ''Historia delle guerre ciuili di questi vltimi tempi, cioe, d'Inghilterra, Catalogna, Portogallo, Palermo, Napoli, Fermo, Moldauia, Polonia, Suizzeri, Francia, Turco''. per Francesco Storti. Alla Fortezza, sotto il portico de' Berettari, 1655, [https://books.google.com/books?id=o1AQbgLabIoC&pg=PA349 p. 349]: "dalla fortuna de Cosacchi dipendeva la sicurezza della Crimea". Nicolò Beregani, ''Historia delle guerre d'Europa'', Volume 2 (1683), [https://books.google.com/books?id=28BCAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA251 p. 251].</ref> and the "Crimean peninsula" becomes current during the 18th century, gradually replacing the classical name of ''Tauric Peninsula'' in the course of the 19th century.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oY1h2Pa1kaUC&pg=PA364 |title=The Annual Register or a View of the History, Politics, and Literature for the Year 1783 |publisher=J. Dodsley |year=1785 |isbn=9781615403851 |page=364 |chapter=State Papers}}</ref>{{Better source needed|reason=this primary source doesn’t directly support the statement|date=December 2023}} In English usage since the [[early modern period]] the Crimean Khanate is referred to as ''Crim Tartary''.<ref>[[Edward Gibbon]], ''[[The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire]]'', Volume 1, [https://books.google.com/books?id=LvENAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA306 306f.] "the peninsula of Crim Tartary, known to the ancients under the name of Chersonesus Taurica"; ibid. Volume 10 (1788), p. 211: "The modern reader must not confound this old Cherson of the Tauric or Crimean peninsula with [[Kherson|a new city]] of the same name". See also John Millhouse, ''English-Italian'' (1859), [https://books.google.com/books?id=jfAPAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA597 p. 597]</ref>

Today, the Crimean Tatar name of the peninsula is ''Qırım'', while the Russian is Крым (''Krym''), and the Ukrainian is Крим (''Krym'').<ref>{{Cite news |last=Taylor |first=Adam |date=2021-12-01 |title=To understand Crimea, take a look back at its complicated history |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2014/02/27/to-understand-crimea-take-a-look-back-at-its-complicated-history/ |access-date=2024-07-24 |newspaper=Washington Post |language=en-US |issn=0190-8286}}</ref>

The city ''[[Stary Krym|Staryi Krym]]'' ('Old Crimea'),<ref>William Smith, ''Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography'' (1854), s.v. ''Taurica Chersonesus''. vol. ii, p. 1109.</ref> served as a capital of the Crimean province of the [[Golden Horde]]. Between 1315 and 1329 CE, the Arab writer [[Abu'l-Fida|Abū al-Fidā]] recounted a political fight in 1300–1301 CE which resulted in a rival's decapitation and his head being sent "to the Crimea",<ref>Abū al-Fidā, Mukhtaṣar tāʾrīkh al-bashar ([[Concise History of Humanity|"A Brief History of Mankind"]]), 1315–1329; English translation of chronicle contemporaneous with Abū al-Fidā in ''The Memoirs of a Syrian Prince : Abul̓-Fidā,̕ sultan of Ḥamāh (672-732/1273-1331)'' by Peter M. Holt, Franz Steiner Verlag, 1983, pp. 38–39.</ref> apparently in reference to the peninsula,<ref>Edward Allworth, ''The Tatars of Crimea: Return to the Homeland: Studies and Documents'', Duke University Press, 1998, p.6</ref> although some sources hold that the name of the capital was extended to the entire peninsula at some point during [[Crimean Khanate|Ottoman suzerainty]] (1441–1783).<ref>[[Vasily Radlov|W. Radloff]], ''Versuch eines Wörterbuches der Türk-Dialecte'' (1888), ii. 745</ref>

The word {{crh|Qırım|lead=no}} is derived from the [[Turkic languages|Turkic]] term {{transliteration|crh|qirum}} ("fosse, trench"), from {{transliteration|crh|qori-}} ("to fence, protect").<ref>George Vernadsky, Michael Karpovich, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=sfANAQAAMAAJ A History of Russia]'', Yale University Press, 1952, [https://books.google.com/books?id=sfANAQAAMAAJ&q=qirim p. 53]. "The name Crimea is to be derived from the Turkish word ''qirim'' (hence the Russian ''krym''), which means "fosse" and refers more specifically to the Perekop Isthmus, the old Russian word ''perekop'' being an exact translation of the Turkish ''qirim''."</ref><ref>The Proto-Turkic root is cited as *''kōrɨ-'' "to fence, protect" [[Georgiy Starostin|Starling]] (citing Севортян Э. В. и др. [E. W. Sewortyan et al.], '' Этимологический словарь тюркских языков'' [An Etymological Dictionary of the Turkic languages] (1974–2000) 6, 76–78).</ref><ref>Edward Allworth, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=srR_4d3mjTAC The Tatars of Crimea: Return to the Homeland : Studies and Documents]'', Duke University Press, 1998, pp. 5–7</ref>

