Bender, Moldova

Name

First mentioned in 1408 as Tyagyanyakyacha () in a document in Old Slavonic (the term has Cuman origins), the town was known in the Middle Ages as Tighina in Romanian from Moldavian sources and later as Bender in Ottoman sources. The fortress and the city were called Bender for most of the time they were a rayah of the Ottomans (1538–1812), and during most of the time they belonged to the Russian Empire (1828–1917). They were known as Tighina () in the Principality of Moldavia, in the early part of the Russian Empire period (1812–1828), and during the time the city belonged to Romania (1918–1940; 1941–1944).

The city is part of the historical region of Bessarabia. During the Soviet period the city was known in the Moldavian SSR as Bender in Romanian, written Бендер with the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet, as Bendery (Бендéры) in Russian and Bendery (Бенде́ри) in Ukrainian. Today the city is officially named Bender, but both Bender and Tighina are in use.

History

The town was first mentioned as an important customs post in a commerce grant issued by the Moldavian voivode Alexander the Good to the merchants of Lviv on 8 October 1408. The name "Tighina" is found in documents from the second half of the 15th century. Genoese merchants used to call the town Teghenaccio. The town was the main Moldavian customs point on the commercial road linking the country to the Crimean Khanate. During his reign of Moldavia, Stephen III had a small wooden fort built in the town to defend the settlement from Tatar raids.

In 1538, the Ottoman sultan Suleiman the Magnificent conquered the town from Moldavia, and renamed it Bender. Its fortifications were developed into a full fortress under the same name under the supervision of the Turkish architect Koji Mimar Sinan. The Ottomans used it to keep the pressure on Moldavia. At the end of the 16th century several unsuccessful attempts to retake the fortress were made: in the summer of 1574 Prince John III the Terrible led a siege on the fortress, as did Michael the Brave in 1595 and 1600. About the same time the fortress was attacked by Zaporozhian Cossacks. In the 18th century, the fort's area was expanded and modernized by the prince of Moldavia Antioh Cantemir, who carried out these works under Ottoman supervision.

On 5 April 1710 the Bender Constitution (more commonly known as the Constitution of Pylyp Orlyk) was accepted in Bender. It established the principle of the separation of powers in government between the legislative, executive, and judiciary branches almost 40 years before the publication of Montesquieu's Spirit of the Laws.

In 1713, the fortress, the town, and the neighboring village of Varnița were the site of skirmishes between Charles XII of Sweden, who had taken refuge there with the Cossack Hetman Ivan Mazepa after his defeat in the Battle of Poltava in 1709, and the Turks who wished to enforce the departure of the Swedish king.

During the second half of the 18th century, the fortress fell three times to the Russians during the Russo-Turkish Wars (in 1770, 1789, and in 1806 without a fight).

Along with Bessarabia, the city was annexed to the Russian Empire in 1812, and remained part of the Russian Governorate of Bessarabia until 1917. Many Ukrainians, Russians and Jews settled in or around Bender, and the town quickly became predominantly Russian-speaking. By 1897, speakers of Romanian made up only around 7% of Bender's population, while 33.4% were Jews.

Tighina was part of the Moldavian Democratic Republic in 1917–1918, and after 1918, following the Union of Bessarabia with Romania, the city belonged to the Kingdom of Romania, where it was the seat of Tighina County. In 1918, it was shortly controlled by the Odesa Soviet Republic which was driven out by the Romanian army. The local population was critical of Romanian authorities; pro-Soviet separatism remained popular. On Easter Day, 1919, the bridge over the Dniester River was blown up by the French Army in order to block the Bolsheviks from coming to the city. In the same year, there was a pro-Soviet uprising in Bender, attempting to attach the city to the newly founded Soviet Union. Several hundred communist workers and Red Army members from Bessarabia, headed by , seized control in Bender on 27 May. However, the uprising was crushed on the same day by the Romanian army.

Romania launched a policy of Romanianization and the use of Russian was now discouraged and in certain cases restricted. In Bender, however, Russian continued to be the city's most widely spoken language, being native to 53% of its residents in 1930. Although their share had doubled, Romanian-speakers made up only 15%.

Along with Bessarabia, the city was occupied by the Soviet Union on 28 June 1940, following an ultimatum. In the course of World War II, it was retaken by Romania in July 1941 (under which a treaty regarding the occupation of Transnistria was signed a month later), and again by the USSR in August 1944. Most of the city's Jews were killed during the Holocaust, although Bender continued to have a significant Jewish community until most emigrated after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The Jews were deported to Transnistria by the Romanian authorities in 1941, where a large majority of them died.

In 1940–1941 and from 1944 to 1991 it was one of the four "republican cities", not subordinated to a district, of the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, one of the 15 republics of the Soviet Union. Since 1991, the city has been disputed between the Republic of Moldova and Transnistria. Due to the city's key strategic location on the right bank of the Dniester river, 10 km from left-bank Tiraspol, Bender saw the heaviest fighting of the 1992 War of Transnistria during the Battle of Bender. Since then, it is controlled by Transnistrian authorities, although it has been formally in the demilitarized zone established at the end of the conflict.

