Lviv << loh VEEF or luh VEE oo >> (pop. 729,038) is a major city of Ukraine. Its name was formerly spelled Lvov. The city is an administrative, commercial, industrial, and cultural center of western Ukraine. It is also a major transportation hub.
Lviv’s leading products include agricultural machinery, chemicals, electrical equipment, heavy vehicles, processed foods, and refined petroleum. Lviv has many museums, libraries, research institutes, and schools of higher education. The Lviv National University was established in 1611.
Lev, ruler of the independent principality of Galicia, founded Lviv in the 1200’s (see Galicia). Poland controlled the city—called Lwow by the Poles—from the 1340’s until 1772. From 1772 to 1918, Austria ruled the city, which was then known by its German name, Lemberg. Poland retook the city after World War I ended in 1918. The city became part of the Ukrainian republic of the Soviet Union in 1945, after World War II ended. After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Lviv became part of independent Ukraine.
In February 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine. In the following weeks, Russian forces fired missiles at Lviv several times, but the main fighting took place to the east. Many Ukrainians who were forced from their homes by the war fled to Lviv or passed through the city on their way to refuge in other countries.
