Artillery armament of Umrevinsky ostrog

One of the key factors that determined successful development of the territory of Siberia and the Far East at the end of the 16-18th centuries was use of fire weapons by the Russian service class people. One of the most important types of fire weapons was artillery. There is an impressive set of written sources depicting the Russian artillery in Siberia but the archeological findings are very few. The article reviews the discovered cannon balls and thoroughly analyzes objects found in the vicinity of the Umrevinsky Ostrog, including a treasury of cannon balls. The authors conclude that the Siberian fortresses were armed with outdated artillery weapons with calibers not standardized according to the norms of the 17-18th centuries, which is regarded as a norm for the European military arts on the whole. The analysis of the cannon balls collection found in the vicinity of the Umrevinsky Ostrog allowed significantly specifying the history of the fortress and revealing the facts of military action in the first half of the 18th century, that was not reflected in the known written sources.