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Vitsyebsk| Industrial city and important rail junction in Belarus, on the Western Dvina River, 220 km/137 mi northeast of Minsk and 45 km/28 mi west of the Russian border; population (2004 est) 342,400. The city is the capital of the Vitsyebsk oblast (administrative region). Furniture, electrical goods, machine tools, and textiles are manufactured. |
| As a settlement, Vitsyebsk traces its origins back to Viking (Varangian) explorers in the 6th century. The town was first chronicled in 1021. Part of the Slav princedom of Polotsk from 1101 onwards, it was under Lithuanian rule from 1320 until Poland gained control in 1569; it passed to Russia in 1772. Vitsyebsk was occupied by German troops (1941–44). |
| Vitsyebsk was the birthplace of the Russian-Jewish painter Marc Chagall, in 1887. |
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