How the USSR mastered the Arctic - the polar station "Mother's Ball". Which strait is the narrowest in Russia? Matochkin Shar Strait on the map

The overnight stop was used to meet with the ships of the Kara expedition, and in the morning we moved on. The strait was narrow: in wide places up to two kilometers, and in narrow places up to five hundred meters and a length of slightly less than one hundred kilometers.

Almost at the exit from it, on the left bank, masts and houses appeared with smoke from their chimneys, dogs and people at the weather booths. This was the same polar station called “Matochkin Shar”, the first weather radio station created on the island in Soviet times. Located beyond 73 degrees north latitude, it was for a long time the northernmost polar station in the world and held this primacy until the observatory was launched in Tikhaya Bay on Franz Josef Land, which turned out to be beyond 80 degrees.

Observatory Matochkin Shar. Clouds. 1931

Among those who wintered at the Matochkin Shar station in the first year of its foundation (1923) was Irina Leonidovna. This woman was lucky to win the championship. Rusinova spent only one winter (1922-1923) on the mainland, and again found herself on Novaya Zemlya. And for the third time she wintered from September 1927 to August 1928, and her wintering place was again Malye Karmakuly.

The polar station "Matochkin Shar" first appeared on air in October 1923. Its discovery was dictated by the dire need to provide Kara expeditions with accurate data on the state of weather and ice. The station is located on the shore of the strait of the same name in the eastern part of the North Island, not far from the Kara Sea, which has long been called “a bag of ice.” And indeed it is. As soon as the north wind blows, a huge amount of ice accumulates in the sea. He has nowhere to go: the west is closed by the Novaya Zemlya islands, the east by the Severnaya Zemlya archipelago, and the mainland from the south.

Despite this, at the beginning of the 20th century, transport routes to the great rivers of Siberia - the Ob and Yenisei - were persistently laid through the Kara Sea. When the Kara Sea is clogged with ice, the two main straits connecting it with the Barents Sea - Yugorsky Shar and Kara Gate - are usually closed. And then there remains hope for the third strait - Matochkin Shar.

Strait Matochkin Shar

The narrowest strait in Russia is located in the Arctic Ocean, it separates the North and South islands of the Novaya Zemlya archipelago. The strait at its narrowest point is 600 meters wide. Its name is Matochkin Ball. The word “shar” in the language of the Pomors simply means “sea strait,” and the name Matochkin (from the word “uterus”) was allegedly given to the strait because these places are very rich in game animals, especially birds.

A storm was raging in the White Sea. It took six days to get to the Matochkin Shar Strait. “Malygin” carefully walked along the narrow strait until at the foot of the mountains they saw a high cross erected by Fyodor Rozmyslov, who in the 18th century was the first to compile a detailed description of the Matochkin Shar Strait. Here, at the mouth of the Nochuev Stream, where in 1768-1769 Mr. Rozmyslov spent the winter with his ship, it was decided to build a polar station.

Station "Matochkin Shar" 1912

First of all, they unloaded the railway: 150 meters of narrow gauge railway. And although there was no steam locomotive, only a trolley, how it helped them out during the construction of the station!

In a month and a half, they built not only a house with 15 rooms, but also a radio station, two storerooms, a bathhouse, pavilions, two sixty-meter wooden radio masts, and a weather site.

Matochkin Shar observatory building covered with snow

The station had a full staff: a chief, a meteorologist, a botanist, a geologist, a magnetologist, a radio operator, a cook, a doctor and an electrician.

Head of the Leskinen Observatory 1931

Icebreaking steamer "Sibiryakov"

The entire way from the Matochkin Shar polar station to the exit to the Kara Sea (about 12 kilometers) Irina Leonidovna stood on the deck of the Sibiryakov.

