Since Russia got its name from the Finnish word Rods (meaning rowers) which ended up being translated into the English word Russia, how did the Soviet Union get its name? Where did the word soviet come from? Well, Soviet comes from the Russian word sovet which means council. So Soviet Union would literally mean Council Union which sounds like a funky name fro a campaign regarding council housing. Jokes aside, the Soviet Union was as declared on 22^nd December 1922 but it officially became a state on 30^th December 1922, after all (at that time) 11 republics united with Russia under one entity, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. All countries under this red umbrella had SSR or SFSR attached to their name which meant they were called for example, Moldova which which joined later was known as the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic.