Beslan

 city, district center

Beslan (Russian: Бесла́н; Ossetian: Беслӕн, Beslæn) is a town and the administrative center of Pravoberezhny District of the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania, Russia, located about 29 kilometers (18 mi) north of the republic's capital Vladikavkaz, close to the border with the Republic of Ingushetia. As of the 2010 Census, its population was 36,728, making it the third largest town in the republic behind Vladikavkaz and Mozdok.
Beslan was founded in 1847 by migrants from elsewhere in Ossetia and was unofficially called Beslanykau ("the settlement of Beslan") after a local lord, Beslan Tulatov. In official use, however, the town was known after Tulatov's surname as Tulatovo or Tulatovskoye. It was renamed Iriston (lit. Ossetia) in 1941. From 1942 to 1943 the Germans tried to take Beslan, on the Adyghea-Beslan-Mozdok line. In 1950, when the town was rapidly industrialising, it was renamed Beslan.