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Geographical Review
- Crimea, Ukraine
Crimea or Krym is a very popular vacation place. Beautiful nature, nice beaches, warm climate, rich night life draw people from all over the world.
Crimea, or Krym, is situated in the extreme South of the Eastern European Plain of Ukraine. The territory of the Crimean peninsula is washed by the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, belonging to Atlantic Ocean basin. Crimea lies approximately midway between the Equator and the North Pole. It occupies a territory of approximately 27.000 sq.km. The Crimean peninsula is diamond shaped; its western coast is formed by the Tarkhankut peninsula, and the eastern one by the Kerch peninsula. In the North, Crimea is linked with the Khersonskaya oblast (region) of Ukraine with the 7-km-long Perekop isthmus.
General Review
- Sevastopol, Crimea, Ukraine
All kinds of transportation, exept by river, are well developed in Crimea.
The sea ports of Crimea - Sevastopol, Yalta, Feodosia and Kerch - connect the peninsula with the southern regions of Ukraine, Krasnodarskiy Territory of Russia, Georgia, and through the Volgo-Donskoy shipping canal, with the Caspian Sea, the White Sea and the Baltic Sea; through the Bosporus shipping canal, particularly, the ports are linked with all countries of the world.
The length of paved roads is about 7,000 km, and of the railway system over 1,000 km. The Simferopol airport is one of Ukraine's most important airports.
The wealth of Crimea includes various minerals, but iron-ore, deposits of building and flux limestones, salt resourses of Sivash Lake and other lakes, and also gas deposites in the plains area and Karkinitsky Bay are of great industrial importance.
Recreational resources are of special importance to Crimea.
They include beaches (517 km of coastline, including over 100km of artificial coastline), medicinal mud (Saks'ke and Chokraks'ke Lakes, Bulgans'kyi deposit), and mineral springs (over 200).
There are 4 State Reserves in the territory of Crimea; the Crimean Reserve, Karadagsky Reserve, Yaltinsky Mountain and Forest Reserve, and the Reserve of Martyan Cape.
- Gurzuf, Crimea, Ukraine
From the North to the South the Crimean peninsula is about 200 km long, and from the West to the East about 325 km. Sea borders prevail in Crimea, the coastline of which is about 1000 km.
The population of Crimea is about 2,033,000. Simferopol is the capital with about 344,000 inhabitants. The largest cities are Sevastopol (about 350.000), Kerch (about 157,000), Yevpatoria (about 106,000), Feodosia (about 75,000), and Yalta (over 82,000). Crimea is one of the multinational regions. There are more than 100 nations and nationalities.
The Crimean peninsula is distinquished by its variety of landscape. The northern part of it is a steppe zone; the southern part is covered with the woods of the Crimean mountains.
- Sudak, Crimea, Ukraine
The mountain ridges stretch from Sevastopol to Feodosia. The high peaks of the Crimean mountains are in the Main, or the Southern, ridge. The mountain Roman-Kosh (1545 meters above the sea) is the highest of them.
The climate of the northern part of the peninsula is temperate-continental. The climate of the South Coast of Crimea is of the Mediterranean type.
A coast strip (from 2 to 5 kilometers) stretches along the south coast of the Crimean mountains, where the famous health resorts of Yalta, Alupka, Alushta, Foros, Simeiz, Miskhor, Livadia, and Gurzuf are situated. Sevastopol and Balaklava are very convenient bays on the Black Sea coast.
A little bit of the history
- Sudak, Crimea, Ukraine
From ancient times, Crimea was the crossing point of different tribes, nations and cultures. The civilizations of ancient Greece and Rome, the ancient Russ and Byzantine Empires, and Khazaria and Balkan countries interacted in the Crimean land.
Sites of primitive peoples discovered in Crimea by archaeologists are evidence of settling of the territory by man in the Stone Age.
The ancient population of Crimea included half-settled normandic tribes, known as Cimmerians, who lived there in the 2nd to 1st centuries B.C. The Taurys, who lived in the Crimean mountains, are considered to be the descendants of Cimmerians. The Greek name of the Crimean peninsula is Taurika, named after the mountain ridge Taur in the southern coast of the peninsula.
