On June 26, a postage stamp dedicated to the 200th Anniversary of the Resort Town of Essentuki of the Stavropol Territory was put into postal circulation

Essentuki is a resort town in the Stavropol Territory. It forms the Essentuki urban district. Since 1992, it has been the administrative center of the specially protected ecological resort region Caucasian Mineral Waters (CMW) and the seat of its administration. Since 2006, it has been a resort of federal significance.

In 1798, resulting from a shift of the Russian border to the south, the Essentuki redoubt - the second Russian defense point in Pyatigorie - was founded on the right bank of the Bolshoi Essentuk River. In 1825, on the initiative of General A. Yermolov, 235 families of Volga Cossacks were resettled to this area and founded a village on the bank of the Bugunta River. This settlement, which became known as the Essentuki village gave birth to Essentuki. The mineral springs discovered in 1811 by F. Haass aroused no interest of doctors and visitors of the Caucasian Mineral Waters. In 1823, A. Nelyubin, a professor of the St. Petersburg Medical and Surgical Academy, studied and described in detail the waters from the Essentuki springs. He discovered 20 more springs, numbered them and classified them as salt-alkaline and sulphur-alkaline. The hill from which the springs flowed out was called Shchelochnaya (Alkaline). In 1839, the Cossacks built the first wooden bathhouse with the water heated with a large samovar (boiling tank). In 1846, the management of mineral waters was transferred to the Governor of the Caucasus, Prince M. Vorontsov. Since that time, the Bugunta springs have been referred to as the Essentuki springs.

The first hotel for vacationers was built in Essentuki in 1863. The hotel was small, with only four rooms, but by the beginning of the 20th century, the resort had already grown highly in vogue.

Nowadays, Essentuki is considered the largest and most popular drinking and balneotherapeutic resort in Russia for treatment of gastrointestinal, hepatic and metabolic diseases. The main healing remedies of the resort are more than 20 mineral springs. The city has vast spa parks – the Lechebniy Park (lower park) and the Victory Park (upper park). The parks host mineral water springs, many therapeutic institutions, and marked up Terrainkur routes. The basic therapeutic factors of Essentuki are salt-alkaline springs Essentuki-4, Essentuki-20, Essentuki-17, Essentuki-2 (New) and sulphur-alkaline spring Essentuki-1-Burovaya. The waters of the springs are used for drinking therapy, baths, irrigations and inhalations. Besides, the sulfide silt mud of Tambukan Lake is also used for therapeutic purposes (mud treatment).

The postage stamp provides an image of Upper Nikolayevsky Mineral Baths.

In addition to the issue of the postage stamp, JSC Marka produced First Day Covers and special cancels for Moscow and Essentuki of the Stavropol Territory.


Design Artist: N. Karpova.
Face value: 80 rubles.
Stamp size: 58×26 mm, sheet size: 136×129 mm.
Emission form: a sheet with formatted margins with 8 (2×4) stamps.
Quantity: 56 thousand stamps (7 thousand sheets).

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