56°46′18″N103°47′10″E / 56.77167°N 103.78611°E /56.77167; 103.78611
Ilimsk (Russian:Илимск) was a small town in Siberia, within today'sIrkutsk Oblast of Russia. The town was flooded by theUst-Ilimsk Reservoir in the mid-1970s.
Ilimsk was founded in 1630 on theIlim River, a tributary of theAngara River, asIlimsky Ostrog (i.e., "Fort Ilim"). From here a portage ran east to theKuta River which joins theLena River atUst-Kut, thereby allowing travel from theYenisei River basin to that of theLena River. In early times the Ilimsk Uyezd was one of the few grain-producing areas in Siberia. Around 1700 there were 280 settlements, including sevenostrogs. In 1745 there were 7,605 peasants. Much of the grain was shipped down the Lena to feed theOkhotsk Coast and other areas in eastern Siberia. Grain production shifted south as the area around Irkutsk became more settled. From 1764 to 1775 the town was the administrative center of a district (okrug) and had population of around 700 by the end of the 19th century.[1]
Alexander Radishchev was exiled to Ilimsk between 1792 and 1796. His wife had died, and her sister joined Radishchev in Ilimsk, bringing his younger children with her. Radishchev later married her, while still in Ilimsk.
After theOctober Revolution of 1917, Ilimsk became a village (selo). In the mid 1970s, after the construction of theUst-Ilimsk Dam (Russian:Усть-Илимская ГЭС) on the Angara atUst-Ilimsk (below the fall of the Ilim into the Angara), the site of the village was flooded by theUst-Ilimsk Reservoir.
Before the site was flooded, archaeological excavations were carried out in the village during 1967–75; the Spasskaya Tower and the Church of Our Lady of Kazan from the oldostrog (wooden fort) were taken apart and moved to theTaltsy Museum (Russian:Тальцы), an open-air museum of traditional architecture nearIrkutsk. In the early 2000s, an exact copy of another tower of the former Ilimskostrog and the southern wall of the fortress were built at the Taltsy site next to the buildings moved from Ilimsk, thus recreating a large portion of the historic fortified town within easy reach from Irkutsk.[2]
