The city was founded around the VI-VII centuries. According to legend, the town was called Khminychi and was the center of one of the Drevlians tribes, the Minskians.
The first written mention as a village of Zhitomirsky Uyezd, Kyiv Voivodeship of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania dates back to March 26, 1499. For sixty-five years it belonged to the Chornobyl Kmyts, a well-known and influential family of Right-bank Ukraine. Since 1565, after it was sold by Filon Kmita,[2] the town became the property of the Olizar family,[3] who later received the title of counts.
In July 1768, Ivan Bondarenko's Cossacks visited the town.[4]
In 1779, Magdeburg rights and a coat of arms were granted with the image of the family emblem of the Olizar Counts: a golden church flag with a cross on a red background (noble coat of arms "Radvan"). After the second partition of Poland in 1793, Korostyshiv became part of the Russian Empire. In 1795, the town became part of the Radomyslsky Uyezd of the Volhynian Governorate, and in 1797 it was transferred to the Kyiv Governorate, which it remained part of for more than 120 years. The Olizar family remained the owners of Korostyshev until 1873. Most of the lands of the manor were forests.
According to the 1897 census, 7,863 residents lived in the city.
Korostyshev native Leebe Shaikovich, whose name would be modified to Louis Sakowitz when he emigrated to the United States in 1886, founded the high-fashion department store chain Sakowitz, based in Houston, Texas, U.S..[5]
On Oct 9, 1900 Henry de La Vaulx (1870–1930 and a companion set a distance record in a balloon traveling 1200 miles from Vincennes to Korostyshiv. in 35.75 hours
