156 THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. [chap. 



important facts which are known regarding this peninsula, along 

 with the necessary bibliographical references. 



First as to its name, it is sometimes also written " Yelmert 

 Land," ^ but this is quite incorrect, 



" Yalmal " is of Samoyed origin, and has, according to a 

 private communication from the well-known philologist Dr. E. 

 D. EuROP^us, the distinctive meaning " land's-end." Yelmert 

 again was a boatswain with the Dutch whale-fisher Vlamingh, 

 who in 1664 sailed round the northern extremity of Novaya 

 Zemlya to Barents' winter haven, and thence farther to the 

 south-east. Vlamingh himself at his turning-point saw no 

 land, though all signs showed that land ought to be found in 

 the neighbourhood ; but several of the crew thought they saw 

 land, and the report of this to a Dutch mapmaker, DicK 

 Rembrantsz. van Nierop, led to the introduction of the supposed 

 land into a great many maps, commonly as a large island in 

 the Kara Sea. This island was named Yelmert Land. The 

 similarity between the names Yelmert Land and Yalmal, and 

 the doubt as to the existence of the Yelmert Island first shown 

 on the maps, have led to the transfer of the name Yelmert 

 Land to the peninsula which separates the Gulf of Obi from the 

 Kara Sea. It is to be remarked, however, that the name 

 Yalmal is not found in the older accounts of voyages from the 

 European waters to the Obi. The first time I met with it 

 was in the narrative of Skuratov's journey in 1737, as the 

 designation of the most north-easterly promontory of the 

 peninsula which now bears that name. 



Yalmal's grassy plains offer the Samoyeds during summer 

 reindeer pastures whiclj are highly valued, and the land is said 

 to have a very numerous population in' comparison with other 

 regions along the shores of the Polar Sea, the greater portion, 

 however, drawing southward towards winter with their large 

 herds of reindeer. But the land is, notwithstanding this, among 

 the most imperfectly known parts of the great Russian empire. 

 Some information regarding it we may obtain from sketches of 

 the following journeys : 



Selifontov, 1737. In the months of July and August the 

 surveyor Selifontov travelled in a reindeer sledge along the 

 coast of the Gulf of Obi as far as to Beli Ostrov. About this 

 journey unfortunately nothing else has been published than is 

 to be found in LlTKE, Viermaligc Iicise, &c., Berlin, 1835, p. 66, 

 and Wrangel, Sibirischc Beise, Berlin, 1839, p. 37. 



^ On the maps in Linschoten's work already quoted, printed in 1601, 

 and in Blavii Atlas Major (1665, t. i. pp. 24, 25), this land is called "Nieu 

 West Vrieslant" and "West Frisia Nova," names which indeed have 

 priority in jjr'int, but yet cannot obtain a preference over the inhabitants' 

 own beautiful name. 



I 



