[citation needed] However, adjacent to the new official locality, a certain Moldavian colony had already existed, which by the end of 18th century was an independent settlement known under the name of Moldavanka.
[1] The Romanians owned relatively small plots on which they built village style houses and cultivated vineyards and gardens.
Nearby were the military barracks and the country houses (dacha) of the city's wealthy residents, including that of the Duc de Richelieu, appointed by Czar Alexander I as Governor of Odesa in 1803.
Colonists of various ethnicities settled mainly in the area of former Romanian colony, outside of the official boundaries, and as a consequence, in the first third of the 19th century, Moldavanka emerged as the dominant settlement.
The neighborhood also is mentioned by the Russian jazz song containing the slight local accent and performed by Mark Bernes "Chalands, that filled with grey mullets".