Lake Onega

Lake Onega is a vast freshwater expanse in the north, drained by the Svir toward Lake Ladoga and the Baltic. Its deeply indented northern shores shelter many islands, including Kizhi, while rock carvings on the eastern shore depict boats, people and animals from the fourth to second millennia before Christ. The Murom monastery was founded on the eastern shore in 1350. In 1703 Peter I founded an ironworks at Petrozavodsk on the western shore, beginning a new centre of production beside the lake.