Good mood to you, dear readers of our blog.
This year I have had to revise my conclusions again and again about where people tried to settle in our area in the 17th century. Ah, it was like this. I once met a comrade at a store; the comrade used to live with his wife in a neighboring village. Well, just like in the village, there are five residential buildings left. So they separated after the divorce, the comrade moved to our village, and his wife moved to her parents in the city. So, word for word, we started talking about the cop and the comrade tells me that in the field behind his garden, he and his wife found a place where they dug up about fifty crosses and rings. I asked about ceramics, the comrade answered me that there were at least pots of broken shards, re-glued, and forged nails, and most importantly, all the scales of Ivan the Terrible.
“Oh, this is interesting,” I thought and, at the first opportunity, I went to the place. Do you know what I saw there? The field dried up after the snow melted, and only the place where the village once stood was not just a slurry of mud, but also partially covered by a large puddle. I don't know why this is so. Well, I really don’t understand. After all, literally 50 meters from the core of the former settlement, there is a high hillock, where the soil has exactly the same composition and, as in that advertisement, the main thing is dry. This is not the first or even the second time in my practice when I find settlements from the Tsarist period and they stand in places where it is impossible to pass until mid-May. Don't know. Maybe at that time these were not fields, but dense forests, and therefore the distribution of moisture in the soil was different. I don’t know, but there is this fact.
That is why I began to review the maps to see where I had previously been in reconnaissance and where, for reasonable reasons at that time, I had not reached.
There is one interesting place; I have already gone that way twice. All around are swamps, swamps and water meadows, and in the middle there is a large hill. So, this winter, once again sitting behind the monitor, looking for maps until my eyes turned red, I saw one interesting detail. On the PGM one village is depicted right in the center of this very swamp. Previously, I thought that this was not real, that most likely there was an error in the map. Well, now I’m thinking, maybe there’s something there? You need to get out to the place and look around. After all, that’s what all my competitors think, too. I have to go, maybe I’ll find a clue there.
I reached the edge of the swamp. The swamp itself was drained back in the 70s, but this turned out to be unpromising. So, they dug a ditch along the riverbed, made a grid of smaller ditches and reported on the reclamation work carried out according to the statistics of the USSR General Plan.
I went out onto the road that runs along the main ditch. If you believe the map, then there is only a kilometer to the desired point. What is a kilometer for a seasoned digger? Moreover, if in the end you can find an entire village from the times of the Russian Tsardom.
I walked, the smell of a rotting swamp was disgusting only at first, then I sort of sniffed it. The road was not comfortable for long; then obstacles began in the form of flooded places. It was clear that someone was trying to drive the Niva, but at the first puddle he turned around and drove back.
Okay, I'm going, the puddles are shallow, rubber boots are big enough. But I am constantly bothered by the marks that are clearly visible on the road track. I walk and think, such disturbing thoughts. “What if these are diggers who have already reached and knocked out the place I had planned??? Although maybe these are hunters???” The place here is interesting, with all kinds of living creatures in abundance. So while I was walking, I saw two herons, ducks, and even an otter dived with a splash of water.
But, I move on, here are more and more puddles overcome at the edge of the waterline of my boots. And here I am at the finish line. More precisely, the daughter that I put in the navigator was no more than a hundred meters. But reality turned out to be, as usual, more realistic than my plans. To reach the point it was necessary to somehow cross a large ditch. And now there are two meters deep, no less.
Well, what then? I got my bearings on the area and realized that I could only get through on the other side, right where I had once walked. Perhaps, maybe I can understand this only on the spot. Because the water is still standing in the meadows. And there’s a detour there, from the edge of the swamp, three kilometers away. But, oh well, maybe it’s worth it and after a couple of days I decided to repeat the trip, only entering from a different direction.
In the meantime, I returned to the car and went to dig in my favorite and well-known plowed field at the edge of the old village. Don't let your trip go to waste. I dug from the heart…
And, exploration of new places is an interesting business, here you need to rack your brains and cover kilometers with your feet. But, if the puzzle is solved and the puzzle is put together, then the reward will be worth it.
