Balaklava

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Place, port and golf

Balaklawa (Ukrainian and Russian Балаклава ; Crimean Tatar Balıqlava ) is like Chersonese an ancient Greek settlement in Crimea and since 1957 a district of Sevastopol .

geography

The sea west of Balaklava

The bay of Balaklava is located around 15 kilometers southeast of the center of the port city of Sevastopol and is protected from the open sea by mountains.

history

Historians assume that Balaklava was settled 3,000 years ago.

The Greeks called this area Symbolon , which means the Bay of Symbols . The Romans followed the Greeks, but no evidence of either culture can be found today. Homer described Symbolon in the Odyssey as "a narrow bay in which there are no storms".

Ruins of the harpsichord fortress

When the Genoese occupied the Crimean coast in the mid-14th century, the fortress was given the name Harpsichord . The remains of the most important base of the Genoese in the Crimea can still be seen today on the hill between the bay and the open sea.

When the Turks conquered the city in 1475 , they gave it a new name again: Balaklawa (Turkish Balık Yuva ), which means "fish tank" in German. When the Crimea was annexed to Russia in 1783, Tsarina Catherine II ordered the settlement of archipelago Greeks .

During the Crimean War , the British were based in Balaklava. This is where the Battle of Balaklava took place.

On September 29, 1941, the occupation of Crimea by troops of the Wehrmacht began . In the Battle of the Crimea (April 8 to May 12, 1944), the Red Army succeeded in completely retaking the peninsula. This was followed by the “ cleansing ” of the Crimea: Together with other non-Slavic minorities (mostly Crimean Tatars , Armenians and Crimean Germans ), the archipelago Greeks from Balaklava - like all their compatriots on the peninsula - were deported in 1944 on the orders of Stalin ; only Russians, Belarusians and Ukrainians were encouraged to settle there.

In 1947 Stalin had a secret submarine nuclear bunker built in the Bay of Balaklava , the " Object 825 GTS ".

  • The Amazons - Company welcomes Empress Catherine II and Emperor. Joseph II. , 1783

  • Port entrance of Balaklava, 1854

  • English military camp 1854–1855

Attractions

Nuclear bunker for submarines

Paradoxically, the largest attraction in Balaklava, in a double sense of the word, cannot be seen, it is a nuclear bunker for submarines . After the collapse of the Soviet Union , it was partially looted and destroyed. It has been a museum since 2003. Fourteen employees guide tourists through parts of the 15,000 square meter bunker.

Churches

In addition to the ruins of the harpsichord , one can visit the "Twelve Apostles" church from the 14th century in Balaklava. It is located at ul. Rubzowa 41 (Russian ул. Рубцова ) just outside the center and was restored in the early 1990s. The church is a Podvorje (Russian Подворъе ), a branch of the St. Clement Monastery of Inkerman , and the services are celebrated by the monks of Inkerman.

population

The population of Balaklava is unknown, but it is believed to be less than 10,000.

economy

Besides tourism, only a few smaller businesses are known in Balaklava, mainly in shipbuilding and viticulture.

communication

Area code +380 (692), postcode 99000.

traffic

Siege of Sevastopol with a railway line

In the Crimean War (1853-1856), the English built the first strategic railway line in railway history in 1855 to secure their supplies from Balaklava to the camp of the British-French siege army in front of Sevastopol. This railway line is closed today. From the center of Sevastopol, you can take trolleybuses number 12, 13, 14, 17 and 20 to the end of the day in half an hour. From there, take bus number 9 again in half an hour to the end of the line at Balaklava.

sport and freetime

In the 19th century, Balaklava became a small spa town in the middle of a nature reserve. The vegetation is unique to this day: along the south coast, the mountain slopes right up to the seashore are overgrown with dense fir forests.

Personalities

Alexander Kuprin : The Russian writer was one of the most successful Russian writers of the early 20th century , along with Maxim Gorky , Alexei Nikolajewitsch Tolstoy and Anton Chekhov . In his story "Laistrygonen" in 1911, Kuprin describes the pride of the fishermen in Balaklava, who for him embodied an ideal: life in its elementary processes, close to nature, in the rhythm of the seasons, alternating between hard work and thoughtless happiness. But this life was already a romantic idyll in Kuprin's time.

See also

literature

Web links

Commons : Balaklawa  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Isabelle Kreindler, The Soviet Deportated Nationalities: A Summary and an Update , in: Soviet Studies, Vol 38, no 3, July 1986. p. 396

Coordinates: 44 ° 31 '  N , 33 ° 36'  E