Uryupinsk

Uryupinsk ( _ru. Урю́пинск) is a town in Volgograd Oblast, Russia, the administrative center of Uryupinsky District, situated some km to mi|340 northwest of Volgograd on the Khopyor River. Population: 41,960 (2002 Census); 42,954 (1989 Census).

History

Founded in the late 14th–early 15th century as Uryupin, it was a border outpost of Ryazan Principality, populated by Don Cossacks.

Since 1857—stanitsa Uryupinskaya, home of Pokrovskaya Fair, a center for trade on the southeast side of the Eastern European Plane.

It was renamed Uryupinsk in 1929.

Name of the town

The name of this town is known to most Russian people as a synonym for "backwater town". This usage became widespread after the popular Soviet film " [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053317/ The Fate of a Man] "Fact|date=February 2007. The film was based on a short story by Mikhail Sholokhov, and Uryupinsk was the place of the action, just an inconspicuous provincial town.

There are two theories of the historical background for the name choice. One is that it is from name of a Tartar prince "Uryup", who got bogged down in a swamp near this location, during a fight with Yermak and got captured.

Another is that it is from either the family name "Uryupin" or the word "uryupa" ( _ru. урюпа). According to "Explanatory Dictionary of the Live Great Russian language" by Vladimir Dal, published in 1866, this archaic word means "untidy person", which probably in this context characterizes not a person, but the swampy area.

Economy and industry

Uryupinsk is a developed industrial center with a concentration in heavy industries such as agricultural machinery (harvesting machines) and loading equipment (a large crane-making plant is located here). The city also contains factories of light industry production (such as knitted fabric, shoe fabric, and furniture fabric), paper production plant, and a packing plant.

Another major industry involving the outlying areas of the town is goat farming and goat leather production. Because of its mild southern climate, the region is a good area for agriculture, and there are many agricultural processing factories in the region, specializing mainly in beef, oil and butter production.

Even though Uryupinsk is industrialized, it is ecologically clean.Fact|date=February 2007

Demographics

Ethnic Composition: Russian (96.1%), Ukranian (1.5%), Roma (0.7%), Byelorussian (0.3%).

*Births (2001): 355
*Deaths (2001): 747 [http://www.volganet.ru/uryupinsk5.php]

References