Gari

Gari's Russian settlement grew from the search for arable land to supply Pelym. Marshes and a severe climate limited grain production around that northern fortress, encouraging officials to investigate more promising ground. In September 1622 the Pelym governor Pyotr Nikitin sent the clerk Putila Stepanov and companions to inspect the Gari tract, assess its soil and determine how many peasants could be settled on crown ploughland.

Ten peasants were placed in the new settlement in 1623. The following year an order from Tobolsk called for twenty more, showing the importance attached to expanding cultivation. The settlement occupied the right bank of the Sosva and became known as Garinskaya sloboda. Its beginnings therefore belonged to a practical attempt to support the Russian administrative frontier with grain. Survey, peasant resettlement and crown agriculture connected this wooded river country with Pelym, while the small recorded population indicates the limited scale on which the undertaking began.