Muscovite campaign across the Urals against Pelym and Yugra
A boat-borne force under the voivodes Fyodor Kurbsky-Cherny and Ivan Saltyk-Travin crossed the Urals, defeated the Vogul prince Asyka at Pelym and sailed down the Tavda, the Irtysh and the Ob — the first reliably documented campaign of a Muscovite army into Western Siberia.
- Date
- 9 May – 1 October 1483exact date · duration: ≈ 5 monthsDate in the Julian calendar
- Place
- Pelym fortapproximate locationtoday: Pelym, Sverdlovsk Oblast, Russia · Central and Northern Asia
- Route
- Ustyug → Vychegda River → Cherdyn (Great Perm) → Portage across the Ural Mountains → Pelym fort → Tavda River → Irtysh at the mouth of the Tobol → Ob at the Irtysh confluence
- Participants
- Fyodor Semyonovich Kurbsky-Cherny, Ivan Ivanovich Saltyk Travin, Ivan III, Grand Duchy of Moscow
- Threads
- Muscovy, Asia and Africa in the 15th and 16th centuries
- Also known as
- Первый сибирский поход; Югорский поход 1483 года
The campaign was prompted by Vogul (Mansi) raids on Great Perm. The force, made up of deti boyarskie (minor service gentry), men of Ustyug and Vologda and other northerners, left Ustyug on 9 May 1483, followed the northern rivers to the Urals and hauled its boats across the mountains. On 29 July, near the Pelym fort, the voivodes defeated the army of Prince Asyka; they then sailed down the Tavda past Tyumen into the Siberian land and from there along the Irtysh to the Ob, where they captured the Yugra prince Moldan. On 1 October, the feast of the Intercession, the force returned to Ustyug, having covered about 4,500 km.
In the spring of 1484 the princes of Yugra acknowledged their dependence on Moscow and undertook to pay tribute, and Ivan III added the Yugra land to his title. Western Siberia became firmly part of Russia only a century later, after Yermak’s campaign and the founding of the first Siberian towns. The route shown is approximate.
Connections
Related events
- Muscovite–Novgorodian War (1477–1478)9 October 1477 – 15 January 1478 · Eastern EuropeYugra had long paid tribute to Novgorod; by subjugating Novgorod, Moscow inherited these claims as well
Same participants
- Great Stand on the Ugra River8 October – 11 November 1480 · Eastern Europevia Ivan III
- Construction of the Moscow Kremlin walls and towers1485–1495 · Eastern Europevia Ivan III
- Sudebnik of 1497September 1497 · Eastern Europevia Grand Duchy of Moscow
Meanwhile in the world
Other regions, within 5 years of this event
Western and Central Europe
- Battle of Bosworth Field22 August 1485
- Wars of the Roses22 May 1455 – between 1485 and 1487
Eastern Europe
- Great Stand on the Ugra River8 October – 11 November 1480
- Construction of the Kremlin’s Dormition Cathedral1475 – August 1479
- Construction of the Moscow Kremlin walls and towers1485–1495
Africa
- Founding of São Jorge da Mina (Elmina)January 1482
- Voyage of Bartolomeu Dias around the southern tip of Africabetween July and August 1487 – December 1488