Stryi

Stryi ( _uk. Стрий, Polish: Stryj, also known as Stryy, Stryia and Stry) is a city located on the left bank of the Stryi River in the Lviv Oblast (province) of western Ukraine (in the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains). Serving as the administrative center of the Stryisky Raion (district), the city itself is also designated as a separate raion within the oblast.

Population

* 1843 - 8,000 inhabitants
* 1880 - 12,600 inhabitants
* 1900 - 22,600 inhabitants
* 1910 - 27,400 inhabitants
* 1931 - 30,500 inhabitants
* 1959 - 36,200 inhabitants
* 1970 - 48,000 inhabitants
* 1976 - 55,000 inhabitants
* 1989 - 67,000 inhabitants
* 2001 - 63,000 inhabitants
* 2006 - 61,700 inhabitants

Name

Most likely the city got its name from the name of the river of Stryi, one of the tributaries of Dniester. Obviously, the name of the river is older than the city that was founded later.

Stryi, as a name of river is a very old name and means "stream". Its etymology stems from an Indo-European root *sreu. Words that have the same root can be found in modern Ukrainian - струм, струя, Polish - struga, strumien, Irish (Celtic) - sruami, German - stromm, Persian - struth (river), Hindu - sravati (to flow), Latvian - straume, Lithuanian - sriatas, strautas (stream, the thing that flows) and several other languages.

In different times the name was written differently, although it has always sounded the same. In various old documents we can find such names: Stryg, Stry, Stryj, Stryjn, Stryjia, Strig, Strigenses, Stryi, Strey, Striig, Strya, Sthryensis, Sthrya, Stryei, Stri. The inhabitants take pride in the fact that the city has managed to keep its original name over time.

History

Stryi was mentioned for the first time in 1385 (see: Red Ruthenia). In 1431 it was given the Magdeburg Rights, and it was located in the Ruthenian Voivodeship, which from the XIV century until 1772 was a part of Poland.

Its geographical location had a positive influence on its development and growth. The town became a flourishing trade center from the 15th to 16th century due to support from the Polish king Jan III Sobieski, but declined in the 17th century, after numerous wars fought by the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

There was a big castle in the city that was demolished in the 19th century, and almost whole city burned to the ground in a fire in 1886. A few kilometers south of Stryi, in the Carpathian Mountains around the peak of Zwinin (992 meters above sea level), a bloody World War One battle took place in 1915, in which some 33000 Russian soldiers died.

Stryi passed to Austria in 1772 (see: Partitions of Poland), to Poland in 1919, and to the Soviet Union (Ukrainian SSR) in 1939 (see: Polish September Campaign). In interbellum Poland, it was the capital of the Stryj County (area 2081 sq. km., pop. 152600) of the Stanisławów Voivodeship. Its pre-1939 population consisted of roughly equal proportions of Jews, Poles, and Ukrainians.The Nazis exterminated the Jews. During the Cold War it was home to Stryy air base.

Famous people

People born in Stryi who are famous:

* Louis Begley (born 1933), American novelist
* Kazimierz Nowak (1897–1937), Polish traveller
* Józef Koffler (1896–1941), Polish composer
* Mendel Wolf Hacker Diesendruck (1902-1974), Rabbi

External links

* [http://www.stryi-rada.gov.ua Stryi City Counsel official web-site]
* [http://stryi.com.ua Stryi Unofficial web-site]
* [http://www.shtetlinks.jewishgen.org/stryy/ ShtetLinks page - Stryy]