Odessa, Ukraine (formerly Russia, USSR). In the AD 15th century, nomadic tribes inhabited what is now the Odessa region. Crimean Khanate ceded the area to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in the middle of that century. The city on the Black Sea's northwestern seashore was officially founded in 1794 (first called Odessa on January 10, 1795) as a Russian naval fortress (built on the ruins of a mid-18th century Ottoman fortress Eni Dunia) in an old Turkic town of Khadjibey. Khadjibey was taken by Russian forces in the Russo-Turkish War of 1787–1792, on 25 September 1789.

An avant-garde commander in the battle over Khadjibey and Akkerman (now Belgorod-Dnestrovskiy) and also the masterminded of the successful storming of the nearby fortress of Izmail was a Spaniard (likely of the Catalan Jewish converso origin) in Russian service, Major General (promoted to Admiral in 1796) José de Ribas (Iosif (Osip) Mikhailovich Deribas). In 1793, de Ribas together with a Flemish army engineer Franz de Volan created the final plan for the port of Khadjibey. Osip Mikhailovich Deribas headed the port, oversaw the building of it and also participated in the building of the city of Odessa. The best known street in Odessa (and one of the few that has never been renamed) is the main street of Deribasovskaya named after Iosif Mikhailovich. The name "Odessa" itself, is likely to have been derived (as was customary at the time) from the Greek name of an ancient Greek colony of Odessos, which was thought to have been located somewhere nearby.

The new city grew quickly much to the credit of a Frenchman the Duc de Richelieu, who served as the city's governor between 1803 and 1814. Another Frenchman, Count Louis Alexandre Andrault de Langeron succeeded him in office. From 1819 to 1859, Odessa was a free port (Porto Franco). Odessa became the most cosmopolitan city in the Russian Empire with Russians, Ukrainians, Jews, Romanians, Greeks, Bulgarians, Albanians, Armenians, Italians, French, Germans being well represented. Russia's most famous poet, Alexander Pushkin, noted that in Odessa "you can smell Europe." By the middle of the 19th century Odessa became Russia's largest grain-exporting port. This explains why so many "New World" grain belt towns established in the 19th century were happy to adopt Odessa's name.

As of  January 1 , 2000 and for a term of 25 years, Odessa Sea Commercial Port (the largest seaport in Ukraine) is again a special free economic zone (Porto Franco). Currently, Odessa is the administrative center of the region by the same name with its over 1 million inhabitants.

Curious to know why there are so many places - cities, towns and villages named Odessa throughout the world?
Read other Odessa histories.