Melitopol

Melitopol is situated in the southern part of Zaporizhia region, on the Molochnaya River. Melitopol lasts about 100 km south of Zaporizhia, in a steppe region where vegetables, grapes, and other fruits are grown. Population is nearly 174, 000.

Melitopol in Greek means honey town. However Melitopol is known not only for its fruit trees. The city serves as a regional and manufacturing¹ center. Products include automobile engines, tractor parts, refrigerators, food products, and consumer goods². The Tavrichesk Agricultural State Academy (founded in 1930), the Melitopol Pedagogical University and a region museum are there in Melitopol. As well there are several technical schools.

The vast settlement³ on the near-azov steppe was founded in 1784 as Novooleksandrivka but then renamed Melitopol in 1841. in the last few years the city has become an important industrial center, with a big plant manufacturing air-cooled Diesel engines which are used at the North Polar stations and on the Antarctic continent.

But the city is most beautiful in autumn when its markets and shops abound⁴ in fruit. The famous water-melons⁵ of Melitopol are most delicious not to mention⁶ the juicy apricots, apples and pears.

From Melitopol the road runs straight as arrow and the air grows warmer as one gets further south⁷.

There is the Askaniya Nova Reservation nearby Melitopol, which attracts crowds of tourists. The territory of the Askaniya Nova Reservation includes the virgin steppe. The research institute on the reservation is named after M.F.Ivanov, a prominent scientist who for many years headed the scientific work in livestock breeding.

The famous Askaniya breed⁸ of fine fleece sheep⁹, the Ukrainian steppe white and spotted¹⁰ pigs were raised here. Askaniya Nova also boasts of its botanical and zoological gardens where many unique species¹¹ of plants and animals are collected. Here, under natural conditions, are kept bisons, hybrids of the bison and Siberian Capricorns (goats)¹² rein-deers¹³, zebras, gnu and antelopes, the Przhevalsky wild horses, and also ostriches¹⁴, peacocks¹⁵, and other kinds of birds and animals.

18 kilometers to the north of the city of Melitopol, a stone hill of piled up boulders¹⁶is scattered. The people have named it Stone Tomb.

Weather-beaten for millions of years, overgrown¹⁸ with green lichen, these boulders, different in form and fantastic in their outlines, produce the impression of silent stateliness.

Many legends have been devised¹⁹ about this wonder of nature. Here is one of them.

The hero Bogur committed the offence against the God and the latter punished the hero by making him “dig out boulders from the nearby mountain-ridge²⁰ by hand and pile²¹ them into a high mountain on the bank of the Molochnaya River. Executing God’s will, Bogur wrested out huge boulders from the ridge, carried them and piled one upon the other in place indicated by God: to fulfill this work quicker he resorted to cunning by piling them loosely²². When the work was more then half done, Bogur, when dragging up the boulders²³, accidentally stumbled and fell through a crack deliberately left by him²⁴ between the rocks, stuck there and starved to death²⁵. Such a punishment befell him for wanting to deceive God. After that God told the winds to fill up all the cracks between the rocks with sand to cover the body of the hero Bogur whose bones are still jammed at present between the rocks. This place was named Stone-Mountain”.

Stone Tomb is a unique relic from geological and historical point of view. At present Stone Tomb is 12 meters high, and there are more than 3000000 slabs²⁶ on the area about 3 hectares. Stone Tomb in the Near-Azov steppe played a significant part in the spiritual culture of the people in ancient times.