Northwest Russia

It is bounded by Norway, Finland, the Arctic Ocean, the Ural Mountains and the east-flowing part of the Volga.

The western side was the main source of squirrel, for which there was a large demand during the Middle Ages.

[1] In northwestern Russia the Fennoscandian Ice Sheet reached its Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) extent 17 ka BP, five thousand years later than in Denmark, Germany and Western Poland.

Lobes originated as result of ice flow following shallow topographic depressions filled with soft sediment substrate.

These basins possibly canalized the Weschelian ice into streams that feed the lobes found further east and south.

[2] Highlands made up of hard bedrock like Valdai and Tikhvin had the opposite effect of diverting ice into basins.

[3] The three main lobes of the Fennoscandian Ice Sheet in Russia during the LGM followed the basins of Rybinsk and the rivers of Dvina, Vologda.

From the site of Saint Petersburg one route runs south to the Black Sea and a shorter one goes to the headwaters of the Volga.

From portages around the Lovat one could go west down the Western Dvina to Riga or east to the upper Volga River.

Today the entire route is canalized and the lower Sheksna is part of the Rybinsk Reservoir.

The Sukhona route and Veliky Ustyug: This route crosses the center along the Sukhona and Vychegda Rivers which join near Veliky Ustyug and links Novgorod to the Kama River and Kazan.

From the middle Pechora, up the Shchugor River, over either of two Ural passes and down the Northern Sosva to the Ob.

The Ves' lived east Lake Ladoga and were pushed toward the Dvina by the expansion of Novgorod after 1100.

[citation needed] Zavolochye (meaning "beyond the portage") is a geographic term referring to some of the area between Lake Onega and the lower Dvina.

Janet Martin, Treasure from the Land of Darkness: The Fur Trade and its Significance for Medieval Russia, 1986, which this article partly summarizes.