The CUP was first established as the Committee of the Ottoman Union (Ottoman Turkish: "İttihad-ı Osmanî Cemiyeti") in Constantinople (now Istanbul) on 6 February 1889 by a group of medical students of the Imperial Military School of Medicine. Between 1906 and 1908 it was known as the Committee of Progress and Union (CPU) (), but changed its name back to the more recognizable Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) during the Young Turk Revolution.