Lubny is reputed to be one of the oldest cities in Ukraine, allegedly founded in 988 by
knyaz (prince)
Vladimir the Great (Volodymyr) of
Kyiv. The first written record, however, dates from 1107, when a battle against the
Polovtsians took place nearby. The settlement was originally known as
Luben (). The population of Lubny increased from around 3,000 as of 1860 to 10,000 in 1897. Following the
17 October Manifesto Khliborob ( - "Peasant"), the first
Ukrainian language newspaper in
Dnieper Ukraine, was published in Lubny. A local newspaper
Lubenshchyna has been circulating in the city since July 1917. In 1918 Lubny was the site of battles between the
Zaporozhian Division of the
Ukrainian People's Republic and the
Bolsheviks. By 1926 the city's population had grown to 21,000. On 16 October 1941 over a thousand of the city's Jews, including women and children, were massacred by German
Einsatzgruppen on the outskirts of the city. The action, all the way until the execution, was thoroughly documented by photographer
Johannes Hähle. Under the
Soviet rule Lubny served as a centre of machine-building, mechanical, construction,
tobacco, textile, furniture, food and pharmaceutical industries, housing an agricultural research station, technical and medical schools and a museum. ==Modern Lubny==