Sudak (redirected from Sulchat)

Sudak (sdäk`), town, S Ukraine, on the Crimean peninsula. It is a resort on the Black Sea. Its major industries are rose-oil processing and the production of fine quality wines and champagnes. Founded as a Greek settlement in the 3d cent. A.D., the town passed to Novgorod around 800. From the 9th to 11th cent., the port played an important role in trade with Byzantium and the Mediterranean area. In the 13th cent., Marco Polo passed through the town, and the Venetians established a community there. After repeated Tatar attacks (1289, 1322, 1327), Sudak passed to Genoa and was fortified; but it declined steadily under the Genoese and the Crimean Tatars, to whom it passed in 1475. Russia acquired Sudak in 1783 with the rest of the Crimea.

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Sudak 

an urban-type settlement in Crimean Oblast, Ukrainian SSR, under the jurisdiction of the Feodosiia city soviet. Situated on the Black Sea, 57 km southwest of Feodosiia and 104 km from Simferopol’. Population, 12,100 (1975). Enterprises in Sudak include the central farm of the Sudak Sovkhoz Plant, two wineries, a food-processing combine, and a bread-baking combine. Sudak is a maritime climatic health resort, with very warm summers (average July temperature, 23°C) and mild winters (average February temperature, 2°C). Annual precipitation is 310 mm. The swimming season is from July to mid-October. Ampelotherapy is offered from September to November. Patients are treated mainly for nontubercular respiratory diseases, functional disorders of the nervous system, and metabolic disorders.

In the fourth century B.C., the Tauri built a settlement on the site of present-day Sudak. The settlement was replaced in the third century A.D. by the Greek city of Sogdea. Known by the Eastern Slavs as Surozh, Sogdea was an important center of international trade until its destruction by the Mongol-Tatars in the 13th century. Beginning in the early 13th century, the city was controlled by the Republic of Venice. It was taken over by Genoa in 1365, when it became part of the province of Gazaria under the name of Soldaia. It was destroyed by the Turks in 1475. Sudak was a district capital of the Crimean Khanate from the 16th to the 18th century. It was occupied by Russian troops in 1771 and incorporated into the Russian Empire in 1783, under the name Cyril Fortress. In the 19th century, Sudak was a provincial settlement without administrative authority, part of Fedosiia District, Tavrida Province. Soviet power was established in the settlement in November 1920. Since 1929, Sudak has been an urban-type settlement. The settlement was occupied by fascist German troops from Nov. 1,1941, to Apr. 13, 1944.

Sudak has remains of a Genoese fortress of the 14th and 15th centuries that in 1958 was made part of the architectural and historical preserve of the Sophia Museum of Kiev. The structure features stone walls with an entry gate and 16 round and square defense towers, a consular donjon-castle with an inner court, a domed church that was made a mosque by the Turks, and storage facilities. Remains of a portal tower and the Church of the Twelve Apostles are found near the fortress. Restoration work is being conducted on the fortress. Guest houses, houses of rest, and sanatoriums have been built in Sudak.

REFERENCES

Lesik, N., and B. Tsybulevskaia. Sudak v proshlom i nastoiashchem. Simferopol’, 1958.
Polkanov, A. I. Sudak: Puievoditel ‘. Simferopol’, 1970.
Sekirinskii, S. A., O. V. Volobuev, and K. K. Kogonashvili. Sudakskaia krepost’. Simferopol’, 1971.