Moldovan authorities control the commune of Varnița, a suburb on the fringe of the city to the north. Transnistrian authorities control the suburban communes of Proteagailovca, which borders the city to the west and Gîsca, which borders the city to the south-west. They also control Chițcani and Cremenciug, further to the south-east, while Moldovans are in control of Copanca, further to the south-east.

Administration

Nikolai Gliga is the head of the state administration of Bender .

List of Heads of the state administration of Bender

• Tom Zenovich (1995 ~ 30 October 2001)
• Aleksandr Posudnevsky (30 October 2001 ~ 11 January 2007)
• Vyacheslav Kogut (11 January 2007 ~ 5 January 2012)
• Aleksandr Moskalyov, acting Head of Administration (5 January 2012 ~ 9 February 2012)
• Valery Kernichuk (9 February 2012 ~ 15 November 2012)
• Yuriy Gervazyuk (24 January 2013 ~ 18 March 2015)
• Lada Delibalt (20 March 2015 ~ 7 April 2015)
• Nikolai Gliga (7 April 2015 ~ )

Climate

People and culture

Demographics

In 1920, the population of Bender was approximately 26,000. At that time, one third of the population was Jewish. One third of the population was Romanian. Germans, Russians, and Bulgarians were also mixed into the population during that time.

At the 2004 Census, the city had a population of 100,169, of which the city itself 97,027, and the commune of Proteagailovca, 3,142.

Note: 1 Since the independence of Moldova, there has been ongoing controversy over whether Romanians and Moldovans should be counted officially as the same ethnic group or not. At the census, every citizen could only declare one nationality. Consequently, one could not declare oneself both Moldovan and Romanian.

Note: 2 The Ukrainian population of Bessarabia was counted in the past as "Ruthenians"

Population dynamics by years: |archive-date = 19 July 2017|language=ru}}

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Media

• Radio Chișinău 106.1 FM

Sport

FC Tighina is the city's professional football club, formerly playing in the top Moldovan football league, the Divizia Națională, before being relegated.

Notable people

• Liubov Abravitova (born 1980), Ukrainian diplomat
• Mehmed Selim Pasha (1771–1831), Ottoman statesman
• Lev Berg (1876–1950), leading Jewish Russian geographer, biologist and ichthyologist
• Boris Solotareff (1889–1966), Russian painter
• Jerzy Neyman (1894–1981), Polish mathematician and statistician
• Baruch Agadati (1895–), Russian-born Israeli classical ballet dancer, choreographer, painter, and film producer and director
• Mozes Kahana (1897–1974), writer, poet, first chairman of the Moldovan Writers' Union
• Sir Michael Postan FBA (1899–1981), British historian
• Yosef Kushnir (1900–1983), Israeli politician who served in the Knesset
• Maurice Raizman (1905–1974), French chess master
• Yevgeny Fyodorov (1910–1981), Soviet geophysicist, statesman, public figure and academician
• Zrubavel Gilad (1912–1988), Hebrew poet, editor and translator
• Tamara Buciuceanu (1929–2019), Romanian stage, screen and TV personality
• Emil Constantinescu (born 1939), Romanian professor and politician, who served as the third President of Romania, from 1996 to 2000.
• Viktor Sokolov (born 1962), admiral and commander of the Russian Black Sea Fleet
• Nicolai Lilin (born 1980), Italian-Moldovan writer famous for writing Siberian Education, a fake memoir which narrated his youth in Bender
• (1931–2022), Romanian opera singer
• Ilie Cazac (born 1985), former Moldovan tax inspector and political prisoner
• Liuba Chișinevschi (1911–1981), Romanian communist
• (1929–2009), Russian writer
• Roman Roșca (born 1982), Moldovan jurist and politician

Sport

• Veaceslav Semionov (born 1956), Moldavian football manager and former footballer. Since November 2014 he is the head coach of Moldavian football club FC Dacia Chișinău
• Fedosei Ciumacenco (born 1973), Olympian Moldovan race walker, competed in the 20 kilometres distance at the Summer Olympics: 1996, 2000, 2004 and 2008
• Serghei Stolearenco (born 1978), Moldovan former sprint freestyle swimmer, competed in the men's 50 m freestyle at the 2000 Summer Olympics
• Alexandru Melenciuc (born 1979), Moldovan footballer. He currently plays for Navbahor Namangan
• Andrei Tcaciuc (born 1982), Moldavian football midfielder who plays for FC Speranța Crihana Veche
• Igor Bugaiov (born 1984), footballer, who plays for FC Irtysh Pavlodar
• Alexei Casian (born 1987), Moldavian football midfielder who represents Lane Xang Intra F.C.
• Vadim Cemîrtan (born 1987), Moldovan football striker who plays for FC Bunyodkor
• Artyom Khachaturov (born 1992), Armenian-Moldovan footballer who currently plays for Moldovan club FC Zimbru Chișinău

International relations

Twin towns – Sister cities

Bender is twinned with:

