Uryupinsk is a town in Volgograd Oblast, Russia, located 340km northwest of Volgograd on the Khopyor River. Population:EtymologyThere are two theories of the historical background for the town's name. One is that it is from name of a Tartar prince Uryup, who got bogged down in a swamp near this location, during a fight with Yermak and got captured. Another is that it is from either the family name Uryupin or the word "урюпа" (uryupa). According to the 1866 Explanatory Dictionary of the Living Great Russian Language by Vladimir Dal, this archaic word means untidy person, which probably in this context characterizes not a person, but the swampy area.The name of this town is known to many Russian people as a synonym for "backwater town". This usage became widespread after the popular Soviet film Destiny of a Man. The film was based on a short story by Mikhail Sholokhov, and Uryupinsk was the place of the action, shown as an inconspicuous provincial town.HistoryFounded in the late 14th–early 15th century as Uryupin, it was a border outpost of the Principality of Ryazan, populated by Don Cossacks. Since 1857, it is the stanitsa of Uryupinskaya and home of Pokrovskaya Fair, a center for trade on the southeastern side of the East European Plain. It was renamed Uryupinsk and granted town status in 1929.