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Saky

Saky is a resort town in Western Crimea, known for its ancient healing muds and saline lakes, its rich history from antiquity to the present day, the unique coexistence of balneology with the chemical industry, a high level of inclusivity, and a park sculpture of dinosaurs that has become a symbol of the town.

Overview

Located in Western Crimea in the steppe zone near Lake Saky. The healing properties of Saky mud and brine were known over two thousand years ago. The modern resort emerged in the first half of the 19th century. Having survived destruction during the Crimean War and depopulation, the town was revived thanks to Ukrainian settlers from Poltava and the salt industry. In Soviet times Saky combined a balneological resort with a powerful chemical plant. Today Saky is an important rehabilitation center with a high level of accessibility for wheelchair users, and the town's landmark is a sculpture of prehistoric animals depicted on its official coat of arms.

Key Details / Subtopics

  • Antique mentions and Kara-Tobe: The first written evidence about the Saky land, which "heals all kinds of wounds," was left by the ancient Roman scholar Gaius Pliny the Elder (Gaius Plinius Secundus, 1st c.) and the Greek geographer Claudius Ptolemy (2nd c.). Nearby are the ruins of the antique settlement of Kara-Tobe (founded before the Common Era, later subdued by Rome). The settlement was also known during the Crimean Khanate.
  • Resort formation and the Crimean War: The resort history of Saky began in the first half of the 19th century with the opening of a military hospital and the first sanatoriums. During the Crimean War (1853–1856), the settlement suffered destruction due to the landing of the Anglo-French landing force on the neighboring coast and active combat operations.
  • Ukrainian resettlement and the chumak trade: After the war, due to the mass emigration of Crimean Tatars to the Ottoman Empire, the region remained depopulated for a long time, until Ukrainian peasants from the Poltava Governorate began to resettle here. During the chumak era, Ukrainians actively extracted and transported salt from Lake Saky.
  • Stay of cultural figures: The writers Mykola Gogol and Maksymilian Voloshyn underwent mud treatment in Saky. In 1890, Lesya Ukrainka came here for the first time; however, the mud-treatment course at the time harmed the poetess, so during her stay in the town she wrote no poetry.
  • City status and the Saky Chemical Plant: Saky received the official status of a settlement in the 1930s, and city status in 1952. For almost a hundred years the resort coexisted with the Saky Chemical Plant, which produced from brine bromine, chlorine, potassium permanganate, copper sulfate, magnesium, zinc, barium, and rare-earth metals. In 2000 the plant went bankrupt, but salt extraction continues.
  • Inclusivity: The town is exemplary in Crimea for its care for wheelchair users — its urban infrastructure is equipped with ramps at 80%.
  • Dinosaur sculpture and the city coat of arms: The sculptural landmark of Saky is the composition "The Battle of the Brontosaurus with the Celatosaurs" (Borotba brontozavra z tselatozavramy) in the city park, created in 1932 by the sculptor and paleontologist Serhii Lykhosherstov from sawdust and magnesia cement (before the first paleontological dinosaur find in Crimea in 1934). After its destruction it was recreated in 1982 in concrete, and in 2005 the silhouette of the brontosaurus ("Brontyka") was approved on the coat of arms of the city of Saky.