Yermak Timofeyevich
The Don Cossack warrior Yermak Timofeyevich was born by the Chusovaya River on the eastern fringes of the Muscovite lands. The only information about Yermak's upbringing comes from a source called the Cherepanov Chronicle. This chronicle, compiled by a Tobolsk coachman in 1760 - long after Yermak's death - was never published in full, but in 1894 the historian Aleksandr Alekseyevich Dmitrieyev concluded that it probably represents a copy or paraphrase of an authentic 17th-century document. According to the section of the chronicle entitled "On Yermak, and where he was born", Yermak's grandfather, Afonasiy Grigor'yevich Alenin, came from Suzdal, north-east of Moscow. To escape poverty, he moved south to Vladimir where he became a coachman in the Murom forests. In the Murom forests, the voyevoda arrested him for driving unscrupulous passengers - robbers who had hired him. Afonasiy's son (Yermak's father) Timofey relocated to the Stroganov lands on the Chusovaya in order to make money. There speculation locates the birthplace of Vasiliy Timofeyevich Alenin, later known as "Yermak".