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Rybinsk

Rybinsk (Russian: Рыбинск, IPA: [ˈrɨbʲɪnsk]) is the second-largest city of Yaroslavl Oblast, Russia. It lies on both banks of the Volga at its confluence with the Sheksna, about 267 kilometres (166 mi) north‑northeast of Moscow. As of the 2021 census, its population was 177,295; the 2010 Census recorded 200,771.

Historically a major transshipment and trading hub on the upper Volga, Rybinsk expanded rapidly after the opening of the Vyshny Volochyok Waterway and was chartered as a town in 1777. In the Soviet era it developed into an industrial center and inland river port associated with the creation of the Rybinsk Reservoir. The city is noted for its 19th‑century merchant architecture along the Volga embankment and is sometimes included in extended Golden Ring of Russia itineraries. Rybinsk has borne several names: Ust‑Sheksna (until 1504), Rybnaya Sloboda (until 1777), Shcherbakov (1946–1957), and Andropov (1984–1989).

Rybinsk is one of the oldest Slavic settlements on the Volga River. The place was first recorded by chroniclers in 1071 as Ust-Sheksna, i.e. "the mouth of the Sheksna".[citation needed] During this period the settlement was a regional center for craft and metal based produce and for trade. In the mid-13th century, Ust-Sheksna was laid waste by invading Mongols. For the next few centuries, the settlement was referred to alternatively as Ust-Sheksna or Rybansk. From 1504, it was identified in documents as Rybnaya Sloboda (literally: "the fishing village"). The name is explained by the fact that the settlement supplied the Muscovite court with choice sturgeons and sterlets. In the 17th century, when the sloboda was capitalizing on the trade of the Muscovy Company with Western Europe, it was rich enough to build several stone churches, of which only one survives to the present. More old architecture may be found in the neighborhood, including the last of Muscovite three-tented churches (in the Alexandrov Hermitage) and the Ushakov family shrine (on Epiphany Island).

In the 18th century, the sloboda continued to thrive on the Volga trade. Catherine the Great granted Rybnaya Sloboda municipal rights and renamed it Rybinsk. It was a place where the cargo was reloaded from large Volga vessels to smaller boats capable of navigating in the shallow Mariinsk Canal system, which connects the Russian hinterland with the Baltic Sea. With a population of 7,000, the town daily accommodated up to 170,000 sailors and up to 2,000 river vessels. Consequently, the local river port became known as the "capital of barge-haulers".

The town's most conspicuous landmark, the Neoclassical Savior-Transfiguration Cathedral, was constructed on the Volga riverside from 1838 until 1851. It was built to a design that the Dean of the Imperial Academy of Arts, Avraam Melnikov, had prepared for Saint Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg. After Melnikov lost the contest for the best project of St. Isaac's Cathedral to Auguste de Montferrand, he sold his grandiose design to the municipal authorities of Rybinsk.

As a trade capital of the Upper Volga, Rybinsk formerly attracted scores of foreigners, who built a Lutheran church and an imposing Roman Catholic cathedral, said to be the tallest on the Volga. There is also the Nobel Family Museum, documenting the operations of that prominent Swedish family during the Russian Empire.

20th-century American film moguls Nicholas Schenck and Joseph Schenck were born in the town, and there is a grand 18th-century mansion of the Mikhalkov family, whose living members include Sergey Mikhalkov, Nikita Mikhalkov, and Andron Konchalovsky.

In the Soviet years, Rybinsk continued its impressive renaming record, for it changed its name four times: to Shcherbakov (after Aleksandr Shcherbakov) in 1946, back to Rybinsk in 1957, to Andropov (after Yuri Andropov) in 1984, and back to Rybinsk in 1989.

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