- Khersones, Crimea, Ukraine
That name was used in the age of antiquity and Middle Ages.
In the 6th century B.C., in the eastern part of Taurika, at the location of modern towns Kerch and Feodosia, there was founded the town of Pantikapey, which was called Bosporus by Greeks, and the fortress Kafa. In the western part of Crimea, the town Khersones was founded in the 5th century B.C. by settlers from the South coast of the Black Sea (from Heraclea Pontic).
Scythians are also considered to be the ancient inhabitants of Crimea.
Scythian Neapol (founded at the end of the 3rd century B.C. and existed up to the 4th century A.D.) was the center of Scythian tribes in Crimea. It was situated at the site of modern Simferopol.
In the 3rd century the Christian religion began to disseminate in Crimea. It came probably from Asia Minor. At the time Khersones continued its development as a slave-holding republic with an aristocratic system. Khersones became the main strong point for Romans in the North coast of the Black Sea.
- Khersones, Crimea, Ukraine
The adoption of Christianity in Russ is connected with Crimea. In 989, when Prince Volodymyr conquered Khersones, the Byzantine Emperor tried to evade his obligations by promising to give his sister Ann away in marriage to Volodymyr in exchange of military assistance to the Empire and the Christening of Russ.
The incursion of Mongolian armies into Taurika began in 1223, and in 1239 Mongolian tribes under the command of Batyi-Khan conquered a steppe territory of Crimea. The town of Krym (modern Stary Krym) became the administrative center of the whole peninsula, supplanting Taurika. At the same time there were several independent Mongolian states in Crimea. The Genoese settlement Kafa (Feodosia) was one of the most famous among them.
At the beginning of the second half of the 19th century, the Crimean peninsula became the theatre of military actions of the bloody Crimean War.
- Crimea wineries, Ukraine
After the Crimean War and abolition of serfdom, the government began to distribute plots of land in Crimea and stimulate the interest of migration there from other provinces of Russia and from abroad.
Towards the end of the 19th century arable farming first appeared in Crimea. Trade in Crimea features the export of fruits, tobacco, grapes, wine, fish, canned food, salt and iron-ore.
Since old times, Crimea attracted people with its wonderful medicinal climate. Mainly nobles, merchants, military aristocracy and businessmen lived in the region. They bought plots of land in Crimea and built palaces and private residences.
- Sudak, Crimea, Ukraine
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, a number of outstanding scientists and art workers lived and worked in Crimea, including L. Tolstoy, A. Gorky, A. Chekhov, A. Kuprin, Lesya Ukrayinka, M. Kotsubinsky, I. Repin, F. Shalyapin and many others.
After the Great October Socialist Revolution and Civil War in Russia, the representatives of 70 nations and nationalities lived in Crimea, including Ukrainians, Russians, Tatars, Germans, Jews, Greeks. October 18th, 1921 marked the creation of the Crimean Autonomous Repulic as a part of the Russian Federation, within the limits of the Crimean peninsula.
At the beginning of the World War II the heroic defence of Sevastopol began on October 30th, 1941 and lasted for 250 days. In June 1945 the Crimean Autonomous Republic was reorganized into the Crimean region, which became part of Ukraine on February 19, 1954. In 1991 Crimea received autonomy again, but as a part of Ukraine.
Crimean Economy
- Yevpatoria, Crimea, Ukraine
The economy of Crimea was formed under the influence of natural resources and pecularities as well as the advantages of the geographical location of the peninsula. Crimea has favourable natural conditions for the development of agriculture, recreation industry and some industrial productions like the extraction of gas, iron-ore, flux limestone, building materials, and soda and bromine compounds production.
Labour-intensive machine-building and metal-processing are prevalent fields of specialization in the Crimean economy.
- Massandra palace, Yalta, Crimea, Ukraine
The agriculture of Crimea is historically oriented for the development of farming.
A special place in the economy of Crimea is occupied by enterprises manufacturing consumer goods.
The Crimean fine dessert wines and champagne stand very high in the world market. The essential oils of Crimea have also won due authority.
The recreation industry is heavily developed in Crimea. The health centers are mainly concentrated in the South Coast of Crimea and the resorts of Yevpatoria. There are a number of tourist stations and camps in the mountainous part of Crimea.
