Armiansk
Armiansk [in Russified Ukrainian, Армянськ; in Russian, Армянск] or properly in Ukrainian Virmenske [Вірменське] (Crimean Tatar: Ermeni Bazar). See Google Map; EU map: VII-14. A city (2014 pop 22,286) of regional significance in the northern part of the Crimea on the Perekop Isthmus, on the Kherson–Dzhankoi railway line (with its station), the Kherson–Dzhankoi–Kerch (E97) Highway, along the North Crimean Canal. It serves as the administrative center (Armiansk council) of the Armiansk municipality (2014 pop 24,759) which covers 162 sq km and includes both the city council and the Suvorove village council with its three villages: Perekop, Suvorove, and Voloshyne (their Crimean Tatar names, respectively, Or-Qapi, Kulla, and Dzhulha, with 2014 combined rural pop. 2,473).
History. The vicinity has remains of Neolithic settlements, Bronze Age, Scythian-Sarmatian kurhans, the ancient Perekop trench, and traces of the walled Greek city of Tafros, predecessor of Or-Qapi and Perekop. In the 17th century at the site of the present Armiansk there was a transit trading place on the so-called Chumak Route, where the chumaks traded various goods for salt. Here, in the 1730s, Armenians and Greeks who left the nearby destroyed Or-Qapi (present-day Perekop), founded Armiansk. The first name of the town was Ermeni Bazar (Crimean Tatar for the ‘Armenian market’), later abbreviated to Ermeni. Together with the rest of the Crimea the town was incorporated into the Russian Empire in 1783. In the 19th century, it served as a minor collecting point for grain shipments by carts to Crimean ports, but its rail connection to Dzhankoi was not approved until 1915 and not completed until 1935.
After the First World War and Russian Civil War, the settlement became part of the Crimean Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic within the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic. Its Russian name of Armiansk became standard in 1921 and it was designated a raion center (1921–25); in 1925 it was incorporated into the Dzhankoi raion, then designated as center of the Ishun rural raion (1925–30), the only rural raion in the Crimea designated as Ukrainian by nationality because of its ethnic Ukrainian plurality. Indeed, in 1926 Armiansk had a population of 2,670, by ethnicity (in percent) Ukrainian (43.6), Russian (22.9), Tatar (21.2), Jewish (7.2), German (0.8), Armenian (0.7) and Polish (0.7). In 1930 it became part of Krasnoperekop raion of the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (since 1945, of Crimean oblast). After the completion of the Kherson–Dzhankoi railway line (1935), the settlement grew to 3,963 in 1939.
During the Second World War it was occupied by the Germans from 26 September 1941 to 9 April 1944. Its Jews were exterminated by the Nazis and the Crimean Tatars were deported by returning Soviets during the deportation of Crimean Tatars in 1944. In 1954, together with the rest of the Crimea, the settlement was transferred to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic; it was designated a town (smt) in 1968 and a city in 1991. In the post-war years as part of the Ukrainian SSR it experienced industrialization and population growth: 8,532 (1970), 20,650 (1979), 24,833 (1979).
Following the 1991 Ukraine’s Declaration of Independence, Armiansk became part of independent Ukraine. Its population was slightly augmented by the returning Crimean Tatars, but then began a slow decline due to ageing population: 26,200 (1992), 25,300 (1998), 23,869 (2001), 22,893 (2006), 22,592 (2011), and 22,337 (1 January 2014). The ethnic make-up of the population according to the 2001 census was (in percent): Russians (55.7), Ukrainians (36.2), Crimean Tatars (3.5), Belarusians (1.1), Armenians (0.3), Tatars (0.3), Moldavians (0.3) and others (2.6). Only 16.7 percent of the population in the city spoke Ukrainian, while 80.6 percent spoke Russian.
Following the annexation of the Crimea by the Russian Federation in 2014, the city saw a small exodus of Ukrainians and replacement with Russians and then a continued slow demographic decline: 21,987 (September 2014), 22,011(2015), 21,754 (2018), 20,692 (2021). A special census conducted in September 2014 revealed the following composition of the population by ethnicity (in percent): Russians (57.9), Ukrainians (27.3), Tatars (1.3), Crimean Tatars (1.1), Belarusians (0.7), Azeris (0.5), Koreans (0.4), Armenians (0.3), others (1.8), and those unwilling to declare their ethnic identity (8.9).
Economy. The main employer in Armiansk is ‘Crimean Titanium’ (formally, Crimean State Production Association ‘TITAN’ [KPO ‘TITAN’]) With over 4,500 employees, it was the largest producer of titanium dioxide in Eastern Europe. Founded in 1969, it began with the production of ammonium phosphate (1971), then aluminum sulfate and liquid glass epoxy (1973), red iron oxide pigment (1974) and finally two titanium dioxide pigment plants (1978). Water was drawn from the North Crimean Canal and titanium ore (ilmenite) from mining and enriching plants at Vilnohirsk (Dnipropetrovsk oblast) and Irshansk (Zhytomyr oblast).
When part of independent Ukraine, in March 1999, Armiansk was included in the ‘Syvash economic zone’ set up by the government of Ukraine to encourage foreign investment. In February 2000, the KPO ‘TITAN’ was converted into the state joint stock company SJSC ‘TITAN’; by August 2004, the closed joint stock company ‘Crimean TITAN’ was formed, comprising 50 percent less one share held by Ostchem Germany GmbH (controlled by Dmytro Firtash), with the remaining majority held by SJSC ‘TITAN.’ Following Russian annexation of the Crimea in 2014, Dmytro Firtash registered the company in Moscow as a Ukrainian company, tried to retain the supply of raw materials as before 2014, but by 2016 had to turn to Sri Lanka for ilmenite; the plant had to operate at 40–50 percent capacity because water supply to the North Crimean Canal was cut.
