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Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: NUM-ORC |
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ODESSA , one of the most important seaports of Russia, ranking by its population and foreign trade after St Petersburg
The general aspect of Odessa is that of a wealthy west-European city. Its chief
granaries
establishment ) and surrounded by a boulevard, where was formerly a wall
Odessa is the real capital , intellectual and commercial, of so-called Novorossia, or New Russia, which includes the governments of Bessarabia and Kherson
chief
In 1795 the town had only 2250 inhabitants; in 1814, twenty years after its foundation, it had 25,000, The population has steadily increased from xoo,000 in 185o, 185,000 in 1873, 225,000 in 1884, to 449,673 in 1900. The great majority of inhabitants are Great Russians and Little Russians; but there are also large numbers of Jews (133,000, exclusive of Karaites), as well as of Italians, Greeks, Germans and French (to which nationalities the chief merchants belong), as also of Rumanians, Servians, Bulgarians, Tatars, Armenians, Lazes, Georgians. A numerous floating population of labourers, attracted at certain periods by pressing work in the port, and afterwards left unemployed owing to the enormous fluctuations in the corn trade, is one of the features of Odessa. It is estimated that there are no less than 35,000 people living from hand to mouth in the utmost misery, partly in the extensive catacombs beneath the city. The leading occupations are connected with exporting, shipping and manufactures. The industrial development has been rather slow: sugar-refineries, tea-packing, oil-mills, tanneries, steam flour-mills, iron and mechanical works, factories of jute sacks, chemical works, tin-plate works, paper -factories are the chief. Commercially the city is the chief seaport of Russia for exports, which in favourable years are twice as high as those of St Petersburg
capital . The total returns amount to 16 to 20 millions sterling a year, repres senting about one-ninth of the entire Russian foreign trade; and 14% if the coast trade be included as well. The totalexports are valued at to to 11 millions sterling annually, and the imports at 6 to 9 millions sterling, about 81% of all the imports into Russia. Grain, and especially wheat, is the chief article of export. The chief imports are raw cotton
History.The bay of Odessa was colonized by Greeks at a very early period, and their portsIstrianorum Portus and Isiacorum Portus on the shores of the bay, and Odessus at the mouth of the Tiligul Limancarried on a lively trade with the neighbouring steppes. These towns disappeared in the 3rd and 4th centuries, and for ten centuries no settlements in these tracts are mentioned. In the 14th century this region belonged to the Lithuanians, and in 1396 Olgerd, prince of Lithuania, defeated in battle three Tatar chiefs, one of whom, Khaji Beg or Bey, had recently founded, at the place now occupied by Odessa, a fort which received his name. The Lithuanians, and subsequently the Poles, kept the country under their dominion until the 16th century, when it was seized by the Tatars, who still permitted, however, the Lithuanians to gather salt in the neighbouring lakes. Later on the Turks left a garrison here, and founded in 1764 the fortress Yani-dunya. In 1789 the Russians, under the French captain de Ribas, took the fortress by assault. In 1791 Khaji-bey and the Ochakov region were ceded to Russia. De Ribas and the French engineer Voland were entrusted in 1794 with the erection of a town and the construction of a port at Khaji-bey. In 1803 Odessa became the chief town of a separate municipal district or captaincy, the first captain being Armand, duc de Richelieu, who did very much for the development of the young city and its improvement as a seaport. In 1824 Odessa became the seat of the governors-general of Novorossia and Bessarabia. In 1866 it was brought into railway connexion with Kiev and Kharkov via Balta, and with Jassy in Rumania. In 1854 it was unsuccessfully attacked by the Anglo-Russian fleet, and in 1876-1877 by the Turkish, also unsuccessfully. In 1g05-1906 the city was the scene of violent revolutionary disorders, marked by a naval insurrection. (P. A. K.; J. T. BE.) End of Article: ODESSA If you wish, you can link directly to this article.
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