Cher·niv·tsi (ch?r-n?v?ts?, -ny?w?-) or Cher·nov·tsy (-nôf?-) A city of southwest Ukraine in the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains near the Romanian border. It was a center of the Ukrainian nationalist movement in the 19th and early 20th centuries.American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.