Smarhon, or Smorgon, is a town in Grodno Region, Belarus.
History
Within the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Smarhon was part of Vilnius Voivodeship.
Forty percent of the names of
Smarhon District's settlements have remained of
origin, while residents of Smarhon once spoke in the Eastern Aukštaitian-
Vilnius dialect of Lithuanian language.
In 1795, the town was acquired by the Russian Empire in the course of the Third Partition of Poland.
Amid the disastrous retreat from Russia in 1812, Napoleon left the remnants of the Grande Armée at Smorgon on December 5 to return to Paris.
From 1921 until 1939, Smarhon ( Smorgonie) was part of the Second Polish Republic. In September 1939, the town was occupied by the Red Army and, on 14 November 1939, incorporated into the Byelorussian SSR.
From 25 June 1941 until 4 July 1944, Smarhon was occupied by Nazi Germany and administered as a part of the Generalbezirk Litauen of Reichskommissariat Ostland.
Smorgon is known as the place where a school of bear training, the so-called "Bear Academy", was founded.
Culture
Up until World War II, Smarhon was widely known for its
Baranka,
[, , ] traditional
ring-shaped bread rolls, similar to
and
. Russian food historian William Pokhlyobkin considered Smarhon to be the birthplace of baranki.
[ Баранки. In: В. В. Похлёбкин, Кулинарный словарь от А до Я. Москва, Центрполиграф, 2000, (William Pokhlyobkin, Culinary Dictionary. Moscow, Centrpoligraf publishing house, 2000; Russian)] Baranki were supposedly used to feed bears in the Bear Academy. Written accounts of Smarhon baranki appeared in the 19th century. Polish-Lithuanian journalist
Adam Kirkor wrote in the encyclopedia
Picturesque Russia: "In Smorgon, Oshmyany district, Vilna province, almost all the petty bourgeois population is busy baking small bubliki, or
, which are widely known as
Smorgon obvaranki. Each traveller would definitely buy several bundles of these bubliki; besides, they are transported to
Vilnius and other cities."
[ ()] Władysław Syrokomla mentioned Smarhon as "the capital of obwarzanki famous in all Lithuania".
Smarhon obwarzanki were a traditional treat at Saint Casimir's Fair in Vilnius.
[ ()]
International relations
Smarhon is twinned with:
Notable people
-
Peter Blume (1906–1992), US painter, in magic realism style
-
Isaac Itkind (1871–1969), distinguished Russian and Soviet sculptor
-
Abraham Isaac Kook (1865–1935), rabbi, Jewish theologist, Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Palestine, learned in Smarhon Yeshiva
-
Moyshe Kulbak (1896–1937), Belarusian Yiddish poet, writer, executed by the NKVD
-
Moshe Kussevitzki (1899–1966), Polish-US Jewish cantor
-
Ida Lazarovich Gilman or Ida Mett (1901–1973), Russians anarchism militant and author,
-
Shalom Levin (1916–1995), Secretary Gen. and President of Israel Teachers Union, Knesset (Parliament) Member, educator and author
-
Shmuel Rodensky (1902–1989), Israeli actor
-
Karol Dominik Przezdziecki (1782–1832), Polish people count, fighter for the liberation of Poland in the revolt of 1830–1831
-
David Raziel (1910–1941), fighter for the emancipation of in Palestine, commander of the Irgun nationalist resistance organization, killed in Iraq on an anti-Nazi mission
-
Esther Raziel Naor (1911–2002), politician, militant in the Irgun Jewish nationalist resistance during the British mandate in Palestine
-
William Schwartz (1896–1977), US painter
-
Nahum Slouschz (1872–1966), Israeli writer, translator and archaeologist
-
Abraham Sutzkever (1913–2010), Yiddish and Polish poet and Second World War partisan
-
The Gordin brothers, Abba Gordin (1887–1964) and Wolf Gordin (1885–1974), anarchist educators, militants, and theorists
Notes
External links
