Askaniia-Nova

Askaniia-Nova [Асканія-Нова; Askanija-Nova]. See Google Map; see EU map: VII-14. Town smt (2020 pop 2,638) in Kakhovka raion, Kherson oblast. Although there have been settlements in the vicinity since the late Bronze Age, documentary sources first mention a town only in 1822. The original name was Chapli, but the present name has been used since 1841. Three sizable groups of German colonists arrived at this location between 1828 and 1830. In 1856 the colony was purchased by the Falz-Fein family. In the last decades of the 19th century, one family member, Friedrich Falz-Fein, established a zoological park and nature preserve on this territory—the oldest nature preserve in Ukraine and also the world’s oldest nature preserve established in an open steppe terrain. It exists until today as the Askaniia-Nova Biosphere Reserve.

Marko Robert Stech

[This article was updated in 2025.]