01.12.2015

The narrowest strait in Russia is located in the Arctic Ocean, it separates the North and South islands of the Novaya Zemlya archipelago. The strait at its narrowest point is 600 meters wide. Its name is Matochkin Ball. The word “shar” in the language of the Pomors simply means “sea strait,” and the name Matochkin (from the word “uterus”) was allegedly given to the strait because these places are very rich in game animals, especially birds.

From the Finno-Ugric “uterus” is translated as “path” or “direction”, this is what these peoples called the compass and in this sense the name of the strait warns that it is impossible to swim here without this device, it is dangerous to life. For most of the year, Matochkin Shar is covered with ice. It freezes on November 11 and opens only on July 10. When it is ice-free, you can walk through here, because the strait has an impressive depth (average 12 meters, maximum up to 120 meters).

The width of the strait is narrow in only one place, although sufficient for the passage of ships. In other places its width reaches 8 kilometers. However, now navigators know at what time and how to overcome this boundary, which many researchers have studied for a long time and heroically. This corner reminds us of the first Russian polar explorers and explorers, of lost expeditions and travelers.

The first reliable information about the strait was received from the helmsman, hereditary Pomor and original explorer Yakov Yakovlevich Chirakin in 1767, who, in a report to the governor of Arkhangelsk, reported that he passed through the strait between the islands of Novaya Zemlya several times and even plotted part of it on the plan. To “put the strait on the map,” an expedition of 14 people was equipped, including Ya.Ya. Chirakin, navigator Fedor Razmyslov, co-navigator Matvey Rubin and other participants.

During the winter on the coast of Novaya Zemlya, Ya.Ya Chirakin and several of his comrades died from illness or disappeared after going hunting. The expedition of Fyodor Razmyslov, with great difficulty and losses, accomplished a tremendous amount of work; it gave in detail the first descriptions of the strait, which remain accurate to this day. In addition to Y. Chirakin, the expedition lost Andrei Pospelov from Yemetsk, Epifan Popov from Ludsky Posad, Dementy Bernov from Nyukhcha, and Ivan Kazimerov.

In the 20th-21st centuries, all living things on the islands and strait regretted that man had once come here. In 1954, a testing site for Soviet nuclear weapons was opened on the archipelago. One of the three test sites was Matochkin Shar, where underwater tests of nuclear weapons were carried out. In total, 132 nuclear explosions were carried out on Novaya Zemlya until 1990, when a moratorium was declared, including a powerful hydrogen bomb.

This strait (also called Matshar) cuts through the mountainous region of the archipelago. Here the height of hanging glaciers reaches one kilometer.

From a military point of view, the strait is very interesting. The Kara Sea has always had a bad reputation among polar captains. Open in the north-eastern part, it is almost closed from the south-western part. As soon as the northeast winds blow, the Kara Sea immediately turns into an ice bag. The wind drove millions of tons of ice into it. And there is nowhere for this ice to escape. The path to the west is blocked by the “Russian Gibraltar”, and to the south by the mainland. And woe to the ships that get caught in this ice bag. Every experienced polar captain knows that it is easier and more convenient to get out of here through Matshar than, for example, through the Kara Gate. It was here, at the exit from the central Novaya Zemlya Strait, that the Soviet Arctic caravans had to wait for the German submarines.

During the First World War, the Admiral Headquarters of the Kaiserfleet did not plan in these waters for German submarines to hunt Russian ships or the transports of the Entente countries. In those days, it was assumed that the German crews would wait out bad weather here or wait for the arrival of the next convoy from the British Isles. It was for this purpose that a secret base was created in the strait. Whether it operated in 1917–1918, when the Russian North was included in the zone of unrestricted submarine warfare, has not yet been established. However, it is known that it was examined and, most likely, reactivated by the crew of the cruiser Komet, which in the summer of 1940 successfully sailed along the Northern Sea Route to the Pacific Ocean. After it “disappeared” from the sight of Soviet intelligence in the Pechora Sea, Hitler’s crew was engaged in hydrographic work and collecting driftwood off Kolguev Island - officially to reinforce the holds and sides (in case the ship’s hull was compressed by ice). In addition, they discovered large reserves of guano, an excellent nitrogen-phosphorus fertilizer, on Kolguev Island. In those days, the crew of the cruiser carried out several “comic” landings and checked the steepness of the Kolguev slopes. The senior captain on board the Comet, Captain Zur See von Eyssen, during his uncontrolled voyage near Novaya Zemlya, managed to visit the nameless strait between Novaya Zemlya and Franz Josef Land, as well as the western part of the Novaya Zemlya Strait, Matochkin Shar.

