Tyumen

Capital city, economic and cultural centre of Tyumen oblast (region) in the west-central Russian Federation; population (2002) 510,700. The oldest city in Siberia, Tyumen lies 300 km/186 mi east of Yekaterinburg on the Trans-Siberian Railway and the Tura River. It lies at the heart of the country's principal oil-producing region, and its industries include shipbuilding, woodworking, leather tanning, and food processing. It is also an important river and rail transhipment point.

Tyumen was founded in 1586 as a Cossack fortress on the ruins of a Tatar settlement known as Chimgi-Tura. Before construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway, it was an important centre for exploration and trade expeditions into the heartland of Siberia.

During World War II, the embalmed body of Lenin was moved from its vault in Red Square in Moscow to Tyumen, to keep it safe from the invading Germans.

Tyumen

Largest oblast (region) of the Russian Federation, in western Siberia, extending from the Kazakhstan border to the Arctic Ocean; area 1,435,200 sq km/554,131 sq mi; population (1996) 3,170,000 (76% urban). The capital is Tyumen. There are oil and gas extraction, lumbering, and food-processing industries; there is dairy and grain farming (in the south), and hunting, fishing, and reindeer breeding (in the north).

The region mainly consists of the flat marshy flood plain of the Ob and Irtysh rivers. The eastern slopes of the northern Urals and some morainic hills provide the only relief features. There is tundra in the north along the Arctic Ocean coast, succeeded to the south by coniferous forest (covering 20% of the total area), birch forest, and wooded steppe. There are huge deposits of oil and natural gas. Cities in the region include Tobolsk.

The area now covered by Tyumen oblast once formed the core of the Siberian Khanate, and was annexed to Russia in 1581. Its remoteness made it an ideal area for banishment and labour camps.