Geological explorations in the arctic zone of the European northeast of Russia in the XVII century

In the Moscow Kingdom in the XVII century, a lot of work was carried out to search for ore and non-metallic minerals. Such searches also took place in the Arctic zone of the European Northeast of Russia - in the Bolshezemelskaya and Malozemelskaya tundras and adjacent forest areas, as well as on the islands of the Arctic Ocean which were part of the Pustozersky Uyezd (Novaya Zemlya, Vaigach and other islands). The paper describes 14 expeditions carried out in the 1620s-1680s, that surveyed the vast territories of the Arctic zone and studied in detail the Tsilma river basin in search of significant deposits of copper ores. During the expeditions, the places of occurrence of minor deposits of copper and silver ores, as well as deposits of mica and rock crystal, were discovered.