Yavoriv ( uk, Яворів, ; pl, Jaworów; yi, יאַוואָראָוו , translit=Yavorov; german: Jaworiw) is a

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be def ...

in the

Lviv Lviv ( uk, Львів) is the largest city in Western Ukraine, western Ukraine, and the List of cities in Ukraine, seventh-largest in Ukraine, with a population of . It serves as the administrative centre of Lviv Oblast and Lviv Raion, and is o ...

region In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics ( physical geography), human impact characteristics ( human geography), and the interaction of humanity an ...

of western

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inva ...

which is around 15 kilometers from the Polish border. It is the administrative centre of Yavoriv Raion and is situated approximately west of the oblast capital,

. Yavoriv hosts the administration of

Yavoriv urban hromada Yavoriv urban territorial hromada ( uk, Яворівська міська територіальна громада, translit=Yavorivska miska terytorialna hromada) is a hromada (municipality) in Ukraine, in Yavoriv Raion of Lviv Oblast. The a ...

, one of the

hromada A hromada ( uk, територіальна громада, lit=territorial community, translit=terytorialna hromada) is a basic unit of administrative division in Ukraine, similar to a municipality. It was established by the Government of Ukra ...

s of Ukraine. Its population is approximately . Not far from it is the watering-place of Shklo with sulphur springs.

History

The town was first mentioned in written documents in 1436. It received

Magdeburg rights Magdeburg rights (german: Magdeburger Recht; also called Magdeburg Law) were a set of town privileges first developed by Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor (936–973) and based on the Flemish Law, which regulated the degree of internal autonomy within ...

in 1569, from Polish King

Sigismund II Augustus Sigismund II Augustus ( pl, Zygmunt II August, lt, Žygimantas Augustas; 1 August 1520 – 7 July 1572) was King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania, the son of Sigismund I the Old, whom Sigismund II succeeded in 1548. He was the first ruler ...

. Jaworów was a royal town of Poland. It was a favorite residence of king

John III Sobieski John III Sobieski ( pl, Jan III Sobieski; lt, Jonas III Sobieskis; la, Ioannes III Sobiscius; 17 August 1629 – 17 June 1696) was King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1674 until his death in 1696. Born into Polish nobility, Sobi ...

. In 1675 John III signed the Polish-French

Treaty of Jaworów The Treaty of Jaworów was a secret treaty signed on 11 June 1675 between the Polish king John III Sobieski and France in Jaworów, Poland (today Yavoriv). In the treaty, Poland promised to aid France against Brandenburg-Prussia, in exchange for ...

in the town, and there he also received the congratulations from the Pope on his success against the Turks at Vienna (1683), and ratified the formation of the Holy League alliance in 1684. Until the First Partition of Poland, Jaworów was an important center of commerce, located along main merchant route from Jarosław to

Lwów Lviv ( uk, Львів) is the largest city in Western Ukraine, western Ukraine, and the List of cities in Ukraine, seventh-largest in Ukraine, with a population of . It serves as the administrative centre of Lviv Oblast and Lviv Raion, and is o ...

. In 1772 it was annexed by the Habsburg Empire, and included within newly formed Austrian

Galicia Galicia may refer to: Geographic regions * Galicia (Spain), a region and autonomous community of northwestern Spain ** Gallaecia, a Roman province ** The post-Roman Kingdom of the Suebi, also called the Kingdom of Gallaecia ** The medieval King ...

, where it remained until late 1918. In Galicia, it was the seat of a county, with the population of almost 11,000 (Poles, Jews, Ukrainians and Czechs). Jaworów

In the immediate post-

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

period, the area of Jaworów witnessed fights of the Polish-Ukrainian War. After the war, the town became part of the

Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 1918 and 1939. The state was established on 6 November 1918, before the end of the First World ...

, where it remained until the joint German-Soviet

invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland (1 September – 6 October 1939) was a joint attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union which marked the beginning of World War II. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week af ...

, which started

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, in September 1939. The Jews of the village were merchants or artisans. There was a synagogue. During the invasion of Poland, on 14-16 September 1939, Poles defeated invading Germans in the Battle of Jaworów. Despite the victory, the town soon fell to the Soviets, and was under Soviet occupation from 1939 to 1941, and then under German occupation until 1944. The Jewish population before the German occupation on 26 June 1941 was around 3000. Several hundred Jews were sent to local

forced labor Forced labour, or unfree labour, is any work relation, especially in modern or early modern history, in which people are employed against their will with the threat of destitution, detention, violence including death, or other forms of ex ...

camps or to the Belzec extermination camp. A few were transferred to a labour camp in

. In 1944 the town was re-occupied by the Soviets, and in 1945 it was eventually annexed from Poland by the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

. After the war, the Soviet Extraordinary State Commission reported that more than 4900 people, most of them Jews, had been killed in Yavoriv, in addition to those sent to Bełżec. Only about 20 of the town's Jews were thought to have survived. On 27 May 1947 the UPA blew up the statue of Lenin. In the decades between the 1960s and 1990s the town was a

sulphur Sulfur (or sulphur in British English) is a chemical element with the symbol S and atomic number 16. It is abundant, multivalent and nonmetallic. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms form cyclic octatomic molecules with a chemical formula ...

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the econom ...

centre; excavation pits and degenerated lands remain between Yavoriv and Novoiavorivsk. On 10 December 1991 after the

dissolution of the Soviet Union The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the Sov ...

it became part of

. On 13 March 2022, during the

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014. The invasion has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides. It has caused Europe's largest refugee crisis since World War II. A ...

, the Russians bombed the military base in Yavoriv. A Russian military spokesperson claimed the attack killed up to 180 foreign mercenaries. The Ukrainian side claimed there were at least 35 dead and 134 injured. The attack was heard in neighbouring Poland.

Notable people

Among notable people born here are

Władysław Langner Władysław Aleksander Langner (18 June 1896 in Jaworów 28 September 1972) was a Polish general, best known as commander of the Siege of Lwów in 1939. Early career Władysław Langner spent his childhood in the Polish town of Tarnów, where ...

(General of the

Polish Army The Land Forces () are the land forces of the Polish Armed Forces. They currently contain some 62,000 active personnel and form many components of the European Union and NATO deployments around the world. Poland's recorded military history stre ...

), Stanisław Nowakowski ( president of the Polish Scouting and Guiding Association), and mathematician

Wawrzyniec Żmurko Wawrzyniec Żmurko (9 July 1824, in Jaworów – 3 April 1889, in Lwów) was a Polish mathematician, professor of Lwów University and Lwów Polytechnic, honoris causa of Lwów University, member of Polish Academy of Learning. He was a president ...

. Noted Jewish commentator Rabbi

David Altschuler Rabbi David Altschuler of Prague (1687-1769) was a biblical commentator and the author of a classic commentary, known as the ''Metzudot'', to the Hebrew Bible's Nevi'im and Ketuvim. Altshchuler is also known as the ''Baal Metzudot'', "Master or ...

was born or served as

rabbi A rabbi () is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi – known as '' semikha'' – following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form o ...

at the local synagogue.

Gallery

File:15 Lvivska Street, Yavoriv (03).jpg, Lvivska Street in Yavoriv File:Saints Peter and Paul church, Yavoriv (02).jpg, Saints Peter and Paul church File:7 Market Square, Yavoriv (01).jpg, People's House File:Javoriv-1.jpg, Town center

International relations

Twin towns — Sister cities

Yavoriv is twinned with: Yavoriv panorama

References