Regarding the role of the nameless strait, as was mentioned a little earlier, in Matshara the Nazis inspected the areas of the coast where the most accumulated driftwood, so necessary for the construction of future secret bases on the Arctic coast, including on the island of Mezhdusharsky, and checked the steepness of the shores of the Novaya Zemlya Strait. As a result of the exploration, a large amount of driftwood from Siberian rocks was identified, which was annually brought here by the current of the Kara Sea.

After receiving Soviet pilots on board, the Germans made their first attempt to enter the Western Arctic. But it turned out to be unsuccessful. The Komet managed to get through the ice only as far as Cape Golotechny, then it had to turn back.

But the main task of Eyssen's paratroopers was to reactivate the secret base of the Kaiser's fleet. This base was somewhat reminiscent of the base at the Polar Region.

This is how Colonel V., who visited there twice, described it already in the 1960s.

Under a powerful rocky canopy, protruding far above the strait, a log pier was built, secured to the rock with several metal cables for safety. A clearly visible path led to a small repair shop, where about two dozen spare MAC-type boat batteries with latex-separation housings were stored on a tarred wooden platform. At the foot of the site, in the water, a dozen more of the same batteries were visible. Next to the pier, in a special enclosure, there was a dynamo, which, most likely, once provided charging for submarine batteries. Apparently, it also powered the motors of a small workshop and two 6-liter compressors, and also provided lighting for the entire base. Our soldiers were convinced of the operability of the dynamo after some hesitation, fearing that turning it on could cause an explosion of the entire cave. However, there was no explosion, and the car hummed confidently. The dim “duty” light dispersed the twilight of the cave and revealed several more stone-lined enclosures. There was a 12-cylinder V-shaped diesel engine with 350–400 horsepower, similar to those that were common on German railways in the pre-war period, and small warehouses with diesel fuel and food were also installed.

At this point, Colonel V. always stopped his very interesting story. And only his son often remembered the unusual sweets in a capacious metal jar, which his father brought after one of his business trips. Even one such candy provided two or even three days of wakefulness for an adult who ate it.

Matochkin Ball

Matochkin Ball

strait between O. Northern and O. South Novaya Zemlya; Nenets Autonomous Okrug Pomor, term ball - "strait", Matochkin - along the flow into this strait R. Matochka, and its name can be traced back to Pomor, the name of the Novaya Zemlya Matka.

Geographical names of the world: Toponymic dictionary. - M: AST. Pospelov E.M. 2001.

Matochkin Ball

strait between the North and Yuzh. about you Novaya Zemlya. Named after it flows into the strait. R. Matochka (ball in Pomeranian - “strait”). Connects Barentsevo And Kara Sea. Length approx. 98 km, name. width 0.6 km, name. depth 12 m. The banks are high, steep in places. B.h. covered with ice for years.

Dictionary of modern geographical names. - Ekaterinburg: U-Factoria. Under the general editorship of academician. V. M. Kotlyakova. 2006 .

Matochkin Ball

the strait between the Northern and Southern islands of Novaya Zemlya, connecting the Barents Sea with the Kara Sea. Dl. OK. 98 km, smallest latitude. 0.6 km, shallowest depth. 12 m. The banks are high, steep in places. Most of the year it is covered with ice.

Geography. Modern illustrated encyclopedia. - M.: Rosman. Edited by prof. A. P. Gorkina. 2006 .