Another classical name for Crimea, ''[[History of Crimea#Antiquity|Tauris]]'' or ''Taurica'', is from the Greek Ταυρική (''Taurikḗ''), after the peninsula's Scytho-Cimmerian inhabitants, the [[Tauri]]. The name was revived by the Russian Empire during the mass hellenization of [[Crimean Tatar language|Crimean Tatar]] place names after the [[Annexation of the Crimean Khanate by the Russian Empire|annexation of the Crimean Khanate]], including both the peninsula and mainland territories now in Ukraine's Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.<ref>[[Edith Hall]], ''Adventures with Iphigenia in Tauris'' (2013), [https://books.google.com/books?id=CjwfAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA176 p. 176]:
"it was indeed at some point between the 1730s and the 1770s that the dream of recreating ancient 'Taurida' in the southern Crimea was conceived. [[Catherine the Great|Catherine]]'s plan was to create a paradisiacal imperial 'garden' there, and her Greek archbishop [[Eugenios Voulgaris]] obliged by inventing a new etymology for the old name of Tauris, deriving it from ''taphros'', which (he claimed) was the ancient Greek for a ditch dug by human hands."</ref> In 1764 imperial authorities established the [[Taurida Oblast]] ({{Transliteration|ru|Tavricheskaia oblast}}), and reorganized it as the [[Taurida Governorate]] in 1802. While the Soviets replaced it with ''Krym'' ({{langx|uk|Крим}}; {{langx|ru|Крым}}) depriving it of official status since 1921, it is still used by some institutions in Crimea, such as the [[Taurida National University]] established by the [[Crimean Regional Government]] in 1918, the [[FC Tavriya Simferopol|Tavriya Simferopol football club]] so named in 1963, and the [[Tavrida Highway|Tavrida federal highway]] being built under [[Russian occupation of Crimea|Russian occupation]] from 2017.

Other suggestions either unsupported or contradicted by sources, apparently based on similarity in sound, include:
# the name of the [[Cimmerians]], although this derivation is however no longer generally held.{{sfn|Sulimirski|Taylor|1991|p=558}}
# a derivation from the [[Greek language|Greek]] ''Cremnoi'' (Κρημνοί, in post-classical [[Koiné Greek]] pronunciation, ''Crimni'', i.e., "the Cliffs", a port on [[Maeotian Swamp|Lake Maeotis]] (Sea of Azov) cited by [[Herodotus]] in ''The Histories'' 4.20.1 and 4.110.2).<ref>A. D. (Alfred Denis) Godley. ''Herodotus''. Cambridge. Harvard University Press. vol. 2, 1921, p. 221.</ref> However, Herodotus identifies the port not in Crimea, but as being on the west coast of the Sea of Azov. No evidence has been identified that this name was ever in use for the peninsula.
<!--Κριμαία ?-->
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# The Turkic term (e.g., in {{Langx|tr|Kırım}}) is related to the [[Mongolian language|Mongolian]] appellation ''kerm'' "wall", but sources indicate that the Mongolian appellation of the Crimean peninsula of ''Qaram'' is phonetically incompatible with ''kerm/kerem'' and therefore deriving from another original term.<ref>See [[John Krueger|John Richard Krueger]], specialist in the studies of Chuvash, Yakut, and the Mongolian languages in Edward Allworth, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=srR_4d3mjTAC The Tatars of Crimea: Return to the Homeland : Studies and Documents]'', Duke University Press, 1998, p. 24.</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=FdsyAQAAQBAJ Jews in Byzantium: Dialectics of Minority and Majority Cultures], BRILL, 2011, p.753, n. 102.</ref><ref>The Mongolian ''kori<sup>−</sup>'' is explained as a loan from Turkic by Doerfer ''Türkische und mongolische Elemente im Neupersischen'' 3 (1967), 450 and by Щербак, ''Ранние тюркско-монгольские языковые связи (VIII-XIV вв.)'' (1997) p. 141.</ref>
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<!--if ''kori<sup>−</sup>'' is a loan word into Mongolian, it cannot be of Mongolian origin.  This is consistent with above.-->[[Strabo]] (''Geography'' vii 4.3, xi. 2.5), [[Polybius]], (''Histories'' 4.39.4), and [[Ptolemy]] (''Geographia''. II, v 9.5) refer variously to the [[Strait of Kerch]] as the Κιμμερικὸς Βόσπορος (''Kimmerikos Bosporos'', romanized spelling: ''Bosporus Cimmerius''), its [[Kerch Peninsula|easternmost part]] as the Κιμμέριον Ἄκρον (''Kimmerion Akron'', Roman name: Promontorium Cimmerium),<ref name="history1779">{{cite book |author=Compiled from original authors |title=An Universal History, From the Earliest Accounts to the Present Time |year=1779 |pages=127–129 |chapter=The History of the Bosporus |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CCsIAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA129}}</ref> as well as to the city of [[Kimmerikon|Cimmerium]] and thence the name of the [[Bosporan Kingdom|Kingdom of the Cimmerian Bosporus]] (Κιμμερικοῦ Βοσπόρου).