the city has typically been known by the official name of the time or a transliteration derived from it. The city's former name Akkerman is still extensively used as a nickname in informal speech and in local media. History In the 6th century BC, Milesian colonists founded a settlement named Tyras on the future location of Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi, which later came under Roman and Byzantine rule. In Late Antiquity, the Byzantines built a fortress and named it Asprokastron ("White Castle" - a meaning kept in several languages), but it passed out of their control in the 7th-15th centuries under control of Bulgaria, the cities called Belgorod(white city), as it was the border of the Bulgarian empire. The Voskresensk Chronicle lists Bilhorod "at the mouth of the Dniester, above the sea" among the towns controlled by Kyivan Rus'. In the 13th century the site was controlled by the Cumans, and became a center of Genoese commercial activity from on. Briefly held by the Second Bulgarian Empire in the early 14th century, by the middle of the century it was a Genoese colony. Sfântul Ioan cel Nou (Saint John the New), the patron saint of Moldavia, was martyred in the city in 1330 during a Tatar incursion. In 1391, Cetatea Albă was the last city on the right bank of the Dnister to be incorporated into the newly established Principality of Moldavia, and for the next century was its second major city, the major port and an important fortress. In 1420, the citadel was attacked for the first time by the Ottomans, but defended successfully by Moldavian Prince Alexander the Kind. In the 15th century, the port saw much commercial traffic as well as being frequently used for passenger traffic between central Europe and Constantinople. Among the travellers who passed through the town was John VIII Palaiologos. Following the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans in 1453, Sultan Mehmed II brought in colonists from Asprokastron to repopulate the city. In 1484, along with Kiliia, it was the last of the Black Sea ports to be conquered by the Ottomans. The Moldavian prince Stephen the Great was unable to aid in its defence, being under threat of a Polish invasion. The citadel surrendered when the Ottomans claimed to have reached an agreement with Prince Stephen, and promised safe passage to the inhabitants and their belongings; however, most of the city-dwellers were slaughtered. Later, attempts