Feodosiia

(ancient Theodosia), a city under oblast jurisdiction in Crimean Oblast, Ukrainian SSR. Feodosiia is located on the southeastern coast of the Crimea, 116 km east of Simferopol’. It is a port on the Black Sea and has a railroad station, the terminus of a branch of the Kerch’-Dzhankoi line. Population, 75,000 (Jan. 1, 1976).

Theodosia was founded in the mid-sixth century B.C. by Greeks from the ancient city of Miletus and became a Greek polis with highly developed commerce. In the 380’s B.C. it became part of the Bosporan state and a major grain-exporting center. In 107 B.C. it was one of the centers of a slave revolt led by Saumacus. Theodosia was sacked by the Huns in the fourth century A.D. and conquered by the Khazars in the late sixth century. In the early 13th century it was captured by the Mongol-Tatars.

In the second half of the 13th century, the Genoese founded the commercial center of Kaffa on the site of Theodosia. In the 14th and 15th centuries it was an important center for trade between the East and West (seeGENOESE COLONIES ON THE NORTHERN BLACK SEA SHORE). In the 15th century it was part of the Crimean Khanate and an important slave-trading center. In 1771, Russian forces seized Kaffa during the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–74 (seeRUSSO-TURKISH WARS OF THE ITTH-WTH CENTURIES); the Crimean Khanate became independent of Turkey. In 1783 the city, together with all of the Crimea, became part of the Russian Empire and had its original name restored.

In 1802, Feodosiia became a district capital in Tavrida (Tauride) Province. In 1892 it was linked to the Sevastopol’-Donbas Railroad. In 1899 the commercial port was moved from Sevastopol’ to Feodosiia. In 1902, a social-democratic organization was formed in the city. The workers of Feodosiia took part in the Revolution of 1905–07, and in 1905 the rebel battleship Potemkin briefly dropped anchor in the city’s harbor.

Soviet power was established in Feodosiia on Dec. 20, 1917 (Jan. 2, 1918). The city was subsequently occupied by Austrian and German troops and captured by English and French interventionists and White Guards; it was liberated by the Red Army on Nov. 14, 1920. In 1921 it became part of the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. On Nov. 2, 1941, it was occupied by fascist German troops. The city was liberated on December 30, during the Kerch’-Feodosiia Landing Operation of 1941–12, but was once again occupied on Jan. 17, 1942. Soviet troops liberated the city on Apr. 13, 1944, in the Crimean Operation of 1944. After the war, the city and its industry were rebuilt. In the years of Soviet power. Feodosiia has become a health-resort center of the Crimea.

Feodosiia is a climatic, balneological, and pelotherapeutic health resort. Summers are very warm, with an average July temperature of 24°C; winters are mild, with an average February temperature of 0°C. Annual precipitation is 360 mm. Medical treatments are based on the climate, sea bathing (from June to October), the drinking of chloride, sulfate, and sodium water from the Feodosiia Mineral Spring in Pasha Tepe, and silt mud from Lake Adzhigol’. The health facilities treat diseases of the digestive organs and the circulatory and the respiratory systems and functional disorders of the nervous system. The city has sanatoriums for adults and children, balneological and mud-bath treatment facilities, houses of rest, and boardinghouses, as well as a beach with fine sand. In 1975 the city had 16 hospitals, with 1,000 beds (8.6 beds per thousand inhabitants), and 426 physicians (one physician per 274 inhabitants).

Industry is represented by machine shops and milk plants, factories that produce tobacco goods, furniture, and toys, and an offset printing plant. The city has a polytechnical school, a museum of local lore, with the affiliated A. S. Grin Memorial Literary Museum, and the I. K. Aivazovskii Picture Gallery (Aivazovskii was born in Feodosiia).

The old part of the city was laid out in the Middle Ages. On Karantin Hill stand the remains of the walls and towers of a Genoese fortress (14th–15th centuries). Feodosiia has several churches (13th-14th centuries) and the Mufti-Jami Mosque (1623). Beginning in the second half of the 19th century, construction has embraced a variety of architectural styles; numerous dachas, private homes, and boardinghouses were built. An esplanade was built between 1947 and 1953. Between the 1950’s and the 1970’s new residential districts sprang up, and several sanatoriums and houses of rest were built. The railroad station was constructed in 1955. The city has a monument to the artist Aivazovskii (bronze and granite; 1930; sculptor, I. Ia. Gintsburg).