Kupil (, ; ; , ) is a village ('' selo'') in

Khmelnytskyi Raion Khmelnytskyi Raion () is one of the three administrative raions (districts) of Khmelnytskyi Oblast in western Ukraine. Its administrative center is the city of Khmelnytskyi. Population: On 18 July 2020, as part of the administrative reform of ...

(

district A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or county, counties, several municipality, municip ...

) of

Khmelnytskyi Oblast Khmelnytskyi Oblast (), also known as Khmelnychchyna (), is an administrative divisions of Ukraine, oblast (province) in western Ukraine covering portions of the historical regions of western Podolia and southern Volhynia. The Capital (political) ...

(

province A province is an administrative division within a country or sovereign state, state. The term derives from the ancient Roman , which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire, Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...

) of western

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

. It belongs to Viitivtsi settlement hromada, one of the

hromada In Ukraine, a hromada () is the main type of municipality and the third level Administrative divisions of Ukraine, local self-government in Ukraine. The current hromadas were established by the Cabinet of ministers of Ukraine, Government of Uk ...

s of Ukraine.

History

Settlement in Kupil began in the 18th century, when it had long been part 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 ...

. The

Czartoryski The House of Czartoryski (feminine form: Czartoryska, plural: Czartoryscy; ) is a Princely Houses of Poland, Polish princely family of Lithuanian-Ruthenians, Ruthenian origin, also known as the Familia (political party), Familia. The family, whic ...

family owned the estate of which Kupiel was a part and they erected a palace by the village. The forced

Partitions of Poland The Partitions of Poland were three partition (politics), partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth that took place between 1772 and 1795, toward the end of the 18th century. They ended the existence of the state, resulting in the eli ...

at the end of that century incorporated the area into 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 ...

where it stayed until the Soviet take-over after

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. The population was made up of Ukrainians, Poles and Jews all of whom had previously been Polish citizens.''

Słownik geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego The Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavic Countries () is a monumental Polish gazetteer, published 1880–1902 in Warsaw by Filip Sulimierski, Bronisław Chlebowski, Władysław Walewski Władysław is a Polish given ...

'', vol. XV, pt. 2: Januszpol – Wola Justowska, Warsaw 1902, p. 196. During World War II, the invading German army occupied the town on July 5, 1941, following the commencement of

Operation Barbarossa Operation Barbarossa was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and several of its European Axis allies starting on Sunday, 22 June 1941, during World War II. More than 3.8 million Axis troops invaded the western Soviet Union along ...

. Jewish people were kept imprisoned in a local

ghetto A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other ...

and used to perform forced labour. On September 21, 1942, about 600 Jewish inhabitants of Kupil were taken to Volochisk and executed outside the town. The remaining Jewish inhabitants were shot dead at the town's cemetery. Kupil was liberated from German occupation by the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

in March 1944. The

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

scholar

William Chomsky William Chomsky (born Ze'ev Chomsky; January 15, 1896July 19, 1977) was an American scholar of the Hebrew language. He was born in the Russian Empire (modern Ukraine) and settled in the United States in 1913. From 1924 until 1969, he was a membe ...

was born in Kupil in 1896. He later moved to the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. William is the father of

Noam Chomsky Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American professor and public intellectual known for his work in linguistics, political activism, and social criticism. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a ...

and David. The Yiddish write
Chaim Bejder
was born in Kupil in 1920. He was an editor of the only Jewish magazine in the Soviet Union, '' Sovetish Heymland''. He moved to the United States in 1996 and died in the state of New York in 2003.

References

{{coord, 49, 36, 36, N, 26, 30, 36, E, source:ukwiki_region:UA_scale:100000, display=title Villages in Khmelnytskyi Raion Starokonstantinovsky Uyezd Historic Jewish communities in Ukraine Jewish Ukrainian history Holocaust locations in Ukraine