The first half of the XVIIth century
The second half of the XVIIth century

The second half of the XVIIIth century

The first half of the XIXth century
The second half of the XIXth century

Beginning of the XXth century

Inscription on the drawing of the town Kuznetsk (from the book, beginning of the XVIIIth century)

At the beginning of the XVIIIth century the Altai Territory was situated outside Russian Federation. Here the Turkic-speaking tribes settled, who recognised the power of the hontaidgi. The exploration of the Upper Ob-side by russian peasants to the south from the Berd became possible only after the building fortifications there.

The first russian fortress in the Upper Ob-side was built in summer 1709. It was situated in the place, where the Bija and the Katun flow together, that's why it was called the Bikatun fortress. In a year this fortification was seized by Dgungarians, the garrison was occupied and all the buildings were burnt to the ground. The try to settle down in the new territory was a failure.

The annexation of the territory between the Ob and the Irtish is connected with the building of many russian fortresses along the right bank of the Irtish in the 1715-1720-s, and along the right bank of the Ob in 1716-1718-s. The building of russian fortifications led to the fact the servants of the Dgungarian Khan had to go from the Ob to the South to the Altai Mountains in 1718.

Under cover of garrisons the peasant exploration of the devastated territory began, and during the first quarter of the XVIIIth century exceptionally the right bank of the Ob was occupied - mainly the basin of the Chumish. The left-bank Ob-side in the 1720-s stayed uninhabited, where only hunter's huts were to find there.

Since 1718 the co-operative assotiation of workmen began to penetrate to foothills of Altai, and they hunted and looted the ancient burials. Among the members of the expeditions the first miners came. In basins of the Aleji, the Charish and the Uba they found many "Chudskoi mines" - mine working-out, left by the ancients, which were called by Russians "Chud".

In the middle of the 1720-s the Ural factory-owner Akinfij Demidov got the information about the deposits of the iron-ore in Altai. In February 1726 The State Berg-Collegium alllowed Demidov to start the mining and the copper business. In September 1729 the Kolivan-Voskresensk copper smelting works were started up, and all Demidov's mining industry in the south of West Siberia was named after it Demidov's Mining Department

In the 1743-1744-s Demidov's workers managed to smelt the first silver, the works- owner reported about it to the Empres Elisabeth. At the end of Mai-June 1744 the empress was given the ore, containing gold, from the Zmejeva ("Snake") Mountain. To investigate the remote mining region and to determine silver-ore reserves and the possibilities of building there state works, and also to examine the information about the gold-ore the special commission was sent to the Kolivan-Voskresensk works with A.V. Baer at its head. Succesful results of the activity of the commission, Demidov's death in 1745, and the quarrel among his sons concerning their inheritance pre-determined the destiny of Altai works. On Elisabeth's edict of the 1st Mai 1747 the Kolivan-Voskresensk works with all the buildings, materials and people were taken in state property. Soon the Kolivan-Voskresensk Mining Office under the power of the Tsar Cabinet was established to control the works.

In the 1747-1748-s the territory, which was under the command of the Kolivan-Voskresensk Mining Office, was broadened considerably trough the attaching of new peasants, who lived in Tomsk and Kuznetsk villages. It should be noticed that up to the end of the 1770-s the Kolivan-Voskresensk Mining Office wasn't a part of the national administrative-territorial division of Russia. The inhabitants under the command of the Mining Administration lived in other districts of the Siberian region. It should be accentuated that to the middle of the XVIIIth century the power of mining authorities didn't spread on the whole territory.