ABSTRACT
From Tsar and Great Prince Ivan Vasil'yevich of All Russia to the settlement on the Kama to Yakov and Grigorey, sons of Anika, Stroganov. In the year 8o [1572] our voyevoda, Prince Ivan Yur'yevich Bulgakov with his man I van Borisov wrote to us from Perm' about news of Cheremis attacks on merchants' boats on the Kama. Prince I van has also written to us that your man Tret'yachko1 had written to him on 15th July from the mouth of the river that 40 Cheremis, traitors to us, had come in war on to the Kama with Ostyaks, and Bashkirs, and Buintsy and had killed on the Kama 87 Perm' merchants and fishermen. When this our letter reaches you, you should live very much on your guard. Choose a good leader and with him as many volunteer cossacks as can be had, with all kinds of weapons, with muskets and quivers, and also Ostyaks and Voguls who are true to us, with volunteer cossacks who have not broken away from us, and order them to assemble, and for their wives and children to stay inside the stockade. And when you have chosen a leader and have had the volunteer bowmen and cossacks entered on a roll, and however many Ostyak and Vogul volunteers have been assembled, have them listed by name; and having sorted them out according to what weapons they carry, and noted how many of these volunteers, and Voguls, and Ostyaks have gathered against our traitors, and having had a copy made of this list of names, keep it and send the list under your seal with whomever is suitable to us in Moscow, to the office in the Kazan' palace, to our secretaries Ondrey Shchelkalov2 and Kirey Gorin, so that we should know about their numbers. And send out these leaders with the volunteers, and musketeers, and cossacks, and Ostyaks, and Voguls to fight our traitors, the Cheremis, the Ostyaks, the Votyaks, and the Nogays who have turned traitor and have seceded from us. Whoever of these traitors come to attack the settlements, let the volunteers fight those Cheremis, but protect themselves and retreat from them carefully and guardedly. And let them without fail fight our traitor Cheremis, and Ostyaks, and Votyaks, and Nogays who have betrayed us and have seceded from us. But if some good Cheremis or Ostyaks wish to persuade their comrades to leave the rebels and be true to us, whoever of them agrees is not to be killed but kept safe and we
