Merkury Vagin (

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

: ''Меркурий Вагин'') (died 1712) was a Russian Arctic explorer. In 1712, together with

Yakov Permyakov Yakov Permyakov (; died 1712) was a Russian seafarer, explorer, merchant, and Cossack. In 1710, while sailing from the Lena River to the Kolyma River, Permyakov observed the silhouette of two unknown island groups in the sea. Those islands would ...

, Vagin explored the region of the eastern

Laptev Sea The Laptev Sea () is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is located between the northern coast of Siberia, the Taimyr Peninsula, Severnaya Zemlya, and the New Siberian Islands. Its northern boundary passes from the Arctic Cape to a point with ...

coast. His exploration included Bolshoy Lyakhovsky Island, the southernmost of the New Siberian Archipelago. With a group of

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 ...

they crossed the Yana Bay over the ice from the mouth of the

Yana River The Yana ( rus, Я́на, p=ˈjanə; ) is a river in Sakha in Russia, located between the Lena to the west and the Indigirka to the east. Course It is long, and its drainage basin covers . Including its longest source river, the Sartang, i ...

; after reaching Bolshoy Lyakhovsky, they explored the then-unknown island, which had been reported by Permyakov two years earlier. Vagin and Permyakov were murdered on the return voyage by mutineering expedition members. The Cossacks took their dead bodies down to the ice and set them on fire. No one knows what the rebellious Cossacks did with the ashes, but Merkury Vagin's remains were never found.Н. Исанин. ''Морской энциклопедический справочник,'' Том 2. Ленинград 1986, стр. 76. Merkuriya Island was later named after him.

References

1712 deaths Russian murder victims Explorers from the Tsardom of Russia Explorers of Asia Explorers of the Arctic New Siberian Islands Laptev Sea Year of birth unknown Russian Cossacks {{explorer-stub