Terebovlia

Terebovlia (Теребовля; Trembowla; Trembovla) is a small city in Ternopil Raion, Ternopil Oblast, western Ukraine. Terebovlia hosts the administration of Terebovlia urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. Population: 13,661 (2001). Terebovlia is an ancient settlement that traces its roots to the settlement of Terebovl which existed in Kievan Rus'. In 1913 the city counted 10,000 residents, of whom 4,000 were Poles, 3,200 were Rusyns (Ruthenians) and 2,800 were Jews. In 1929 there were 7,015 people, mostly Polish, Ukrainian and Jewish. Prior to World War II, Trembowla was a county seat within the Tarnopol Voivodeship of the Second Polish Republic. Prior to the Holocaust, the city was home to 1,486 Jews, and most of them (around 1,100) were shot by Germans in the nearby village of Plebanivka on April 7, 1943. Terebovlia is one of the oldest cities in West Ukraine. It was first mentioned in the chronicles of 1097 (Primary Chronicle). During the Red Ruthenia times it used to be the center of Terebovlia principality. It was called Terebovl (Trembowla). Terebovlia principality included lands of the whole southeast of Galicia, Podolia, and Bukovina. Polish King Casimir III the Great became the suzerain of Halych after the death of his cousin, Boleslaw-Yuri II of Galicia, when the city became part of the Polish domain. It was fully incorporated into Poland in 1430 during the reign of king Władysław II Jagiełło, while his son Casimir IV Jagiellon granted the town limited Magdeburg Rights. After the rebuilding of the castle in Terebovlia in 1366, Poland (Podole Voivodeship) administered the town. It was part of the system of border fortifications of the Polish Kingdom and later the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth against Moldavian and Wallachian incursions. The town also later resisted frequent invasion by the Crimean Tatars, the Ottomans and the Zaporozhian Cossacks from the south and southeast. Because of the threat of invasion, the Terebovlya castle, monastery and churches were all designed as defensive structures.