Crimea: an integral part of Ukraine

By Matthew Parish, Associate Editor

The history of Crimea is a chronicle of cultural intermingling, imperial conquest and enduring connections with the Ukrainian mainland. The peninsula’s location between the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov made her a maritime crossroads linking the steppe civilisations of the north with the Mediterranean world to the south. Over millennia, Crimea’s distinctive identity has been shaped by the coexistence of Greeks, Scythians, Tatars, Slavs and others—each leaving traces of language, architecture, and religion that still define her complex heritage.

Ancient and Medieval Origins

Crimea’s earliest recorded inhabitants were the Cimmerians and Scythians, nomadic tribes that controlled the steppe routes of the northern Black Sea. By the 6th century BC, Greek settlers founded colonies along Crimea’s southern coast, most famously at Chersonesus near modern Sevastopol. These Hellenic outposts created enduring patterns of trade and urban life that tied Crimea to the wider Black Sea economy and to the ancient Greek world.

The peninsula’s interior remained dominated by nomadic peoples—the Scythians, Sarmatians, and later the Goths—whose presence mingled with that of Greeks and other settlers. In the medieval era, Crimea passed through Byzantine, Khazar, and later Mongol influence. The Crimean port of Kaffa (Feodosia), established by Genoese merchants in the 13th century, became one of Europe’s most cosmopolitan trading centres, linking the Mediterranean with Central Asia.

The Crimean Khanate and the Slavic Connection

From the 15th century until the late 18th, Crimea was the seat of the Crimean Khanate, ruled by the Giray dynasty as a vassal state of the Ottoman Empire. The Khanate’s Tatar population maintained Turkic and Islamic traditions while conducting extensive interaction with the Slavic principalities to the north, including the lands that would later become Ukraine. Many Ukrainian peasants were captured in Tatar raids, yet peaceful exchange also persisted: trade in grain, horses and salt bound the steppe economies together.

For Ukrainian Cossacks along the Dnipro River, Crimea was both a neighbour and an adversary. The Cossack Hetmanate’s campaigns against the Tatars and the Ottomans were part of the same geopolitical contest that shaped early modern Ukraine’s emergence. Thus Crimea and the Ukrainian steppe formed a shared historical theatre—one of conflict but also of exchange across a porous frontier.

Imperial Annexation and Integration

In 1783 Catherine the Great annexed Crimea to the Russian Empire, ending the independence of the Khanate. The Russian administration promoted colonisation by Russians, Ukrainians, Germans and Armenians, while many Tatars emigrated to the Ottoman Empire. Yet Crimea remained intertwined with Ukraine’s southern lands. The nearby city of Kherson served as the gateway for imperial expansion into the Black Sea region, and much of Crimea’s grain, manpower and trade passed through the Ukrainian mainland.

During the 19th century Crimea’s ports and vineyards prospered, and her warm climate made her a fashionable retreat for the Russian aristocracy. The Crimean War (1853–1856) exposed the peninsula’s strategic value as Britain, France and the Ottoman Empire sought to curtail Russian naval power in the Black Sea. Despite imperial centralisation, Crimea’s population stayed ethnically mixed—Tatars, Ukrainians, Russians, Greeks, and Jews living side by side in cities such as Simferopol and Yalta.

Soviet Transformation and the Ukrainian Connection

Following the turmoil of the 1917 revolution and subsequent civil war, Crimea became an autonomous republic within Soviet Russia. The Second World War devastated the peninsula, with the Stalinist deportation of the entire Crimean Tatar population in 1944 marking one of the darkest chapters in her history. In 1954 the Soviet Union transferred Crimea from the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. The decision, often portrayed as symbolic, reflected Crimea’s geographic, economic and infrastructural ties to Ukraine: her water, electricity, and transport links all ran through the Ukrainian mainland.

Under Soviet rule, Crimea was rebuilt as a centre of tourism, industry and naval power. Ukrainian workers and engineers played an essential role in her reconstruction. The peninsula’s cities retained strong Ukrainian cultural elements—language, folk traditions and academic exchange flourished despite the dominance of Russian administration.

Independence and Contemporary Resonance

With Ukraine’s independence in 1991, Crimea became part of the new state as the Autonomous Republic of Crimea. The peninsula enjoyed self-governing institutions and a multi-ethnic character, with Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars seeking to reassert their heritage. The return of the Tatars from exile symbolised the peninsula’s slow restoration of historical justice.

Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Crimea’s economy and infrastructure remained deeply linked to Ukraine: her electricity grid, water supply via the North Crimean Canal and overland trade routes all depended upon mainland connections. Ukrainian cultural life—schools, universities, and churches—remained visible, even as Russian influence continued through the Black Sea Fleet and the peninsula’s majority Russian-speaking population.

A Distinctive Cultural Mosaic

Crimea’s identity has always been more than the possession of any single empire or nation. She is defined by her complex past: the ruins of Greek temples, the minarets of Bakhchysarai, the Orthodox monasteries of Chersonesus, and the vineyards of Yalta all testify to centuries of coexistence. The peninsula’s folk music blends Turkic melodies with Slavic harmonies; her cuisine mixes Ukrainian borshch with Tatar chebureki.

This cultural mosaic underlines why Crimea has long been understood within Ukraine not merely as a strategic asset but as a part of her historical narrative—a region that reflects the diversity, tolerance, and resilience of the Ukrainian nation itself.

Conclusion

The history of Crimea cannot be reduced to conquest or annexation. It is a story of continuous connection with the Ukrainian lands, forged by geography, trade and human migration. From ancient Chersonesus to the post-Soviet republic, Crimea’s fate has always been intertwined with that of Ukraine. Her landscape embodies a shared history of hardship and renewal, and her culture remains one of the clearest expressions of Ukraine’s enduring place between Europe and the Black Sea world.