Types of settlements in Russia
Types of settlements in Russia, Soviet Union, and some other post-Soviet states have certain peculiarities with respect to the English language traditions. Some terminology described here is obsolete and is used in historical descriptions.
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Modern classification
The settlements of Russia are subdivided into two major categories: settlements of urban type and settlements of rural type.
Settlements of urban type
- Город (gorod), translated as either town or city. The Russian language has no separate words for "town" and "city". Officially, towns are classified by their population count (see below). Additionally, towns are clasified by their level of jurisdiction (raion/oblast/krai/republican/federal). In translation, the word "city" is traditionally applied to the towns with population of at least 100,000.
- Superlarge (сверхкрупные города): over 3,000,000.
- Larger (крупнейшие города): 1,000,000–3,000,000,
- Large (крупные города): 250,000–1,000,000.
- Big (большие города): 100,000–250,000.
- Medium (средние города): 50,000–100,000.
- Small (малые города, городки): less than 50,000.
- Посёлок городского типа (posyolok gorodskogo tipa), translated as "urban-type settlement" is a type of smaller urban settlements. There are several subtypes of urban-type settlements:
- Urban-type settlement proper—mostly urban population of 3,000–12,000.
- Work settlement (рабочий посёлок)—mostly urban population occupied in industrial manufacture.
- Builders' settlement (посёлок строителей)—mostly urban population occupied in construction.
- Dacha settlement (дачный посёлок)—typically, a suburban settlement with summer dachas.
- Beach settlement (курортный посёлок)—mostly urban population occupied in beach services.
- Station (станция)—mostly urban population occupied in transportation industry.
Settlements of rural type
- Посёлок сельского типа (posyolok selskogo tipa), or simply "посёлок", translated as "rural-type settlement". The "rural-type" (сельского типа) designation is added to the settlements the population of which is mostly occupied in agriculture, while posyolok (посёлок) proper indicates a mix of population working in agriculture and industry.
There are also several other types of rural-type settlements:
- Larger rural-type settlements, with population of 500–3,000:
- Село (selo)—translated as "village".
- Станица (stanitsa)—historically, a Cossack rural settlement. The name is still currently in use, with the basic meaning of "village".
- Слобода (sloboda)—historically, a settlement freed from taxes and levies for various reasons. The name is still currently in use with the basic meaning of "village".
- Smaller rural settlements, with population fewer than 500:
- Деревня (derevnya)—translated as "village". (See a satellite image of a typical Russian village of Maslovo, near Tver.)
- Хутор (khutor)—translated as "hamlet" or "farmstead", a rural settlement of one or several families.
- Рыбацкий посёлок (rybatsky posyolok)—translated as "fishermen's settlement", a shore settlement of the rural type with the population occupied in the fishing industry.
- Починок (pochinok)—a newly formed rural settlement of one of several families. Pochinoks are established as new settlements and usually grow into larger villages as they develop.
- In automonous republics of Russia, national terminology is used in the Russian language. Such settlement types include аул (aul), аал (aal), and кишлак (kishlak).
Classification of rural-type settlements according to their population counts
- Large: over 5,000.
- Big: 1,000–5,000.
- Medium: 200–1,000.
- Small: less than 200.
Historical terms
- Krepost (крепость, a fort), a fortified settlement. A Kremlin, Russian citadel, is a major krepost usually including a castle and surrounded by posad. Ostrog, on the other hand, was a more primitive kind of krepost which could be put up quickly within rough walls of debarked pointed timber.
- Posad (посад), a medieval suburban settlement.
- Mestechko (местечко, from Polish: miasteczko; Yiddish: shtetl), a small town in Western Krai annexed during the Partitions of Poland; typically with Jewish majority.
See also
Categories
Settlements