Prehistory horse trappings, southern Siberia, 280–180 BC.
Hermitage Museum. Siberia in
Paleozoic times formed the continent of
Siberia/Angaraland, which fused to
Euramerica during the Late
Carboniferous, as part of the formation of
Pangea. The
Siberian Traps were formed by one of the largest-known volcanic events of the last 251 million years of
Earth's geological history. Their activity continued for a million years, and some scientists consider it a possible cause of the "
Great Dying" about 250 million years ago, estimated to have killed 90% of species existing at the time. The region has paleontological significance, as it contains bodies of prehistoric animals from the
Pleistocene Epoch, preserved in ice or
permafrost. Specimens of
Goldfuss cave lion cubs,
Yuka the mammoth and another woolly mammoth from
Oymyakon, a
woolly rhinoceros from the
Kolyma, and bison and horses from
Yukagir have been found. Remote
Wrangel Island and the
Taymyr Peninsula are believed to have been the last places on Earth to support woolly mammoths as isolated populations until their extinction around 2000 BC. At least three species of humans lived in southern Siberia around 40,000 years ago:
H. sapiens,
H. neanderthalensis, and the
Denisovans. In 2010, DNA evidence identified the last as a separate species. Late Paleolithic southern Siberians appear to be related to Paleolithic Europeans and the Paleolithic
Jōmon people of Japan. DNA analysis has revealed that the oldest fossil known to carry the derived KITLG allele, which is responsible for
blond hair in modern Europeans, is a 17,000 year old
Ancient North Eurasian specimen from Siberia. Ancient North Eurasian populations genetically similar to
Mal'ta–Buret' culture and
Afontova Gora were an important genetic contributor to Native Americans, Europeans, Ancient Central Asians, South Asians, and some East Asian groups (such as the
Ainu people). Evidence from full genomic studies suggests that the first people in the Americas diverged from
Ancient East Asians about 36,000 years ago and expanded northwards into Siberia, where they encountered and interacted with Ancient North Eurasians, giving rise to both
Paleosiberian peoples and
Ancient Native Americans, which later migrated towards the
Beringian region, became isolated from other populations, and subsequently populated the Americas.
Early history , one of many
Indigenous peoples of Siberia. Representation of a Chukchi family by
Louis Choris (1816) During past millennia, different groups of
nomads – such as the
Enets, the
Nenets, the
Huns, the
Xiongnu, the
Scythians, and the
Yugur – inhabited various parts of Siberia. The
Afanasievo and
Tashtyk cultures of the
Yenisey valley and Altay Mountains are associated with the
Indo-European migrations across Eurasia. The proto-Mongol
Khitan people, whose territory spanned a vast area, were also attested in the
Ob region of western Siberia in the sixteenth century. In the 13th century, during the period of the
Mongol Empire, the Mongols conquered a large part of this area. With the breakup of the
Golden Horde, the autonomous
Khanate of Sibir was formed in the late-15th century. Turkic-speaking
Yakut migrated north from the
Lake Baikal region under pressure from the Mongol tribes from the 13th to 15th centuries. Siberia remained a sparsely populated area. Historian
John F. Richards writes: "it is doubtful that the total early modern Siberian population exceeded 300,000 persons".
Early Russian exploration The first mention of Siberia in chronicles is recorded in 1032. The city-state of
Novgorod established two trade routes to the
Ob River, and laid claim to the lands the Russians called
Yugra. The Russians were attracted by
its furs in particular. Novgorod launched military campaigns to extract tribute from the local population but often met resistance, such as two campaigns in 1187 and 1193 mentioned in chronicles that were defeated. After Novgorod was annexed by
Moscow, the newly emerging centralized Russian state also laid claim to the region, with
Ivan III of Russia sending
expeditionary forces to Siberia in 1483 and 1499–1500. The Russians received tribute, but contact with the tribes ceased after they left. The growing power of the
Tsardom of Russia began to undermine the Siberian Khanate in the 16th century. First, groups of traders and
Cossacks began to enter the area. The Russian army was directed to establish forts farther and farther east to protect new Russian settlers who migrated from Europe. Towns such as
Mangazeya,
Tara,
Yeniseysk, and
Tobolsk developed, the last becoming the
de facto capital of Siberia from 1590. At this time,
Sibir was the name of a fortress at
Qashliq, near Tobolsk.
Gerardus Mercator, in a map published in 1595, marks
Sibier both as the name of a settlement and of the surrounding territory along a left tributary of the Ob. Other sources contend that the
Sibe, an indigenous
Tungusic people, offered fierce resistance to Russian expansion beyond the Urals. Some suggest that the term "Siberia" is a
Russified version of their ethnonym. Siberia became one of the destinations for sending internal exiles. Exile was the main Russian punitive practice with more than 800,000 people exiled during the 19th century. The first great modern change in Siberia was the
Trans-Siberian Railway, constructed during 1891–1916. It linked Siberia more closely to the rapidly industrialising Russia of
Nicholas II. Around seven million Russians moved to Siberia from Europe between 1801 and 1914. Between 1859 and 1917, more than half a million people migrated to the Russian Far East. Siberia has extensive natural resources: during the 20th century, large-scale exploitation of these took place, and industrial towns cropped up throughout the region. At 7:15 a.m. on 30 June 1908, the
Tunguska event felled millions of trees near the
Podkamennaya Tunguska River (Stony Tunguska River) in central Siberia. Most scientists believe this resulted from the
air burst of a meteor or comet. Even though no crater has ever been found, the landscape in the (sparsely inhabited) area still bears the scars of this event.
Soviet Union In the early decades of the
Soviet Union (especially in the 1930s and 1940s), the government used the
Gulag state agency to administer a system of penal
labour camps, replacing the previous
katorga system. According to semi-official Soviet estimates, which did not become public until after the
fall of the Soviet government in 1991, from 1929 to 1953 more than 14 million people passed through these camps and prisons, many of them in Siberia. Another seven to eight million people were
internally deported to remote areas of the Soviet Union (including entire nationalities or ethnicities in several cases). Half a million (516,841) prisoners died in camps from 1941 to 1943 during
World War II. At other periods, mortality was comparatively lower. The size, scope, and scale of the Gulag slave-labour camps remain subjects of much research and debate. Many Gulag camps operated in extremely remote areas of northeastern Siberia. The best-known clusters included
Sevvostlag (
the North-East Camps) along the
Kolyma and
Norillag near
Norilsk, where 69,000 prisoners lived in 1952. Major industrial cities of northern Siberia, such as Norilsk and
Magadan, developed from camps built by prisoners and run by former prisoners.
Russian Federation After the
Soviet collapse in 1991, Siberia faced severe economic decline during
Russia's transition to a
market economy, characterized by
hyperinflation, industrial collapse, and resource privatization. While the idea of a Siberian Republic for more regional autonomy was discussed and a Siberian Agreement was formed in the 1990s, the region remained consolidated under Russian federal authority. Economic shifts led to increased resource-based specialization and a decline in the population, particularly in the Russian Arctic, as the previous focus on industrial settlements was largely abandoned. On 2 December 2019, the '
Power of Siberia' gas pipeline started functioning. The project was started in 2014 to supply
natural gas from Siberia to
China. family in
Novosibirsk, after 2000 ==Geography==