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Ivano-Frankivsk, formerly Stanyslaviv, is a city located in Western Ukraine. It is the administrative centre of Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast and Ivano-Frankivsk Raion. Ivano-Frankivsk hosts the administration of Ivano-Frankivsk urban hromada. Its population is Built in the mid-17th century as a fortress of the Polish Potocki family, Stanisławów was annexed to the Habsburg Empire during the First Partition of Poland in 1772, after which it became the property of the State within the Austrian Empire. The fortress was slowly transformed into one of the most prominent cities at the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains. After World War I, for several months, it served as a temporary capital of the West Ukrainian People's Republic. Following the Peace of Riga in 1921, Stanisławów became part of the Second Polish Republic. After the Soviet invasion of Poland at the onset of World War II, the city was annexed by the Soviet Union, only to be occupied by Nazi Germany two years later. With the liberation of Soviet Ukraine in 1944 and the shifting of borders, the Communist regime ran the city for the next four-and-a-half decades. A few years before the fall of the Soviet Union, the blue-yellow flag was raised in the city as the symbol of an independent Ukraine. A city visitor may find elements of various cultures intertwined within Ivano-Frankivsk, the Polish city hall, the Austro-Hungarian city's business centre, the Soviet prefabricated apartment blocks at the city's rural–urban fringe, and others. Ivano-Frankivsk is also one of the principal cities of the Carpathian Euroregion. [edit] History
The town of Stanisławów was founded as a fortress in order to protect the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth from Tatar invasions and to defend the multi-ethnic population of the region in case of armed conflicts such as the Khmelnytsky Uprising of 1648. The fort was originally built next to Zabolotiv village (known since 1435), and Knyahynyn (1449).[1] The village of Zabolotiv and the land around it were purchased by Andrzej Potocki from another Polish nobleman, Rzeczkowski. Stanisławów was issued by Potocki and his declaration establishing the city with Magdeburg rights on May 7, 1662; but the city and its rights, however, were not recognized by the Polish Crown until August 14, 1663, when John Casimir had finally approved it. By 1672, the fortress had been rebuilt from wood to stone, brick, and mortar. Also a new large fortified Potocki palace was erected in the place of an older wood structure. Today this building serves as the military hospital. In the same year Jews were granted the right to become permanent residents, who could work, conduct commerce and travel in and out of the city as they pleased. Originally the city was divided into two districts: Tysmenytsia and Halych. Sometime in 1817–1819 the neighbouring village of Zabolottya, that had a special status, was incorporated into the city as a new district, while Tysmenytsia district was divided into Tysmenytsia and Lysets districts. Each district had its main street corresponded with its name: Halych Street (Halych district), Tysmenytsia Street which today is Independence Street (Tysmenytsia district), Zabolotiv Street – Mykhailo Hrushevsky Street and Street of Vasylyanok (Zabolottya district), and Lysets Street – Hetman Mazepa Street (Lysets district). Later the city was split into six small districts: midtown where the rich Catholic population and patricians lived, pidzamche (subcastle), and four suburbs – Zabolotiv, Tysmenytsia, Halych and Lysets where the plebeians lived.
In the 1939 invasion of Poland by German and Soviet forces, the territory was captured by the Soviets in September 1939 and annexed to the Ukrainian SSR. Between September 1939 and June 1941, the Soviet regime ordered thousands of inhabitants of the city to leave their houses and move to Siberia, where most of them perished. Numerous people were taken out of the city prison and simply shot outside of the city when Soviet forces were leaving it in 1941. Ivano-Frankivsk was occupied by German forces from July 2, 1941 to July 27, 1944. There were more than 40,000 Jews in Stanisławów when it was occupied by the Nazi Germany on July 26, 1941. The Stanisławów Ghetto was formed. During the occupation (1941–44), more than 600 educated Poles and most of the city's Jewish population were murdered. In early 1944, the city became part of the Soviet Union and was renamed 'Stanislav'. The Soviets forced most of the Polish population to leave the city, most of them settled in the Recovered Territories. During the post-war period the city was part of the Carpathian Military District housing the 38th Army (70th Motor Rifle Division) that participated in the Operation Dunai. Until 18 July 2020, Ivano-Frankivsk was incorporated as a city of oblast significance and the center of Ivano-Frankivsk Municipality. The municipality was abolished in July 2020 as part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced the number of raions of Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast to six. The area of Ivano-Frankivsk Municipality was merged into the newly established Ivano-Frankivsk Raion. On 24 February and 11 March 2022, Ivano-Frankivsk was struck by Russian missiles during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. [edit] Timeline
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