the immigrants from Russian Empire. In the late 19th century, especially due to growing anti-Semitic sentiment in the Russian Empire and better economic conditions, many Jews chose to settle in Chişinău. Its population had grown to 92,000 by 1862 and to 125,787 by 1900. By the year 1900, 43% of the population of Chişinău was Jewish. In the interwar period the quantity of the city population was not increasing, and in June 1941 Chişinău had 110,000 people. The birth of the 500,000 Chişinău inhabitant was celebrated in 1979. The population of the city is 592,900 (2007) which grows to 911,400 in the entire metropolitan area. Etymology According to one version, the name comes from the archaic Romanian word chişla (meaning "spring", "source of water") and nouă ("new"), because it was built around a small spring. Nowadays, the spring is located at the corner of Pushkin and Albişoara streets. An alternative version, by Ştefan Ciobanu holds it, that the name was formed the same way as the name of Chişineu (alternative spelling: Chişinău) in Western Romania, near the border with Hungary. Its Hungarian name is Kisjenő, from which the Romanian name originates. Kisjenő in turn comes from kis "small" + the "Jenő" tribe, one of the seven Hungarian tribes that entered the Carpathian Basin in 896 and gave the name of 21 settlements. Chişinău is also known in Russian as Кишинёв (Kishinyov). It is written Kişinöv'' in the Latin Gagauz alphabet. It was also written as "Кишинэу" in the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet in Soviet times. Historically, the English language name for the city, "Kishinev", was based on the modified Russian one because it entered the English language via Russian at the time Chişinău was part of the Russian Empire (e.g. Kishinev pogrom). Therefore, it remains a common English name in some historical contexts. Otherwise, however, the Romanian-based "Chişinău" has been steadily gaining wider currency, especially in the written language. Gallery See also Timeline of Chișinău References Further reading External links www.chisinau.md – official site of Chişinău ; www.monument.sit.md – Architecture of historical Chisinau oldchisinau.com – Historical Chisinau in photos – Chisinau. Jewish Cemetery.Synagogue.Monuments