Environment and Russian Colonization of the Kazan Khanate''s Territories (1552-1700)
The article contains a brief analysis of the process of Russian colonization of the territories of the Kazan Khanate using environmental history approach. It is shown that environment influenced on the development of new territories from the moment of planning the military invasion: the establishment of control over the natural resources of the region was an important motive of Ivan the Terrible's Kazan campaigns. The consequence of colonization was the active plowing of previously sparsely populated lands, transformation of natural landscapes into agricultural and considerable impoverishment of hydrosphere.