Amga (; , ''Amma'') is a rural locality (a '' selo'') and the

administrative center An administrative centre is a seat of regional administration or local government, or a county town, or the place where the central administration of a commune, is located. In countries with French as the administrative language, such as Belgiu ...

Amginsky District Amginsky District (; , ''Amma uluuha'') is an administrativeConstitution of the Sakha Republic, Article 45 and municipalLaw #172-Z #351-III district (raion, or ''ulus''), one of the thirty-four in the Sakha Republic, Russia. It is located in ...

of the

Sakha Republic Sakha, officially the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), is a republics of Russia, republic of Russia, and the largest federal subject of Russia by area. It is located in the Russian Far East, along the Arctic Ocean, with a population of one million ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

.''Registry of the Administrative-Territorial Divisions of the Sakha Republic'' It also the only inhabited locality and the administrative center of Amginsky Rural Okrug within Amginsky District. Population:

Etymology

The name ''Amga'' is derived from an Evenk word meaning ''gorge'' or ''ravine''.

Geography

Amga is located on the

Amga River The Amga (; , ''Amma'') is a river in Sakha (Yakutia), Russia. The length of the river is . The area of its basin is . The Amga freezes up in the first half of October and stays under the ice until May. Many different kinds of fish can be found ...

, a right tributary of the Aldan, part of the Lena basin. The

Notora The Notora (; ) is a river in Yakutia (Sakha Republic), Russia, a left tributary of the Aldan, part of the Lena basin. It has a length of and a drainage basin area of . There is a bridge of the Yakutsk — Amga — Ust-Maya highway across th ...

has its sources nearby.

History

It was first founded by the

Cossacks The Cossacks are a predominantly East Slavic languages, East Slavic Eastern Christian people originating in the Pontic–Caspian steppe of eastern Ukraine and southern Russia. Cossacks played an important role in defending the southern borde ...

in 1652 as the '' ostrog'' (fortress) of Amga-Sloboda (). The first church was built in 1680, but it burned down later and was subsequently rebuilt a number of times. Agriculture has been conducted in the area since 1695; it was the first place in Yakutia used for growing crops. Amga was a place of political exile in the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

, with the most famous exile being Vladimir Korolenko, who was exiled here for six years in 1879. It was also the site for fighting during the

Russian Civil War The Russian Civil War () was a multi-party civil war in the former Russian Empire sparked by the 1917 overthrowing of the Russian Provisional Government in the October Revolution, as many factions vied to determine Russia's political future. I ...

. Somewhere in the area was the old river crossing of Amginsk.James R Gibson,"Feeding the Russian Fur Trade",1969 From about 1750 to 1850, a horse track led northwest to

Yakutsk Yakutsk ( ) is the capital and largest city of Sakha, Russia, located about south of the Arctic Circle. Fueled by the mining industry, Yakutsk has become one of Russia's most rapidly growing regional cities, with a population of 355,443 at the ...

. Across the river, one route led south to

Uda Bay Uda Bay (; ''Udskaya Guba'') is a bay in Khabarovsk Krai, Russian Federation. Geography Uda Bay is located in the northwestern Sea of Okhotsk. It lies just west of the Shantar Islands. The Uda River flows into it. It is entered between Cape ...

and the other went southeast to

Ust-Maya Ust-Maya (; , ''Uus Maaya'') is an urban locality (an urban-type settlement) and the administrative center of Ust-Maysky District of the Sakha Republic, Russia, southeast of Yakutsk, the capital of the republic. As of the 2010 Census, its pop ...

and from there south to Ayan. From perhaps 1662, there were a few Russian peasants in the area, but agriculture was usually unsuccessful. In 1737,

Stepan Krasheninnikov Stepan Petrovich Krasheninnikov (; – ) was a Russian explorer of Siberia, naturalist and geographer who gave the first full description of Kamchatka in the early 18th century. He was elected to the Russian Academy of Sciences in 1745. The Kra ...

noted that they had abandoned agriculture and were distinguishable from their Yakut neighbors only in religion.

Climate

Amga has an extreme subarctic climate (Köppen ''Dfd'')

References

Notes

Sources

*Official website of the Sakha Republic. ''Registry of the Administrative-Territorial Divisions of the Sakha Republic''
Amginsky District
. * {{Authority control Rural localities in Amginsky District