See what “Matochkin Ball” is in other dictionaries:

The strait between the North. and Yuzh. about you N. Earth. Connects the Barents and Kara seas. Length 98 km, smallest width approx. 0.6 km, minimum depth 12 m. Covered with ice most of the year... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

MATOCHKIN SHAR, the strait between the North and South of Novaya Zemlya. Connects the Barents and Kara seas. Length 98 km, smallest width approx. 0.6 km, minimum depth 12 m. B.h. covered with ice for years. Source: Encyclopedia Fatherland ... Russian history

Noun, number of synonyms: 2 polygon (10) strait (24) ASIS synonym dictionary. V.N. Trishin. 2013… Synonym dictionary

This term has other meanings, see Matochkin Ball (meanings). Coordinates: 73°15′ N. w. 55°00′ E. d. / 73.25° n. w. 55° E. d. ... Wikipedia

The strait between the North and South islands of Novaya Zemlya. Connects the Barents and Kara seas. Length 98 km, smallest width about 0.6 km, smallest depth 12 m. Covered with ice most of the year. * * * MATOCHKIN SHAR MATOCHKIN SHAR, strait between the North. And… … encyclopedic Dictionary

The strait between the North and South islands of Novaya Zemlya. Connects the Barents and Kara seas. The banks are high and steep in places. The length is about 100 km, the width (at the narrowest part) is about 0.6 km. Depth is about 12 m. Covered most of the year... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Matochkin Ball- Sp Mãtočkino sąsiauris Ap Matochkin Shar/Matochkin Shar L RF tarp N. Žemės salų … Pasaulio vietovardžiai. Internetinė duomenų bazė

Matochkin Ball- strait between o. Northern and about. South Novaya Zemlya; Nenets Autonomous Okrug Pomor, the term Shar Strait, Matochkin along the river flowing into this strait. Matochka, and its name can be traced back to Pomor, the name of the New Earth Matka... Toponymic dictionary

The strait separating the northern island of Novaya Zemlya from the southern one and connecting Severny with the Kara Sea. The strait, from Cape Stolbovoy to Cape Vykhodny, is long. 83 centuries, along the bends 95 centuries, the width of the western mouth is 7 centuries, and the eastern one, at Cape Bull, is 4 centuries;... ... Encyclopedic Dictionary F.A. Brockhaus and I.A. Ephron

Matochkin Ball- Matochkin Shar, a strait between the Northern and Southern islands of Novaya Zemlya. Connects the Barents and Kara seas. Length 98 km, smallest width about 0.6 km, smallest depth 12 m. Covered with ice most of the year... Dictionary "Geography of Russia"

Who closed the sea with gates when it
burst out, came out as if from the womb
Job 38:8

The term “ball” in Russian historical and geographical terminology is used to designate sea straits, which clearly contradicts the general idea of ​​a “ball” as a rounded geometric body. According to Wiktionary the term: “derives from an unspecified form; usually associated with Russian-church-slav. shar' "paint", shariti "to paint", sharchi "artist", which are probably early borrowings from Turkic."

* Linguistic forum. Public interest in the topic

Http://lingvoforum.net/index.php?topic=46059.0

From March 2012 to May 2015, a discussion on the topic “ball” was held at the Linguistic Forum, in which researchers and guest readers, a total of 8838 people, took part. The participants used the vocabulary of several dozen ancient languages, but they failed to explain the concept of “ball” (to connect graphics and reality), and the hydronym Matochkin Shar also surfaced, which could not be explained logically and linguistically.

The topic of this article is the hydronym Shar, using the hydronym Matochkin Shar as an example, we will try to explain it historically, logically and linguistically.

1) History of the development of the Matochkin Shar Strait and etymology

Matochkin Shar is a strait separating the Northern Island of Novaya Zemlya from the Southern Island and connecting the Barents Sea with the Kara Sea. Its length is about 100 km, its width at the narrowest part is about 600 m, its depth is 12 m, and it is covered with ice most of the year.

