Alatyr

Alatyr (Chuvash. Ulatar) is a city in Russia, the administrative center of the Alatyr district of Chuvashia, republican subordination. The population of 45.8 thousand people (2002), of which 87.3% - Russians, 7.2% - Mordovians, 4.1% - Chuvash, 1.3% - other nationalities. The territory of the city is 41.7 km2. The city is located in the Middle Volga region, on the left bank of the Sura River, at the confluence of the Alatyr tributary, 185 km south of the capital of the republic, the city of Cheboksary.

Distance to other major cities: Saransk - 147 km, Ulyanovsk - 160 km.

The railway Kazan - Kanash - Penza passes through the city. The Alatyr-Yadrin highway connects the city with the M7 Volga motorway Moscow - Nizhny Novgorod - Kazan. In addition, the road Nizhny Novgorod - Ulyanovsk passes through the city, which provides reliable communication with all regions of the Volga region.

The city was founded in 1552 by Ivan the Terrible, but the settlement on this place appeared much earlier, as evidenced by the finds of archaeologists. Alatyr is a natural and historical center of one of the most interesting "provinces" of Russia. He draws under his care the Alyatyr district of Chuvashia, the neighboring districts of the Nizhny Novgorod and Ulyanovsk regions, Mordovia.

In addition, the city traditionally focuses on the region of Lower Posuriye. So, when you go from Alatyr directly to Kanash, through the forests stretching to Ibres, rare in this republic with the lowest degree of agricultural development, you understand that the road is worse only in Kazakhstan, and the wilderness is only in the regime zones of Mordovia. This, by the way, indicates the isolation of the Alatyr area from the main territory of Chuvashia. At the same time, in Sumerlu, a good road is laid along the Surah. The main Chuvashia city is connected through Chuvash Posuriye, through Yadrin and Sumerlya, which in turn are tied to Nizhny Novgorod.

The mention of Alatyr in a row with other cities allowed historians to suggest that by that time the city already existed. In particular, F. A. Polunin’s “Geographical Lexicon” contains information indicating that Alatyr was founded in the XIII century, during the reign of Yuri Vsevolodovich Vladimirsky as a prison on the site of the Mordovian village, which in the XVI century was transferred by John IV to a new, more convenient place for the fortress [2]. Disagreements among historians are caused by the fact that in reality the Russian army led by the tsar passed through the territory of the present city. Thus, one of the researchers of the history of Prisurya V.M. Shishkin, believes that Alatyr could have been founded by John Vasilyevich during not the last, but also the 1st Kazan campaign (that is, in 1547-1548) [3] Unconditional and indisputable is the fact that the settlement on the site of the modern city existed long before it was mentioned in Russian chronicles. This is confirmed by the found remains of an ancient settlement (presumably belonging to one of the Mordovian tribes), and archaeological finds (including the X-XII centuries), and the name of the Erzyan settlement of Sandulei preserved in the toponymy of Alatyr (Erz. - Sanglei, "Fork of the River"). Anyway, no later than 1552 (according to V. E. Krasovsky - August 4, 1552 [4]), Tsar John Vasilyevich approached with his army to the high bank of the Sura at the confluence of the Alatyr River and "ordered immediately with him" to build a chopped city and strengthen it according to all the rules of the then serf art, calling it by the name of the river - "Alatyr" [4]. It was from this time that the history of the city of Alatyr began as a Russian military, cultural and religious outpost on the eastern borders of the Moscow state. Together with Yadrin, Vasilsursky and Kurmysh (currently a settlement on the other side of the Sura, in the Nizhny Novgorod region, approximately between Yadrin and Sumerly), these prisons became conductors of the military-administrative influence of Nizhny Novgorod - the hand of the young Russian state, facing east, to the lands of the "mountain cheremis". Mountain cheremis, that is, local Chuvash and right-bank Mari, in turn, a year before the capture of Kazan were taken "under the arm" of John Vasilyevich, and this, according to historians, decided the fate of the Kazan Khanate. So, the 450th anniversary of Chuvashia joining Russia in June 2001, the 450th anniversary of Alatyr in 2002 and the 450th anniversary of the capture of Kazan are closely connected. Alatyr. Simbirsk street.

After the Russian Simbirsk, based on the site of the Bulgarian St. Petersburg (in Chuvash, the city is still called "Chěmpěr"), became a major administrative center, the Mountain side (almost the territory of modern Chuvashia), "hung" between Nizhny and Kazan, was "stretched" between the tops of the triangle - Simbirsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Kazan. Its southern districts, as well as the south of the lower Posuriye with Alatyr (that is, the southern part of the Alatyr province), transmitted from Kazan to the Lower and back, in 1780 went to the Simbirsk governorate (then the province). In the same year, Alatyr became a city. Simbirsk, by the way, was oriented in the XIX century and most of Chuvashia, at least culturally (the influence of N. Novgorod did not go further than Yadrin, and Kazan was the center of Tatar and Islamic). The national Chuvash intelligentsia has grown up in Simbirsk, therefore, this city is the birthplace of the modern Chuvash national consciousness. In this regard, Alatyr - the city of two monasteries, a large mission center (oriented to the Chuvash and Mordovian), became a cultural outpost of Simbirsk. The Soviet government made its own adjustments to the situation: for the young national autonomies, their own political, economic and cultural centers were “cultivated”.

Thus arose Cheboksary and Saransk. Accordingly, the triple periphery, which included the entire present Chuvashia, half of Mordovia, the southeast of Nizhny Novgorod and the northwest of the Ulyanovsk regions ceased to exist. The relic of this territory is the common periphery of four cities (N. Novgorod, Cheboksar, Ulyanovsk, Saransk) with the center in Alatyr, the place of intersection of different economic zones of influence, historical, cultural regions and national areas. From here to Saransk 145 km, to Ulyanovsk 160 km, to Cheboksar 185 km. The administrative-territorial survey conducted in the 1920s led to the elimination of such peripheral territories. Parts of the Alatyr district, with which the city still has close ties, were transferred to Nizhny Novgorod, Saransk and Ulyanovsk, and Alatyr itself - a Russian city on the Mordovian lands (many Russians here - an assimilated Mordovian) - after some hesitation was transferred to Chuvashia.