correct Ukrainian orthography? Pavlo Humeniuk

[Paul B. Gallagher]

Natalia Pylypiuk wrote:

> Dear Professor Hill,
> 
> I have recordings by the famous fiddler HUMENIUK.
> The form *Huemiuk* in note 8 (cited below in blue) is merely a
> typographical error. No such name exists in Ukrainian.
> 
> If we were to transliterate his name from Ukrainian, it would be
> Pavlo Humeniuk, according to the Library of Congress system, and
> Pavlo Humenjuk, according to the International Standard.
> 
> His *Dance under the Willows* would be:
> Tanets' pid verbamy, according to the Library of Congress system, and
> Tanec' pid verbamy,  according to the International Standard.
> 
> The fiddler is known as Pawlo (instead of the expected Pavlo)
> Humeniuk in the literature, because he came from Western Ukraine to
> the USA in 1902, at a time when the Polish (and/or German) alphabet
> would have been used to render his name in the passport and other
> official documents. In the 1920s the names of his songs on the
> various recording were also rendered with the help of the Polish 
> alphabet. Thus we obtain *Tanec pid werbamy* (instead of the expected
> *verbamy*).
> 
> Inasmuch as Humeniuk's name has entered the historical record through
> Polish (German?) mediation, I would recommend following the procedure
> used in academic publications whenever established Latin-script 
> document spelling differs from transliteration norms:
> - LC transliteration [document version].
> - Then the name of the song in LC transliteration.  Thus:
> 
> Pavlo Humeniuk  [Pawlo Humeniuk]
> Tanets' pid verbamy.

As I'm sure you know, there are several systems in various degrees of 
use or disuse, and this link outlines the principal ones:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanization_of_Ukrainian>

Your recommendations for this case are wise, and I would follow them if 
I were writing about Mr. Humeniuk. In the absence of any reasons such as 
those you outline, I would generally choose among the National, BGN, or 
Library of Congress systems according to my target readership.

Here are the options according to the table (I recommend increasing the 
font size when viewing that page to be sure of seeing the diacritics):

Scholarly  Pavlo Humenjuk,   Tanets' pid verbamy
ALA-LC     Pavlo Humeniu͡k,   Tanets͡' pid verbamy
BGN/PCGN   Pavlo Humenyuk,   Tanets' pid verbamy
ISO 9      Pavlo Ǵumenûk,    Tanec' pìd verbami
National   Pavlo Humeniuk,   Tanets' pid verbamy
French     Pavlo Houmeniouk, Tanets pid verbamy
German     Pawlo Humenjuk,   Tanez pid werbamy

Since German uses "ju" for "ю," I conclude that the intermediary must 
have been Polish (not listed in the table), which routinely uses "iu" in 
its own native spelling for /u/ after a palatalized consonant.

I've used "Ǵ" above in ISO 9 because I couldn't find a G-grave in 
Character Map.

-- 
War doesn't determine who's right, just who's left.
--
Paul B. Gallagher
pbg translations, inc.
"Russian Translations That Read Like Originals"
http://pbg-translations.com

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