Until the 19th century, Novaya Zemlya was an uninhabited archipelago, near which Russian Pomors and Norwegians fished and hunted; there were no permanent settlements. The search for the North-Eastern passage to Siberia and China prompted a number of expeditions by the British and Dutch in the 16th century to the area of ​​Novaya Zemlya, the Barents (Icy) and Kara Seas; in addition to studying the sea route, they also looked for precious metals and areas rich in fur.

Most of these exploration and trading ventures ended in vain, with a significant portion of the ships' crews killed. Western sailors turned out to be unsuited to sailing in the northern latitudes, where Russian Pomors, at least since the 15th century, were engaged in routine work, fishing and catching sea animals on ships “made without nails” (according to foreigners).

A) Eastern literature

Anton Marsh (1584)

“Anton Marsh was a factor in the English trading company. His personality is partly known to us thanks to the cases and litigation that arose in the Moscow offices on the occasion of a number of trade speculations he undertook. ...Marsh, as can be seen from the documents relating to him ..., incurred a lot of debts (in the amount of 23,553 rubles), borrowing from private individuals, from Boris Godunov and even from the royal treasury; when the claims were brought for collection, the agents of the English company assured that Marsh had his own yard and that the company could not be responsible for his actions, taken entirely on his own initiative.”

* Extracted from a handwritten scroll (roll), written in Russian, a note about an expedition to the river. Ob, undertaken by Anton Marsh, the main factor of the English company (factor - trustee, commercial agent)
“If you want us to go to the mouth of the river. Ob sea, then we must pass by the islands of Vaygach, Novaya Zemlya, Matvey Land, i.e. Matthew's Land (comment 10) (Land of Matheoue that is, by Matthewes Land), and you can be convinced that it is not very difficult to travel from Vaigach Island to the mouth of the Ob. Written on Pechora, summer 7092, February twenty-first.”

“He also studied another route, to the northeast, through Novaya Zemlya (Noua Zembla) and Matyushin Shar (comment 14) (Mattuschan Yar) to the Ob.”

“From the Naromske Reca or Riuer River to Mattuschan Yar - six days of sailing. From Matyushina Shar to the warm transfer (Perouologli Teupla), i.e. before the warm passage by land - thirteen days of sailing among the sandy shoals.”

“Matyushin Shar is in some places forty miles wide, and in others no more than six.”

B) Comments on the text

10. Land of Matthew, i.e. Matveeva Land. Based on the testimony of the letter that Russian sailors, going to the Ob, pass by three islands - Novaya Zemlya, Vaygach and Matveev, Gamel (Op. cit., pp. 208-209) concluded that the name Novaya Zemlya belongs only to the southern island, and the northern one should be called Matveyeva Land.
The name Matvey also led him to another thought, that “Matochkin Ball” should be called truly Matyushkin, Matyushin, i.e. Matveev Shar.

On the map of I. Massa, “compiled no later than 1608, a strait called “Matsei of tsar” is marked to the north of Novaya Zemlya. “This means Matveev Shar and proves that the current name “Matochkin Shar” is incorrect. To the north of this strait (Matveeva Shara) solid land is shown...
This is the land that was called Matveyeva Land in a letter from Pustozersk dated February 21, 1584.” “Both this strait and the lands north of Novaya Zemlya must have been discovered by a certain Matvey, whose diminutive name was Matyusha; therefore, the land lying north of the strait, which, as we now know, forms an island, should also be called Matveeva.”

To all this, Gamel adds that Rozmyslov (navigator) was the first to change the name Matyushkin to Matochkin. K. Svenske spoke out against this opinion (Novaya Zemlya in geographical, natural history and industrial relations. St. Petersburg, 1866, pp. 46-47): “is there any possibility,” he notes, “that the industrialists who work Rozmyslov remained mostly unknown, suddenly they unanimously accepted the new name he invented, if they had actually called the strait Matyushkin or Matveev before?

