Chalninsky Pochinok

Chalninsky Pochinok grew on the left bank of the Kama, among river meadows, lakes and wooded ground. Small streams, including the Chalna and Melekes, drew settlements towards the great river. Fishing, woodworking and the hauling of merchant boats gave the riverside inhabitants work beyond their fields. The pine woods along the Kama also supplied mast timber for shipbuilding at Kazan and Astrakhan, tying these villages to traffic far downstream.

In 1626, a group of peasants led by Fyodor Popov crossed the Kama from Yelabuga and settled here. Their small community was followed by other villages and farmsteads along the neighbouring streams. In 1650, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich ordered a fortified Cossack settlement at the mouth of the Chalna to guard against Kalmyk and Nogai raids. Around this crossing of waterways, peasant settlement and frontier defence advanced together, forming the nucleus of the riverside community known as Chelny.