Ulan-Ude
Russia · Europe
About Ulan-Ude
Ulan-Ude is the capital city of Buryatia, Russia, located about 100 kilometers (62 mi) southeast of Lake Baikal on the Uda River at its confluence with the Selenga. According to the 2021 Census, 437,565 people lived in Ulan-Ude; up from 404,426 recorded in the 2010 Census, making the city the third-largest in the Russian Far East by population.
Ulan-Ude was first called Udinskoye for its location on the Uda River. It was founded as a small fort in 1666. From around 1735, the settlement was called Udinsk and was granted town status under that name in 1775. It was renamed Verkhneudinsk in 1783, to differentiate it from Nizhneudinsk ("Lower Udinsk") lying on a different Uda River near Irkutsk which was granted town status that year.
The descriptors "upper" and "lower" refer to the positions of the two cities relative to each other, rather than the location of the cities on their respective Uda rivers. Verkhneudinsk lies at the mouth of its river, while Nizhneudinsk...
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)。Photography via Wikimedia Commons.