These guesses hardly have any basis.” On Matveevo Island at the end of the 16th century. there was an outpost that collected duties from ships going to Siberia (A.A. Zhilinsky. The Far North of European Russia. Petr., 1919, p. 41, note).
14. Matyushin Shar. A winding strait, now called Matochkin Shar.

Above (s.v. Matveeva Land) Gamel’s opinion about the relationship between the names “Matveeva Land” and “Matochkin Shar” was indicated; it cannot be considered accepted: in the spelling of Mattuschan Yar we can see a simple distortion of the word Matochkin, moreover, it is the latter rather than the word Matyushin, since the double t interferes with the stress on the second syllable; in English pronunciation it sounds approximately "Matthewshen". “Matochka,” notes Svenske (Op. cit., p. 47), “is called in the Arkhangelsk province. a small compass used by Pomors and timber merchants.

From this comes, b. m., the name of Matochkina Shar, the Matochka River, etc. The origin of the name Shar is unknown. The local sailors mean by this a strait going from one sea to another.” A different explanation is given by A. A. Zhilinsky (Far North of European Russia. Petr., 1919, p. 29): “The name ball in the north generally means a strait, but the name Matochkin probably comes from the word “uterus,” i.e. continent, as the Pomors used to call Novaya Zemlya.”

2) Y. Ya. Chirakin and F. Rozmyslov, researchers of the Matochkin Shar Strait

A) Yakov Yakovlevich Chirakin (d. 1768)

A Kem peasant, a feed worker, sailed to Novaya Zemlya to fish and wintered there ten times. In 1767 he made the first known voyage through Matochkin Shar from the Barents Sea to the Kara Sea; gave a general description of the strait and compiled its schematic map. In 1768, he participated in the expedition to study Novaya Zemlya by F. Rozmyslov, guided his ship through Matochkin Shar and stayed for the winter in the strait, at Cape Drovyanoy, and died there in November 1768.

B) Fyodor Rozmyslov (d. 1771), navigator, explored and described the Matochkin Shar Strait (1768-69).

Http://www.gpavet.narod.ru/rozmyslov_sbornik.htm

“The feedman, Yakov Chirakin, informed the Arkhangelsk governor that in 1766/67. was on Novaya Zemlya and passed through the strait from the Barents Sea to the Kara Sea. He attached a plan and description of the strait to the application. These documents were submitted for consideration to Rozmyslov, who established that the plan “due to its sloppiness cannot be put into action.” The governor, interested in Novaya Zemlya and the possibility of opening a route through the strait indicated by Chirakin to the Ob, began to petition in St. Petersburg for permission to organize an expedition to Novaya Zemlya. Permission has been received."

Apparently, officials were attracted by Ya. Chirakin’s story about “silver on the surface.” Navigator F. Rozmyslov was ordered to explore the Matochkin Shar Strait, go through it to the Kara Sea, reach the Ob and try to find a way to “North America”. Let us note that the logistics of this expedition were unsatisfactory.

3) Researchers about “balls”, related terminology

A) Around the World, No. 12 dated February 23, 2015. S. Popov, hydrographic engineer, honorary polar explorer. http://www.vokrugsveta.ru/vs/article/3406/

“It is usually believed that the ancient name of Novaya Zemlya - Matka - was given by the Pomors for the richness of the local crafts. But perhaps the origin of this name is connected with the ancient wooden compass-matka (from the Finno-Ugric “uterus” - path, road, direction). Lexicographer A. O. Podvysotsky suggested back in the last century that the archipelago was called the Uterus “because it is dangerous to swim on such a long voyage as Novaya Zemlya without a uterus.” And from the diminutive “matochka” came the name Matochkin Shar, which means Novaya Zemlya Strait.”

