Uzhhorod

Early history

Old city and Roman Catholic church, Greek Catholic Cathedral, Uzhhorod

The best known of the first city founders are early Slavs. One of their tribes – White Croats – settled the area of the modern Uzhhorod in the second half of the first millennium AD. During the 9th century a fortified castle changed into a fortified early feudal town-settlement, which became the centre of a new Slavonic principality, at the head of which was a mythical prince Laborets, who was vassal of Great Moravia. Great Moravia, according to historians and experts did not extend as far east as Uzhgorod, in fact it was west of what is now the City of Bratislava, Slovakia.

In 895 AD Hungarian tribes, headed by their leader Árpád, stormed the Hungvar fortress. The forces were not equal and Laborets was defeated and beheaded on the banks of the river that still carries his name. Again, this is mythical. There was not much of a settlement when the Magyar tribes arrived, having left Kiev (then known as Kevevara) and encountering no resistance.

After the arrival of the Hungarians, the small town began to extend its borders. In 1241–1242 the Mongols of Batu Khan burnt the settlement. In the early 14th century Uzhhorod showed strong resistance to the new Hungarian rulers of the Anjou dynasty. Although the majority of inhabitants were Hungarians, they wanted more freedom. From 1318 for 360 years, the Drugeths (Italian counts) owned the town. During that period Philip Drugeth built Uzhhorod Castle. The name Ungvar in Hungarian meaning Castle of Ung. Together with the castle the city began to grow. From 1430, Uzhhorod became a free royal town.

During the 16–17th centuries there were many handicraft corporations in Uzhhorod. In this period the city was engaged in the religious fight between primarily Protestant Transylvania and Catholic Austria. In 1646 the Ungvar Union was proclaimed and the Greek-Catholic church was established in Subcarpathia, in a ceremony held in the Ungvar castle by the Vatican Aegis. In 1707 Ungvar was the residence of Ferenc II Rákóczi, leader of the national-liberation war of Hungarians against Vienna.

The beginning of the 19th century was characterized by economic changes, including the first factories in the city. The greatest influence on Ungvar among the political events of the 19th century was made by the Hungarian Revolution of 1848-1849, during which the native Hungarian nobility sought both get free of the Austrian Empire and to have authority over their own people. 27 March 1848 was officially celebrated in the city as the overthrow of the monarchy in Hungary. It is now celebrated in Hungary on the 15th of March.

In 1872 the first railway line opened, linking the city to the important railway junction of Chop then known as Csap.

Twentieth century

According to the 1910 census, the city had 16,919 inhabitants, of which 13,590 (80.3%) were Magyars, 1,219 (7.2%) Slovaks, 1,151 (6.8%) Germans, 641 (3.8%) Rusyns and 1.6% Czechs.^[4] Since Jews were not counted as ethnicity (as defined by language), rather only religious group, this Austrian-Hungarian census does not specifically mention the Jewish population, which was significant, and consisted of about 31% in 1910.^[5] In the same time, the municipal area of the city had a population composed of 10,541 (39.05%) Hungarians, 9,908 (36.71%) Slovaks, and 5,520 (20.45%) Rusyns.^[6]

The First World War slowed down the tempo of city development. On 10 September 1919 Subcarpathia was officially allocated to the Republic of Czechoslovakia. Uzhhorod became the administrative center of the territory. During these years Uzhhorod developed into an architecturally modern city. After the Treaty of Trianon 1920, Uzhhorod became part of the eastern half of the new Czecho-Slovak state.

11th-century Rotunda in Horiany

After the First Vienna Award in 1938, Uzhhorod was given back to Hungary from which it was forcibly separated after WWI. The inhabitants did not wish to become a part of Czechoslovakia but their wishes were not honored. The city reverted to its original name of Ungvar, the name that the city had for almost 1000 years.

In 1941 the Jewish population reached 9,576. On 19 March 1944, Germans troops entered the city. They established a Judenrat (Jewish council) and set up 2 ghettos, at the Moskovitz brickyard and at the Gluck lumberyard. During May 1944, all Jews were deported to Auschwitz in 5 different transports and subsequently murdered. Only a few hundred Jews survived.^[7]

On 27 October 1944 the city was captured by the troops of the 4th Ukrainian Front of the Red Army. Thousands of ethnic Hungarians were killed, expelled, or else taken to work in Soviet forced labor camps. The Hungarian majority population was decimated in order to strengthen the Soviet and Ukrainian right to the city.

This period brought significant changes. At the outskirts of Uzhhorod new enterprises were constructed and the old enterprises were renewed. On 29 June 1945 Subcarpathian Ukraine was annexed by the Soviet Union and became a westernmost part of the Ukrainian SSR. That year the Uzhhorod State University (now Uzhhorod National University) was also opened. Since January 1946 Uzhhorod was the center of newly formed Zakarpatska oblast.

Since 1991 Uzhhorod has become one of 24 regional capitals within Ukraine. Of these, Uzhhorod is the smallest and westernmost.

In 2002, after some controversy, a bust of Tomáš Masaryk, Czechoslovakia's first president, was unveiled in a main square of the city. A similar bust was unveiled in 1928 on the 10th anniversary of Czechoslovak independence, but was removed by the Hungarians when they took over the region in 1939.

Uzhhorod Castle

Twin towns – Sister cities

Uzhhorod is currently twinned with: