This 1822 map of Voronezh Province is from a larger work, Geograficheskii atlas Rossiiskoi imperii, tsarstva Pol'skogo i velikogo kniazhestva Finliandskogo (Geographical atlas of the Russian Empire, the Kingdom of Poland, and the Grand Duchy of Finland), containing 60 maps of the Russian Empire. Compiled and engraved by Colonel V.P. Piadyshev, it reflects the detailed mapping carried out by Russian military cartographers in the first quarter of the 19th century. The map shows population centers (seven gradations by size), postal stations, roads (four types), provincial and district borders, monasteries, and factories. Distances are shown in versts, a Russian measure, now no longer used, equal to 1.07 kilometers. Legends and place-names are in Russian and French. Voronezh may have been founded as early as the fourth century. In the 16th century it was gradually absorbed by Russia as the tsars built border fortresses in the region to protect against Tatar raids. In the late 17th century Peter the Great established a shipyard in Voronezh to make vessels for his Azov campaigns against Ottoman Turkey. Voronezh later became an important grain producing region in the Russian Empire, part of the famous Black Earth belt.