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First, Russian middle names always are father's names, patronyms. Women keep their middle name after the marriage while their last name (family name) is changed as usual.

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In Russian, patronyms for men always end in -ICH and for women - in -NA. For a given male name, the father's name, a pair of such patronyms (in -ICH and -NA) exists. For some names, short form are also available.

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I mean Russian patronyms, these are not used in West and South Slavic countries, however.

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Ivayla has already given some examples. Here is one more for names in a-declension:

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Father Nikita: Nikitich, Nikitichna.

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Assignining patronyms as middle names is obligatory in Russia. Hence, even non-Russian father's name should have a pair of patronyms:

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Father Ali: Alievich, Alievna.

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For men:
-ovich added to the father's first name if it (father's first name) ends in a consonant
-evich added to the father's first name if it ends in a vowel

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i.e. Feodor's son would be Feodorovich, Evgeni's son would be Evgenievich

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For women
-ovna added to the father's first name if it (father's first name) ends in a consonant
-evna added to the father's first name if it ends in a vowel

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i.e. Feodorovna, but Evgenievna

Read this instead...

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As far as I know, it works something like this:
-ov for men (as in Feodorov) is -ovna for women (Feodorovna)
-vich for men (as in Popovich) is -va for women (Popova)
-skij for men (Sergievskij) is -skaja for women (Sergievskaja)

Edited by the author because of mistakes...

This message was edited 9/24/2004, 5:51 AM