Perm (Пермь, IPA: pʲɛrmʲ) is a city and administrative center of Perm Krai, Russia. It is situated on the banks of the Kama River, at the foot of the Ural Mountains.
Perm is one of the largest cities in Russia, thirteenth most populous, with 976,116 (2006 est.) inhabitants, down from 1,001,653 recorded in 2002 Census and 1,090,944 recorded in 1989 Census. The city is served by Bolshoye Savino Airport but also hosts Bakharevka air base.
In geology, the Permian period takes its name from the region.
Administrative divisions
Perm is divided into seven city districts:
History
During the early middle ages, the region of Perm was populated by pagan Finno-Ugric tribes who lived to the southeast of the legendary Bjarmaland and northeast of Volga Bulgaria. Between the 13th and 14th centuries, Russian fur traders and Christian missionaries from Novgorod and later Moscow founded first settlements in the area. Saint Stephen of Perm is credited with conversion of local population to Christianity in the late 14th century. In the 15th century, the Perm region, because of its highly profitable fur trade, was an object of bitter rivalry between Novgorod and Moscow, and in 1472 Perm was finally annexed by the Grand Duchy of Moscow. In the late 15th and early 16th centuries, soldiers, merchants, Christian monks, and priests were followed by Tsarist administration and peasant settlers from the western Russia.
Perm was first mentioned as a village Yegoshikha in 1647; however, the history of the modern city of Perm starts with the development of the Ural region by Peter I of Russia. Vasily Tatishchev appointed by the Russian Tsar as a chief manager of Ural factories founded Perm together with another major center of the Ural region Yekaterinburg.
Perm was founded on May 15 (May 4 in Julian calendar), 1723, and has had town status since 1781. By 1797, it was already an administrative center of gubernia with the same name.
In the 19th century, Perm became a major trade and industry center with a population of more than 20,000 people in the 1860s and several metallurgy, paper, and steamboat producing factories, including one owned by a British entrepreneur. In 1870, an opera theatre was open in the city, and in 1871 the first phosphoric factory in Russia was built. In 1916,
Perm State University—a major educational institution in modern Russia—was opened. After the outbreak of the Russian Civil War, Perm became a prime target for both sides because of its military munitions factories. In December of 1918 Siberian White Army of admiral Aleksandr Kolchak took Perm but few months later it was captured by the Red Army. Grand Duke Mikail Alexandrovich was executed in the outskirts of Perm with his secretary Nicholas Johnson on June 12, 1918 on the orders of the Perm Cheka. Their bodies were never recovered. Few weeks later on July 7, 1918, Andronic Nikolsky Archbishop Of Perm was also murdered by the Bolsheviks in the city. In 2000, the Russian Orthodox Church glorified him as Hieromartyr Andronik, Archbishop Of Perm,...
