Stariy Krym
Stariy Krym (Old Crimea) is a quiet, modest town in the Eastern Crimea. Its history numbers not one millennium. There was a Tauri settling Karia here, then it had the name of Solkhat (“the holy cross” in Armenian). Crimean Tatars call it Eski Krym (Old Moat). In 1784 it was planned to make Stariy Krym the capital of Crimea and rename it Simferopol.
Stariy Krym is situated at the foot of the Mount Agarmysh (Whitish) which is 724 m above sea level. The local climate is very favourable for treatment of lung patients.
There are more than 12 caves on the Agarmysh Mount. The most famous is the vertical crack, the Sych Gap, 40 m deep and called by the local people the “Bottomless Well”. The cave Fox-Brush with its stalactites and stalagmites is also of particular interest.
The forest of the Agarmysh Mount is represented by oak, ash-tree, maple and beech. The shrubs include Cornelian cherry-trees and hawthorn.
The Agarmysh mount is a resourceful water reservoir supplying the population of Stariy Krym and Feodosiya with fresh water. On the top of the Mount one can enjoy a beautiful panorama of the valley of the Churuk-Su River, the magnificent mountain ridge of Djady-Kaya (Witch Cliff) and the peaks of Kara-Dag (Black Mount) in the distance.
At the foot of the Agarmysh Mount stands the former estate of the great painter of seascapes I. K. Aivazovskiy. Not far from it there is the grave of Mamai Khan (d. 1380), the ruler of the Golden Horde, who was defeated in the battle of Kulikovo by Dmitriy Donskoy (1350–1389).
The historical monuments of Stariy Krym are represented by the Uzbek Mosque, the ruins of a Middle Age church, St. George Armenian monastery.
St. George Armenian monastery built in 1338 stands in a picturesque mountain locality 4-km from Stariy Krym. The monastery was a religious center of the Armenian-Gregorians who migrated to Crimea from the Caucasus.
The citizens of Stariy Krym honour the memory of the fallen for freedom and independence of their homeland. There is a monument to the fallen in the battle with the invaders in the Great Patriotic War and there is a monument in honour of liberation of Stariy Krym on April 13, 1944.
In the local cemetery of Stariy Krym a monument to the famous romanticist A. S. Grin was erected in 1980 by sculptor T. Gagarina. In November 1930 A. S. Grin moved from Feodosiya to Stariy Krym. Here he lived for a short period of time and died on July 8, 1932.