B) Related terminology

Kara Sea

“The most important in terms of navigation are the Yugorsky Shar and Kara Gate straits, connecting the Kara Sea with the Barents Sea, and the Vilkitsky Strait, connecting the Kara Sea with the Laptev Sea.”

The Kara Gate Strait has been known for a long time and was originally called simply the Gate or the Royal Gate, the general meaning in Russian geographical terminology is “passage”.

There is also the Nikolsky Shar strait, Kostin Shar, Olkhon Gates (on Lake Baikal), and the Malye Vorota strait (Murmansk region).

4) Vintage maps

* On the map of Isaac Maas of 1603, only the western coast of Novaya Zemlya is indicated, apparently there was no information about the eastern coast, the Matochkin Shar Strait is not indicated, a bay is indicated approximately in the Matochkin Shar area; http://www.tertiasp.ru/shop/MM-003-1.jpg.

* On the map, publisher Jan Janson, 1650, Amsterdam, the eastern shore is indicated conditionally, the Matochkin Shar Strait is not.

* On the map from the Atlas of Frederick de Wit, published in Amsterdam in the 1670-1710s, only the western coast of Novaya Zemlya is also indicated.

* Map of Muscovy by John Homann, circa 1707, showing the western coast of Novaya Zemlya.

5) Generalization and conclusion

We know that the Matochkin Shar Strait was explored in the 18th century by: Kem peasant feeder Ya.Ya. Chirakin and navigator-lieutenant F. Rozmyslov. They walked through the strait and proved the possibility of ships moving through it. It is also obvious that rumors about the existing strait on Novaya Zemlya were spread in the merchant, diplomatic and maritime communities in the 16th century.

* Polar Post, http://www.polarpost.ru/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1090

According to polar researchers, the straits of Novaya Zemlya are unpredictable, ice conditions change depending on the prevailing winds in the summer.

* According to historical documents that have come down to us, it is clear that the Matochkin Shar Strait has been of interest to Western explorers and sailors since the 16th century. - the shortest route from the west to Siberia, however, due to difficult ice conditions, it was only possible to master it in the 20th century.

For the first time, Novaya Zemlya (west coast) appears on European maps of the 16th century; the name has been recorded in writing since 1584. In medieval cartography, the role of Jewish cartographers was significant; Jewish diasporas located on different continents successfully conducted international maritime trade. The financial situation of many European countries often depended on loans from Jewish bankers (England, France, Holland, German principalities, etc.).

It is advisable to consider the hydronym Shar (strait) in connection with the sacred language of Judeo-Christianity - Hebrew.

6) Hebrew terminology and biblical image

A) Terminology

The hydronym Matochkin Shar contains the meaning of a strait (passage); in Russian toponymy, straits were also designated by the term - GATE. There is a logical connection between the terms “ball” and “gate”; they both mean one object - the sea strait, one content conveyed by different terms. What is the Hebrew word for “gate”?

* SHAR = Hebrew SHAR gate.

It is obvious that the Russian term SHAR (in relation to the strait) is identical to the Hebrew term SHAR, both terms describe the same subject, content, and the consonants and vowels are the same; taking into account transliteration (transmission of terms in another alphabet).

B) Biblical image

* 1 Chronicles 26:13: “And they cast lots, both small and great, according to their families, upon every gate (SHAAR).”

* Isaiah 62:10: “Come on, go through the gate (SHAAR), prepare the way for the people! Level, level the road, remove the stones, raise the banner for the nations!”

* Ezekiel 43:1: “And he brought me to the gate (SHAAR), to that gate (SHAAR) which faces the east.”

Thus, the Russian historical and geographical term SHAR (strait) is borrowed from Holy Scripture, a transliteration of the Hebrew term SHAR (gate, entrance). This fact speaks of the connection between the toponymy of Rus' and the terminology of the Bible; it was from the Book of Books that models of Russian names were drawn: people, cities, lakes, rivers, mountains and seas.