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Around 1860, the Little Ice Age ended, reducing sea ice and reviving Arctic trade after a 200-year slumber. One of the most notable trade networks of this period was the Norwegian-Russian ‘Pomor trade’. The Russians relied on the Norwegians for fish, while northern Norwegians depended on Russian wheat.
At the other extremity, in the Bering Strait, Yup’ik Inuits had long traded furs and handicrafts among themselves. However, with the arrival of American whalers in the mid-1800s, trade in the region started to become global.
Between these two extremities lay the frozen waters of northern Siberia—harsh and sometimes navigable. Ivory, furs, and reindeer products were the primary trade goods. The Russians transported ivory and furs to China in exchange for tea. While most ivory came from walruses, there was a growing hunt for millennia-old mammoth remains. The search for ivory in this inhospitable region became viable only as the African elephant was believed to be on the brink of extinction… but that is a story for another map.
