Ostroh

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Image:Ostroh.png Image:Ostrog (great soviet encyclopedia).jpg Image:Mezhirich.jpg

Ostroh (Ukrainian and Russian Острог, also often spelled Ostrog as it is called in Polish and transliterated from Russian) is a historical town in Ukraine with a population of 14,801 (2001). It is an administrative center of the Ostroh Raion (district) in the Rivne Oblast of the in the west of Ukraine.

The Hypatian codex first mentions it in 1100 as a fortress of Volhynian princes. Since the 14th century, it was the seat of the powerful Ostrogski princely family, who developed their town into a great centre of learning and commerce. Upon the family's extinction in the 17th century, Ostroh passed to the princes Lubomirski. In the 16th century, the first East Slavic books were printed there. The town formerly had a sizable Jewish community, whose rabbis included Kalonymus Haberkasten, Samuel Edels, and Solomon Luria.

Landmarks include the ruins of the Ostroz'ky castle on the Red Hill (JPEG), with the Epiphany church (built in the fifteenth century) and several towers. To the north-west from the castle stand two sixteenth-century towers (JPEG). The suburb of Mejirichi (or Miedzyrzec) contains the Trinity abbey, with a fifteenth-century cathedral and other old structures.

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