Tighina

Tighina Bendery
Transfiguration Cathedral
Flag Coat of arms
Municipality of Bender (in red)
Country	Moldova
Autonomous Region	Transnistria
Founded	1408
Government
• Mayor	Vyacheslav Kogut
Area
• Total	97.29 km2 (37.56 sq mi)
Population  (2004)
• Total	97,027
Time zone	UTC+2 (EET)

Bender, also known as Tighina (Romanian; [Bendery] Error: {{Lang-xx}}: text has italic markup (help)) is a city in Moldova. Although located on the right (western) bank of the river Dniester, since the 1992 War, it is controlled by the authorities of the breakaway region of Transnistria. Together with its suburb Proteagailovca, the city forms a municipality, which is separate from Transnistria according to the Moldovan law. Bender is located in the buffer zone established at the end of the 1992 War of Transnistria. While the Joint Control Commission has overriding powers in the city, Transnistria has de facto administrative control, and both Moldova and Transnistria have small police forces in the city.

Name

First mentioned in 1408 as Тягянякяча (Tyagyanyakyacha) in a document in Old Slavonic, the town was known in the Middle Ages as Tighina in Moldavian sources and Bender in Ottoman sources. The fortress and the city were called Bender for the most part of the time they were a rayah of the Ottomans (1538-1812), and during most of the time they belonged to the Russian Empires (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).

The fortress of Tighina on a Moldovan stamp

The city is part of the historical region of Bessarabia. During the Soviet period the city was known in the Moldavian SSR as Бендер (Bender) in Moldovan (Romanian) written then with the Cyrillic alphabet, and as Бендéры (Bendery) in Russian. In the independent Moldova, officially it is known as Bender, but otherwise both names Bender and Tighina are used.

History

The Fortress in Bender (Bender).

File:Tighina.Fortress.jpg

The Fortress of Tighina (Bender).

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 Lvov on October 8 1408. The name "Tighina" is found in documents from the second half of the 15th century. The town was the main Moldavian customs point on the commercial road linking the country to Tatar Crimea. 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.

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.

The historical military cemetery in the city.

In 1713, the fortress, the town, and the neighboring village Varniţa were the site of skirmishes (kalabalik) between Charles XII of Sweden, who had taken refuge there with the Cossack Hetman Ivan Mazepa after their defeat in the Battle of Poltava, and 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 finally 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.

Tighina was part of the Moldavian Democratic Republic in 1917-1918, and after 1918, as part of Bessarabia, the city belonged to Romania, where it was the seat of Tighina County.

Along with Bessarabia, the city was occupied by the Soviet Union on June 28, 1940, following an ultimatum. In the course of World War II, it was retaken by Romania in July 1941, and again by the USSR in August 1944.

In 1940-41, and 1941-1991 it was one of the four "republican cities" (i.e. not subordinated to a district) of the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, one of the 15 republics of the Soviet Union. Since 1991, the city is part of the independent Republic of Moldova.

A monument of an Infantry fighting vehicle of the breakaway Transnistrian "army".

During the War of Transnistria (1992), because of the city's key strategic location on the right bank of Dniester river, 10 km from left-bank Tiraspol, it was the biggest of the three battlefields of that war.

Since 1992, Bendery is formally in the demilitarized zone established at the end of the conflict, but is de facto controlled by Transnistrian authorities. Moldovan authorities control the commune of Varniţa, which fringes the city to the north. Transnistrian authorities control the communes of Proteagailovca, which borders the city to the west, Gîsca, which borders the city to the south-west, Chiţcani and Cremenciug, further to the south-east, while Moldovans are in control of Copanca, further to the south-east .

Administration

Vyacheslav Kogut is the city's current mayor.

People and culture

Demographics

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.

Ethnic composition
Ethnic group	1930 census	1959 census	1970 census	1979 census	1989 census	2004 census
						the city itself	Proteagailovca	The municipality	%
Russians	15,116	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	41,949	1,482	43,431	43.35%
Moldovans1	-	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	24,313	756	25,069	25.03%
Romanians1	5,464	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	61	0-5	61-66	0.06%
Ukrainians	-	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	17,348	658	18,006	17.98%
Ruthenians, Ukrainians	1,349	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	-	-	-	-
Bulgarians	170	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	3,001	163	3,164	3.16%
Gagauzians	40	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	1,066	25	1,091	1.09%
Jews	8,279	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	383	2	385	0.38%
Germans	243	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	258	6	264	0.26%
Poles	309	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	190	0-12	190-202	0.20%
Armenians	46	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	173	0-16	173-189	0.18%
Gypsies	24	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	132	0-5	132-137	0.13%
Belorussians	188	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	713	19	732	0.73%
others		N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	7,440	0-31	7,440-7,471	7.44%
non-declared	51	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Greeks	37	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A |
Hungarians	24	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Serbs, Croats, Slovens	22	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Czechs, Slovaks	19	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Turks	2	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Albanians	1	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Total	31,384	43,000	72,300	101,292	129,969	97,027	3,142	100,169	100%

Note: ¹ Since the independence of Moldova, there is an ongoing controversy over whether Romanians and Moldovans are the same ethnic group. At the census, every citizen could only declare one nationality. Consequently, one could not declare oneself both Moldovan and Romanian.

Native language
Language	1930 census	2004 census
Russian	16,566	N/A
Yiddish	8,117	N/A
Romanian	4,718	N/A
Ukrainian	1,286	N/A
German	225	N/A
Polish	219	N/A
Bulgarian	78	N/A
Turkish	26	N/A
Greek	21	N/A
Hungarian	20	N/A
Gypsy	16	N/A
Czezh, Slovak	14	N/A
Armenian	11	N/A
Serbo-Croatian, Slovenian	8	N/A
Albanian	2	N/A
other	11	N/A
non-declared	46	N/A
Total	31,384	100,169

Famous natives

Bender Railway Station

Famous people born in the city include:

• Two Ottoman Grand Viziers known as Benderli Pasha
• Constantin Andronic, artist
• Lev Simonovich Berg, Jewish Soviet zoologist and geographer
• Tamara Buciuceanu, Romanian actress
• Emil Constantinescu, former President of Romania
• Iuliu Filippovitch Edlis, dramatist, writer
• Evgenii Konstantinovitch Fiodorov, Russian geophysicist
• Jerzy Neyman, Polish statistician
• Michael Postan, British economic historian
• Anna Pavlovna Tanskaia, singer

Sport

FC Dinamo Bender is the city's professional football club, playing in the top Moldovan football league, the Divizia Naţională.

Sister cities

• Cavriago, Italy
• Montesilvano, Italy

External links

• City portal
• Map of the city
• Bender travel information