Chortkiv

Chortkiv (Чортків; Czortków; Chortkov) is a city in Chortkiv Raion, Ternopil Oblast, western Ukraine. It is the administrative center of Chortkiv Raion, housing the district's local administration buildings. Chortkiv hosts the administration of Chortkiv urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. Population: Chortkiv is located in the northern part of the historic region of Galician Podolia on the banks of the Seret River. In the past Chortkiv was the home of many Hasidic Jews; it was a notable shtetl and had a significant number of Jews residing there prior to the Holocaust. Today, Chortkiv is a regional commercial and small-scale manufacturing center. Among its architectural monuments is a fortress built in the 16th and 17th centuries as well as historic wooden churches of the 17th and 18th centuries. The first historical mention of Chortkiv dates to 1522, when Polish King Sigismund I the Old granted an ownership order for Jerzy Czortkowski over the town and allowed him to name it after himself—Czortków. The small community, numbering at 50 families, were almost all massacred during the Chmielnicki Uprisings of 1648–9. Jewish leadership opposed the resettlement of Jews in Chortkiv until 1705. During that time, the town was also granted Magdeburg rights. However, Chortkiv would later decline in the second half of the 17th century during Ottoman Expansion of central Europe. The town was taken over by Ottoman Empire, whose rule lasted 27 years. It was part of the short-lived Turkish Podolia Eyalet, which lasted from 1672 to 1699. During this period, it was nahiya centre in Yazlofça sanjak as Çortkuv (Spelled as Chortkoov in Turkish). After First Partition of Poland Chortkiv came under Austro-Hungarian rule which lasted from 1772 to 1918, during the time of which it was the center of the Chortkiv Bezirk except brief Russian rule between 1809 and 1815 as part of Tarnopol Governorate. On June 8, 1919 the Ukrainian Galician Army broke for couple months through the Polish front at Chortkiv and began the Chortkiv offensive.