The territory of modern-day Nalchik was formerly known as Sloboda. The modern city dates from the early 19th century when the expanding
Russian Empire built a fort there in 1818. In 1838, a Russian military settlement was founded in the city, and after the
Russian Revolution of 1917, in the year 1921, Nalchik was given the status of administrative center of
Kabardin Autonomous Oblast. During the
Russian Empire, the settlement was the administrative capital of the
Nalchiksky Okrug of the
Terek Oblast. The word "Nalchik" literally means "small horseshoe" in
Kabardian (or Circassian, a
Northwest Caucasian language) and
Karachay-Balkar (a
Turkic language). It is a diminutive of ''na'l'', a common Middle Eastern word (
Arabic,
Persian,
Turkish) for "horseshoe", possibly from the ancient
Scythian, 'nalak' (horseshoe). The city of Nalchik was named this way because of how it is shaped as surrounded by the mountains of the land, and the
Nalchik River is named after the city it runs across. During
World War II, on 2 November 1942, Nalchik was occupied by Romanian mountain troops (
Vânători de munte) under the command of Brigadier General
Ioan Dumitrache, its capture earning the Romanian General the
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. The city was heavily damaged during the conflict. General Dumitrache went to great length ordering his troops to protect local population during the time Nalchik was occupied by Romanian forces. Professor A. N. Dainaco, the Mayor of Nalchik at that time, thanked General Dumitrache for liberating the city. Although he was accused of
war crimes, General Dumitrache was fully exonerated after the war by a joint Soviet and Romanian judicial commission. In 1990, there was a 6.0 magnitude earthquake in Nalchik. With the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Nalchik and the Kabardino- Balkaria region become a federal republic of Russia. In 1999 the remains of Kazym Mechiyev, who died in exile in 1945, were reburied in Nalchik. On October 13, 2005, Nalchik was
attacked by a large group of
Yarmuk Jamaat militants led by
Shamil Basayev and
Anzor Astemirov. Buildings associated with the Russian security forces were targeted, killing at least 14 civilians and wounding 115. Thirty-five policemen died in the fighting. Eighty-nine militants, including their leader
Ilias Gorchkhanov, were killed, and another fifty-nine arrested. ==Administrative and municipal status==