11. Nieuwe kaart van Muskovië of Rusland. Amsterdam: Isaak Tirion, ca. 1765. COLL.S/T A.1
The period between the maps of Russia from the atlases of Mercator (1595) and of Tirion (c. 1765) was for its European part one of consolidation, for Siberia one of further expansion. Since 1667 the Dnieper in Ukraine marked the border (except around Kyiv) between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russia. Tsar Peter I exploited East Ukraine economically and militarily for Russia's participation in the Holy League against the Ottoman Empire (1683-'98) and for the Russo-Turkish wars (1710-'13). At the Treaty of Nystad (1721), that ended the war against the Swedes, Karelia and Livonia were assigned to what now became the Russian Empire. Tsar Peter's reforms intended the modernisation of Russia as a great European power. Empress Anna's war against the Turks (1735-'39) took the lives of a tens of thousands of men and a fortune and it only gained Russia the city of Azov and its environs.