Kamianets-Podilskyi

From Freepedia

Kamianets-Podilskyi or Kamyanets-Podilsky (Ukrainian: Кам’янець-Подільський, Kam”ianets’-Podil’s’kyi) is a city located on the Smotrich River in southwestern Ukraine. Historically it is the ancient capital of Podolia; administratively, a part of Khmelnytsky Oblast and the center of that province's Kamianets-Podilskyi raion (district). As of 2004, the city had 99,068 inhabitants.

The first part of the city's dual name originates from "kamen" or "kamin" — "stone" in the Slavic languages. The second part relates to the Podolia (Podilia) historic district. Hence the name is written and pronounced similarly in Ukrainian, Polish (Kamieniec Podolski), Russian (Каменец-Подольский, Kamenets-Podolsky) and Latin (Camenecium).

History

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 bar:test from:1062 till:1352 # Kievan Ruthenia

 width:15 color:red
 bar:test from:1352 till:1672 # Poland

 width:15 color:green
 bar:test from:1672 till:1699 # Turkey

 width:15 color:red
 bar:test from:1699 till:1793 # Poland

 width:15 color:blue
 bar:test from:1793 till:1915 # Imperial Russia

 width:15 color:blue
 bar:test from:1915 till:1917 # Austria-Hungary

 width:15 color:white
 bar:test from:1917 till:1921 # Polish-Bolshevik War

 width:15 color:pink
 bar:test from:1921 till:1941 # Soviet Union

 width:15 color:yellow
 bar:test from:1941 till:1944 # Nazi Germany

 width:15 color:pink
 bar:test from:1944 till:1991 # Soviet Union

 bar:test at:1062 mark:(line,black)
 at:1062 shift:(10,0) text:1062 First mention
 bar:test at:1241 mark:(line,black)
 at:1241 shift:(10,0) text:1241 Mongol invasion
 bar:test at:1352 mark:(line,black)
 at:1352 shift:(10,0) text:1352 Captured by Casimir the Great of Poland
 bar:test at:1672 mark:(line,black)
 at:1672 shift:(10,0) text:1672 Captured by the Ottomans #in the Treaty of Buczacz
 bar:test at:1699 mark:(line,black)
 at:1699 shift:(10,0) text:1699 Retaken by Jan Sobieski of Poland
 bar:test at:1793 mark:(line,black)
 at:1793 shift:(10,0) text:1793 Poland partitioned, town annexed by Russia
 bar:test at:1915 mark:(line,black)
 at:1915 shift:(10,10) text:1915 Captured by Austria-Hungary during WWI
 bar:test at:1917 mark:(line,black)
 at:1917 shift:(10,1) text:1917-1920 Ukraine and Polish-Bolshevik War
 bar:test at:1793 mark:(line,black)
 at:1921 shift:(10,-7) text:1921 Granted to Bolshevik Russia
 bar:test at:1941 mark:(line,black)
 at:1941 shift:(10,0) text:1941-1944 German occupation 
 bar:test at:1991 mark:(line,black)
 at:1991 shift:(10,0) text:1991 Independent Ukraine

The town is first mentioned in 1062 as a town of Kievan Rus'. In 1241 it was sacked and destroyed by Mongol (Tatar) invaders. In 1352 it was annexed by Polish King Kazimierz the Great and became the capital of Podole Voivodship and the seat of local civil and military administration. The ancient castle was reconstructed and substantially expanded by the Polish kings to defend Poland from the southeast against Ottoman and Tatar invasions. After the Treaty of Buczacz (1672) it was briefly part of Turkey and capital of a local eyalet. To counter the Turkish threat to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, King Jan III Sobieski built a fortress near by, Okopy Świętej Trójcy ("the Entrenchments of the Holy Trinity"). In 1699 the city was recaptured by Poland. The fortress was continually enlarged and was regarded as the strongest in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The preserved ruins of the fortress still contain the iron cannon balls stuck in them from various sieges.

From the Second Partition of Poland (1793), the city belonged to the Russian Empire, where it was the capital of Podol'skaya Guberniya. The Russian Emperor Peter the Great, who visited the fortress twice, was impressed by its fortifications. One of the towers was used as a prison cell for Ustym Karmeliuk (a prominent peasent rebell leader of the early 19th century), who managed to escape from it three times.

With the collapse of the Russian Empire in 1917, the city was briefly incorporated into several short-lived Ukrainian states — the Ukrainian People's Republic, the Hetmanate, and the Directoriya — and ended up in the Ukrainian SSR (Soviet Ukraine) when Ukraine fell under Bolshevik power. During the Polish-Soviet War (1919-1921) the city was captured by the Polish Army, but it was later ceded to Soviet Russia in the Treaty of Riga (1921), which determined the future of the area for the next seven decades as part of the Ukrainian SSR.

Poles and Ukrainians have always dominated the city's population. However, as a commercial center, Kamianets-Podilskyi has been a multiethnic and multi-religious city with substantial Jewish and Armenian minorities. Under Soviet rule it became subject to severe persecutions, and most of the Poles were forcibly deported to Siberia. Early on, Kamianets-Podilskyi was the capital of the Ukrainian SSR's Podil'ska Oblast' , but the administrative center was soon moved to Proskuriv (now Khmelnytskyi).

Tourist attractions

Kamianets-Podilskyi is famous for its ancient fortress, and for ballooning activities in the canyon of the Smotrich River. Since 1998 the city has been growing as a tourist center. Annual Kozats'ki zabavy ("Cossack Games") festivals, which include the open ballooning championship of Ukraine, car racing and various music, art and drama activities, attract an estimated 140,000 tourists and stimulate the local economy. More than a dozen privately owned hotels have recently been built there, a large number for a provincial Ukrainian city.

People

• Stanisław Koniecpolski fought here.
• Ferdynand Antoni Ossendowski lived here.
• Mendele Mocher Sforim lived here.
• Maurice Zbriger was born here.

See also

• Subdivisions of Ukraine.
• History of Ukraine.
• Culture of Ukraine.
• History of Poland.
• Kamenets-Podolsky Pocket.

External links

• Satellite photo
• Soviet topographic map 1:100,000
• "The old fortress on the Smotrich River," in Zerkalo Nedeli (Weekly Mirror), June 28 - July 5, 2002, available online in Ukrainian and in Russian