Other industries include the Syvash aniline-dye plant (the main producer of dyes for the textile industry of Ukraine and of herbicides for farming), a reinforced concrete products plant and a grain mill. Services in finance include a branch of the Prominvestbank as well as other consumer financial institutions. The city has a hospital and a clinic.
Culture and education. Despite the former plurality of ethnic Ukrainians in Armiansk, the dominant culture became Sovietized and Russianized. Its regional studies museum (originally of military and labor glory) was reworked in 1994 to include, in addition to the room of glory (depicting the Russian Civil War, the Second World War [‘the Great Patriotic War’], and the history of the ‘Crimean TITAN’), the history of Armiansk, its people, the nearby Perekop trench and wall, Catherine II and the Crimea, Aleksandr Suvorov and Armiansk, Aleksandr Pushkin and Armiansk. The museum became a venue for excursions, conferences, round-tables, book presentations of local poets and writers, art displays, meetings with the old-timers, dissidents, and veterans of the war in Afghanistan.
Armiansk has the literary-musical club ‘Karkinit’ and the Armiansk association of painters. It was the birthplace of the artist Emmanuil Magdesyan (1857–1908) and a brief home (1934–36) of the artist Mykola Samokysh (1860–1944). There are two churches, the restored 18th century Saint George and the new Saint Nicholas the Miracle Giver, and the new Ermeni Bazar mosque. From the Soviet era, it has a cultural center and two movie theaters. The Vladimir Lenin monument still stands and the ‘Great Patriotic War’ monuments display tank T-34, fighter jet MIG-15 and the BM-13 rocket launcher ‘Katiusha.’
Education is provided at 4 general schools, a music school, 3 libraries, the Armiansk College of Chemical Industry (a professional technical school, formerly branch of the Kherson Technical University, 1990–2014) and a pedagogical education and management institute (branch of the Tavriia National University). Sports are encouraged at a youth sports school, sports facilities with its Stadium ‘Khimik,’ the football club ‘Titan,’ and the runner club ‘Tonus.’
City Plan. Armiansk municipality forms a teardrop-shaped area on the Perekop Isthmus between Perekop Inlet of Karkinit Bay in the west (6.5 km along the shoreline) and the Syvash Inlet in the east (10.8 km along the shoreline); its apex in the north forms a land border with Kherson oblast (20.7 km) and its base in the south (15.5 km) within Krasnoperekopsk raion (renamed by the government of Ukraine the Perekop raion as part of its de-Communization effort in 2016). The Armiansk municipality occupies an area of 162 sq km.
The city of Armiansk is located in the southerly third of the municipal territory and occupies 6.3 sq. km; on a map it forms a compact irregular square, extending 2.56 km E-W and 2.46 km N-S. Its eastern boundary follows the railway line; its northern limit on the North Crimean Canal.
The built-up area of the city is about 85 percent residential, with one-half of it in high-rise apartments and the other half in single-story houses; parks or other tree plantings occupy 52 ha or about 9 percent; industrial use accounts for only 6 percent, since the largest industries, ‘Crimean Titanium’ and the Syvash aniline-dye plant are located 9 km north of the city, in the northern part of the municipality on the shore of the Syvash Inlet. A rail spur and Highway T-2202 provide access to the plants. Along the highway from the city limit are the Perekop trench and wall with the remains of the Or-Qapi fortress (3 km) and the village of Perekop (5 km).
The city has a N-S/E-W street grid pattern; its main N-S arterial, part of Highway E-97, cuts through its center as Simferopol Street. Near its north end is a traffic circle, with Highway E-97 turning NW as the Kherson Highway. Other streets from the traffic circle are: to the north, as local highway T-2202, leading to Perekop, and E-W, the Ivanishchev Street. Ivanishchev Street separates the highrise apartment neighborhoods (S side) from the market (N side, W of traffic circle), the bus depot, stadium and football pitches (NW of traffic circle), and large Victory Park (N side, E of traffic circle). In the E Ivanishchev street leads to the Armiansk railway station.
Simferopol Street, in its northern half, is mostly lined with parks and behind them multi-story apartment buildings. Near its center, S of Haidar Street (which leads to Voloshyne, 2 km west of the city limits), are the city administration and post office (E side). Towards its southern end in the city is the Saint Nicholas the Miracle Giver Church. Two streets over to the east (on Shkilna Street) is the older Saint George Church. At the south end of Simferopol Street, near the W side, is the Ermeni Bazar mosque and on the E side, the city hospital.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
‘Armians'k,’ Heohrafichna entsyklopediia Ukraïny, vol 1 (Kyiv 1989)
Pidhorodets'kyi, P. ‘Armians'k,’ Entsyklopediia suchasnoï Ukraïny, vol 1 (Kyiv 2001)
Vermenych, Ya. ‘Armians'k,’ Entsyklopediia istoriï Ukraïny, vol 1 (Kyiv 2003)
‘Karta Armians'ka, Kryma, z vulytsiamy,’ Mapa Ukraïny https://kartaukrainy.com.ua/Armiansk
Ihor Stebelsky
[This article was updated in 2024.]