Kirovohrad
(Ukrainian:
Кіровоград
[kʲi.ro.wo'ɦrɑd̪],
Russian:
Кировоград,
Kirovograd), (formerly Elisavetgrad) is a
city
in central
Ukraine.
It is located on the
Inhul
river. It is a
railway
and a
motorway
junction. Pop. 239,400 (2004 est.). Developed around a
military settlement
the city got to prominence in the 19th century when it
became an important
trade
centre enjoying the rights of the Ukrainian culture
promoter with the first professional
theatrical
company both in Central and Eastern Ukraine being
established here in 1882. In
Soviet
times the city rose to the status of an
agricultural
and
light industry
centre whose fame was due to such enterprises as
Chervona Zirka Agricultural
Machinery Plant (which
once provided more than 50% of the USSR need in tractor
seeders),
Hydrosila Hydraulic Units Plant,
Radiy Radio Component Plant,
Pishmash
Typewriter
Plant (de facto defunct nowadays) etc. The recent history
of Kirovohrad saw the imminent decline of the city's
industrial potential and general socioeconomic value. The
latter plus the poor reputation of local authorities with
the city's population led to the wide-spread settled
opinions that Kirovohrad belongs to the group of the low-developed
regional capitals of Ukraine. Since 2002 the economics of
Kirovohrad has been slowly reviving. During the
Ukrainian presidential election of
2004 the city got the
country-wide notoriety because of mass
election fraud
committed by local authorities and long after that was
known as District 100 (the community number according to
Central Elections Committee).Administrative
status
The city is the
administrative center
of the
Kirovohrad Oblast
(region),
as well of the surrounding
Kirovohradsky Raion
(district)
within the
oblast.
However, the Kirovohrad is a
city of oblast subordinance,
thus being subject directly to the oblast authorities
rather to the raion administration housed in the city
itself.
Name origin
Throughout
the history Kirovohrad changed its name several times.
Presenting the letter of grant on
January 11,
1752
to Major-General
Jovan Horvat,
the organizer of
Nova Serbia
settlements, the Empress
Elizabeth of Russia
ordered "to found the earthen fortress and name it the
Fort of St. Elizabeth"
(see
On the Historical Meaning of the
Name Elizabeth for Our City
(in
Ukrainian).
Thus very ambivalently the future city was called in
honour of its formal founder, the Russian empress, and
simultaneously with due respect to her heavenly patroness,
St. Elizabeth.
The
official date of the name Yelisavetgrad (usually
spelled Elisavetgrad in English language
publications,)introduction is unknown. It is considered
that the word itself should have appeared in a natural way,
as the amalgamation of the fortress name and the common
Eastern Slavonic
constituent "-grad"
(Old/Church
Slavonic "градъ", "a
settlement encompassed by a wall"). Its first documentally
confirmed usage dates back only to 1764 when the
Yelisavetgrad Province was organized together with the
Yelisavetgrad
Lancer
Regiment.
In
1924 the city was renamed Zinovievsk, (also spelled
Zinovyevsk,) - after
Grigory Zinoviev,
a
Soviet
statesman and one of the
Russian Communist Party (bolsheviks)
leaders, who was born in Yelisavetgrad on
September 20
(September
8
O.S.),
1883. At the time referred he was the member of
Politburo
and the Chairman of the
Comintern's
Executive Committee.
On
December 27,
1934,
after the assassination of
Sergei Kirov
(who hadn't ever been to Kirovohrad and wasn't related to
the city in any possible way), Zinovievsk together with a
number of other
Soviet
cities was renamed again - this time as Kirovo, and
then as Kirovograd. The latter name appeared
simultaneously with the creation of Kirovograd Oblast, on
January 10,
1939
and was aimed to differentiate the region from
Kirov Oblast
in present-day
Russia.
After
the independence of
Ukraine,
the name of the city got started to be spelled directly
via Ukrainian pronunciation as Kirovohrad, though
previous Russified orthography is still widely used due to
the wide spread of this language in the region.
Since
1991 there have been a lot of discussions on the future
fate of the city name. A number of activists fervently
support the idea to return the city its original name
Yelisavetgrad (or now Yelysavethrad in
Ukrainian transcription).
Other variants were also proposed by people who consider
the name of the
Russian
Empress
Elizabeth
inappropriate for contemporary
Ukraine:
they were Tobilevychi (in honour of the
Tobilevych
family, the Coryphaei of the classic
Ukarinian
drama established in Kirovohrad in 1882), Zlatopil,
from Ukrainian "золоте поле", literally "golden field",
and Stepohrad, Ukrainian for "city of
steppes"
(in recognition of the agricultural status of the city),
Ukrayinsk or Ukrayinoslav, i.e. "the
glorifying Ukraine one" and Novokozachyn (to
commemorate the semi-fabulous
Cossack
regiment which could have quartered in the present-day
city location).
Due to the
slight tensions existing among the followers of different
variants mentioned above and primarily because of annual
city budget deficit the deal of Kirovohrad renaming
remains an unresolved case.
History
The
history of Kirovohrad starts from that of
Fort of St. Elizabeth.
This fort was built in 1754 by the order of empress
Elizabeth of Russia
and it played a pivotal role in the new lands added to
Russia by the
Belgrad Peace Treaty
of 1739. In 1764 the settlement received status of the
center of the Elizabeth province, and in 1784 the status
of chief town of a district, when it was renamed after the
fort as Yelizavetgrad.
The Fort
of St. Elizabeth was located on the crossroads of trade
routes, and it eventually became a major trade center. The
city has held regular fairs 4 times a year. Merchants from
all over the
Russian Empire
have visited these fairs. Also, there were a lot of
foreign merchants, especially from
Greece.
Kirovohrad (Yelizavetgrad at the time) was a site of one
of the first
pogroms
in Russia after the death of
Alexander II.
The
first Ukraine theater was built in Kirovohrad, which was
founded by M.
Kropyvnyts'ky,
I. Karpenko-Karyy,
M.
Zankovets'ka,
P.
Saksahans'ky
and M.
Sadovs'ky.
Famous people from
Kirovohrad
|
