Chortkiv

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Chortkiv
Чортків
City
View of Chortkiv and the surrounding Podolian landscape.

Flag

Coat of arms
Chortkiv
Location of Chortkiv in Ukraine
Coordinates: 49°00′27″N 25°47′26″E / 49.00750°N 25.79056°E / 49.00750; 25.79056Coordinates: 49°00′27″N 25°47′26″E / 49.00750°N 25.79056°E / 49.00750; 25.79056
Country  Ukraine
Province  Ternopil Oblast
District Chortkiv Raion
Magdeburg rights 1533
City status 1939[1]
Government
  City Mayor Mykhailo Verbitskyi
Area
  Total 30 km2 (10 sq mi)
Elevation[2] 218 m (715 ft)
Population (2001)
  Total 28,855
  Density 960/km2 (2,500/sq mi)
Time zone EET (UTC+2)
  Summer (DST) EEST (UTC+3)
Postal code 48500—48509
Area code +380 3552
Website http://rada.gov.ua/

Chortkiv (Ukrainian: Чортків; Polish: Czortków) is a city in Ternopil Oblast (province) in western Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Chortkiv Raion (district), housing the district's local administration buildings. Chortkiv is located in the northern part of the historic region of Galician Podolia on the banks of the Seret River.[3] Its population is 28,855 as of the 2001 Ukrainian Census.[1]

In the past Chortkiv was the home of many Hasidic Jews; it was a notable shtetl and had a significant number of Jews residing there prior to the Holocaust. Today, Chortkiv is a regional commercial and small-scale manufacturing center.[3] Among its architectural monuments is a fortress built in the 16th and 17th centuries[4] as well as historic wooden churches of the 17th and 18th centuries.[5]

History

The first historical mention of Chortkiv dates to 1522, when Polish King Sigismund I the Old granted an ownership order for Jerzy Czortkowski over the town and allowed him to name it after himself—Czortków.[5] During that time, the town was also granted Magdeburg rights.[3] However, Chortkiv would later decline in the second half of the 17th century during the Polish-Turkish Wars when the town was taken over by Ottoman Empire,[3] whose rule lasted from 1673 to 1683. It was part of the short-lived Turkish Podolia Eyalet, which lasted from 1672 to 1699.

After First Partition of Poland Chortkiv came under Austro-Hungarian rule which lasted from 1772 to 1918, during the time of which it was the center of the Chortkiv Bezirk. On June 8, 1919 the Ukrainian Galician Army broke for couple months through the Polish front at Chortkiv and began the Chortkiv offensive.[3] Soon afterwards, the town was seized by the Poles and remained part of the Tarnopol Voivodeship of the Second Polish Republic until September 1939.

In 1931, the town had 19,000 inhabitants, 22.8 percent of whom were Ukrainians (Greek Catholics), 46.4 percent of whom were Poles (Roman Catholics), and 30 percent of whom were Jews. Chortkiv was an important garrison of the Polish Border Defence Corps Brigade "Podole", whose commandant from 1935 to 1938 was General Stefan Rowecki. Furthermore, it was home to the 36th Reserve Infantry Division.

The town was annexed to the Soviet Union from September 17, 1939 until June 1941. Its Polish inhabitants, particularly students of the local high school, organized a failed uprising in January 1940,[6] which would serve as the first Polish uprising of World War II. From 1941-1944 it was annexed to Nazi Germany. After the defeat of the Nazis by the Red Army in 1944, the town returned to Soviet control until in 1991 it became part of independent Ukraine. Polish residents of the town were transferred to the Recovered Territories in the immediate postwar period (see Polish population transfers (1944–1946)).

People from Chortkiv

  • Sacha Blonder (André Blondel) (1909-1949), Ecole de Paris painter
  • Waclaw Czerwinski - Polish engineer and pilot, pioneer of Polish gliding,
  • Jerzy Czortkowski, founder of Czortków
  • Pinchas Horowitz (1731–1805), rabbi and Talmudist
  • Jerzy Janicki (1928-2007) – Polish writer and reporter,
  • Edward Kmiecik (born 1928) - Polish painter,
  • Ireneusz Opacki (1933-2005) – academic of the Katowice Silesian University, expert on Polish literature,
  • Jerzy Przystawa (born 1939) - Polish scientist, physicist,
  • Alfred Trawinski - major of the Polish Army, doctor and professor of Medicine Academy of Lwow,
  • Tadeusz Wazewski (1896-1972) – Polish scholar, mathematician, professor of Jagiellonian University,
  • Shmelke of Nikolsburg (1746–1778), one of the great early Chasidic Rebbes
  • Karl Emil Franzos (1848–1904), Austrian novelist
  • Kateryna Rubchakova (1881–1919), Ukrainian actress and singer
  • Leopold Levytskyi (1906–1973), Ukrainian painter
  • Perla (Penina) Richter Feldschu (1900-1943), Warsaw musicologist, wife of Zionist activist Ruben Feldschu (Ben Shem)[7]

See also

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 "Chortkiv, Ternopil Oblast, Chortkiv Raion". Regions of Ukraine and their Structure (in Ukrainian). Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. Retrieved 2 February 2012. 
  2. 'skaja/28552 "Chortkiv (Ternopil Oblast, Chortkiv Raion)". weather.in.ua (in Ukrainian). Retrieved 2 February 2012. 
  3. 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 "Chortkiv". Encyclopedia of Ukraine. Retrieved 3 February 2012. 
  4. "CHORTKIV CASTLE, 1610". Halychyna! - Homeland Page. Central European University Personal Pages. Retrieved 3 February 2012. 
  5. 5.0 5.1 "Foundations of history". chortkiv.com.ua (in Ukrainian). Unicom ISP. Retrieved 3 February 2012. 
  6. Gross, Jan Tomasz (2002). Revolution from Abroad: The Soviet Conquest of Poland's Western Ukraine and Western Belorussia. Princeton University Press. p. 172. ISBN 0-691-09603-1. 
  7. Laurence Weinbaum "'Shaking the Dust Off". The Story of the Warsaw Ghetto’s Forgotten Chronicler, Ruben Feldschu (Ben Shem)" Jewish Political Studies Review 22:3-4 (Fall 2010)

External links

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