• MOZ Beira, Mozambique
• ITA Cavriago, Italy
• PMRMDA Dubăsari, Transnistria (defacto), Moldova (dejure)
• ITA Montesilvano, Italy
• ABKGEO Ochamchire, Abkhazia (defacto), Georgia (dejure)

Gallery

File:Bendery Zentrum.jpg|City centre File:Friedhof.jpg|Military cemetery File:Kids in Fountain with Facade Backdrop - Bendery - Transnistria (36445273450).jpg|Downtown fountain, Bender File:Bender Fortress. Church 03.JPG|Fortress church File:Transnistrienfortress.jpg|Fortress alongside the Dniester River File:Horse and Carriage - Bendery Fortress - Bendery - Transnistria (36032560843).jpg|Horse and carriage at Bender Fortress File:Soviet-Era Memorial with Flower Bed - Bendery - Transnistria (36032549573).jpg|Soviet-era memorial with flower bed, Bender File:National Crest on Plinth - Bendery - Transnistria (36032553743).jpg|Transnistrian crest on plinth, Bender File:Pamiantnik podoliskomu polku 01.jpg|Monument celebrating the Russian annexation of Bessarabia

Notes

References

References

1. Kaba, John. (1919). "Politico-economic Review of Basarabia". American Relief Administration.
2. "Глава Государственной администрации города Бендеры » Государственная администрация г.Бендеры".
3. [http://www.moldova.md/md/istorie/2913/ History of Bender on the Official website of Republic of Moldova] {{webarchive. link. (12 March 2010 : "trecătoare" înseamnă în limba cumană Tighina)
4. {{in lang. ro [http://www.monument.md/arhitectura_fortificata/cetati/204/ "Cetatea Tighina"] {{webarchive. link. (15 April 2008 on Monument.md)
5. Poștarencu, D. Din istoria Tighinei, 1992, p. 84.
6. [[Ion Nistor]], ''Istoria Basarabiei'', Cernăuți, 1923, reprint Chișinău, Cartea Moldovenească, 1991, p.76
7. [http://www.moldova.md/en/istorie/2913/ "Bender fortress"] {{webarchive. link. (14 February 2009 on Moldova.md)
8. [https://www.husj.harvard.edu/articles/the-first-constitution-of-ukraine-5-april-1710 "The First Constitution of Ukraine (5 April 1710)"], Harvard Ukrainian Studies
9. Charles XII of Sweden first took refuge in a Moldavian house in the town, then moved to a house specially built for him in Varnița. cf. ''Ion Nistor, Ibidem, p.140''
10. . (1880). "Słownik geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego i innych krajów słowiańskich, Tom I".
11. "Демоскоп Weekly - Приложение. Справочник статистических показателей.". demoscope.ru.
12. "Turism istoric: Tighina sub epoleti". formula-as.ro.
13. "Archived copy".
14. See Radu Ioanid, The Holocaust in Romania: The Destruction of the Jews and Gypsies Under the Antonescu Regime (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2000), p. 129, 131-132, 199, 201.
15. {{in lang. ru [http://www.olvia.idknet.com/ol88-10-01.htm Olvia Press News Agency] {{Webarchive. link. (4 March 2016)
16. {{in lang. ru [http://www.olvia.idknet.com/ol89-10-01.htm Olvia Press News Agency] {{Webarchive. link. (22 October 2007)
17. {{in lang. ru [http://www.regnum.ru/news/772358.html REGNUM News Agency]
18. {{in lang
19. {{in lang. ru [http://xn--b1addbl5aidjekm0d.xn--p1ai/pridnestrove-novosti/vlast/i-o-glavyi-goroda-benderyi-naznachen-aleksandr-moskalev/ Transnistrian News Portal Pridnestrovets.RF] {{Webarchive. link. (3 March 2016)
20. {{in lang
21. [http://gov-pmr.org/press/messages/item695.html Указ Президента ПМР №754] {{webarchive. link. (2 November 2013)
22. "Указ Президента ПМР №14 "О назначении главы государственной администрации города Бендеры"". Официальный сайт Президента ПМР.
23. "Указ Президента ПМР № 120 "О временно исполняющем обязанности главы государственной администрации города Бендеры"". Официальный сайт Президента ПМР.
24. "Указ Президента ПМР №138 "О прекращении исполнения обязанностей главы государственной администрации города Бендеры"". Официальный сайт Президента ПМР.
25. "Глава Государственной администрации города Бендеры » Государственная администрация г.Бендеры".
26. "BENDER WEATHER BY MONTH // WEATHER AVERAGES".
27. "Bender monthly weather averages".
28. The Transnistrian census of 2004 data by nationality at http://pop-stat.mashke.org/pmr-ethnic-loc2004.htm
29. [http://dediserver.eu/hosting/ethnodoc/data/MO_Tighina_1930.pdf 1930 Romanian Census data for the Tighina County] {{webarchive. link. (20 July 2011)
30. "Moldova". citypopulation.de.
31. Marian Enache, Dorin Cimpoesu, Misiune Diplomatica in Republica Moldova (Iași: Polirom, 2000), p. 399
32. "pridnestrovie.net".
33. "State administration of Bendery report for 2019 19.9 Mb".