Astrowna or Ostrovno (; ; ) is an agrotown in Beshankovichy District, Vitebsk Region,

Belarus Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...

. It is located west of

Vitebsk Vitebsk or Vitsyebsk (, ; , ; ) is a city in northern Belarus. It serves as the administrative center of Vitebsk Region and Vitebsk District, though it is administratively separated from the district. As of 2025, it has 358,927 inhabitants, m ...

. Astrowna is a birthplace of

Lew Sapieha Lew Sapieha (; ; 4 April 1557 – 7 July 1633) was a nobleman and statesman of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. He became Great Secretary of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1580, Great Clerk of the Grand Duchy in 1581, Crown Chancellor in 1 ...

, a statesman of the

Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, also referred to as Poland–Lithuania or the First Polish Republic (), was a federation, federative real union between the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland, Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania ...

and the creator of the Third Lithuanian Statute.

History

Astrowna was founded as a castle of between years 1520 and 1530. At that time the land belonged to Palonnaja manor of Vitebsk ''

powiat A ''powiat'' (; ) is the second-level unit of local government and administration in Poland, equivalent to a county, district or prefecture (Local administrative unit, LAU-1 ormerly Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics, NUTS-4 ...

'' of the

Grand Duchy of Lithuania The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a sovereign state in northeastern Europe that existed from the 13th century, succeeding the Kingdom of Lithuania, to the late 18th century, when the territory was suppressed during the 1795 Partitions of Poland, ...

and was inherited by Ivan and his stepbrother Janush from their mother, duchess Feodora Druck-Sakalinskaja. In 1546, a village was founded near the castle. For the next hundred years or so Astrowna was a property of

Sapieha family The House of Sapieha (; ; ; ) is a Polish-Lithuanian noble and magnate family of Ruthenian origin,Энцыклапедыя ВКЛ. Т.2, арт. "Сапегі" descending from the medieval boyars of Smolensk and Polotsk. Vernadsky, George. ...

. In 1622, a Dominican monastery was founded by Alexander Sapieha. After his death part of the manor was inherited by his daughter Anna and her husband Stanislaw Narushevich. In 1772, Astrowna became a part of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

in the course of the

First Partition of Poland The First Partition of Poland took place in 1772 as the first of three partitions that eventually ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by 1795. The growth of power in the Russian Empire threatened the Kingdom of Prussia an ...

. In 1812, the

Battle of Ostrovno The Battle of Ostrovno () was a military engagement that took place on 25 July 1812, between French forces under the command of King of Naples Joachim Murat and Russian forces under General Ostermann-Tolstoy and ended with the Russian forc ...

took place on the outskirts of the village between the French and Russian armies. At the end of the 19th century, there were about 70 houses in the village, in the beginning of the 20th century — there were about 120 houses. After the

October Revolution The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Historiography in the Soviet Union, Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of Russian Revolution, two r ...

, Astrowna became a part of the

Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic The Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic (BSSR, Byelorussian SSR or Byelorussia; ; ), also known as Soviet Belarus or simply Belarus, was a Republics of the Soviet Union, republic of the Soviet Union (USSR). It existed between 1920 and 19 ...

. After Belarusian independence in 1991, it was administered as a village in Beshankovichy District. In 2005, Astrowna joined the state program for rural development and became an agrotown.

Notable residents

(1557, Astrowna estate (now village) – 1633), a nobleman and statesman of the

, governor of

Slonim Slonim is a town in Grodno Region, in western Belarus. It serves as the administrative center of Slonim District. It is located at the junction of the Shchara and Isa (river), Isa rivers, southeast of Grodno. As of 2025, it has a population of ...

, Brest, and MahiliowКанцлер Леў Сапега (Chancellor Lew Sapieha)
in Belarusian) * (1937-2021), meritorious surgeon

Notes

References

External links

Photos of Astroŭna at globus.tut.by

* {{Authority control Agrotowns in Belarus Populated places in Vitebsk region Beshankovichy district

History

Notable residents

Notes

References

Further reading

External links