(from the Adygei word Myequape, “valley of apple trees”), a city and the center of Adygei Autonomous Oblast (part of Krasnodar Krai, RSFSR). It is situated on the right bank of the Belaia River, a tributary of the Kuban’, on the Tuapse-Ust’-Labinsk highway. Maikop has a railroad station on a siding of the Armavir-Tuapse line. Population, 122,000 (1973; 34,000 in 1897, 45,000 in 1926, 56,000 in 1939, 82,000 in 1959).
Founded as a Russian fortress on May 17, 1857, Maikop became the chief town of a district in 1870. Soviet power was established on Jan. 8 (21), 1918, but the city was seized by White Guards on Sept. 7, 1918. Soviet power was reestablished on Mar. 21-22, 1920, when units of the First Cavalry and partisans entered Maikop. During the prewar five-year plans Maikop was transformed from a remote provincial city with domestic and semidomestic enterprises into an industrial and cultural center. During the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45, Maikop was occupied by fascist German troops from Aug. 10, 1942, to Jan. 29, 1943, and was severely damaged by them. Maikop was fully restored during the first postwar five-year plan.
Food-processing is the city’s leading branch of industry (more than 37 percent of gross output); there are meat, dairy, and food combines as well as canneries and distilleries. Timber, paper, and wood-products enterprises account for 18.5 percent of gross output (furniture, parquet, pressed sawdust, cardboard boxes, wooden crates for produce). There are plants for the production of timber-rafting equipment, communications equipment, metalcutting lathes, and other equipment. Light industry accounts for more than 28 percent of gross output; there are binder-twine, rope, garment, and footwear factories and a tanning extracts plant. Maikop has a hydroelectric power plant. The city has a pedagogical institute and six secondary specialized educational institutions (road engineering, wood-products, and agricultural technicums and medical, pedagogical, and musical schools). Other educational and cultural institutions include the Adygeian Scientific Research Institute of Economics, Language, Literature, and History; a museum of history and local lore; and a dramatic theater.
L. ASHKHAMAKHOVA