Perevoz is a city and the administrative center of Perevozsky District, located 120 kilometers from Nizhny Novgorod. The city sits on the Pyana River.
History
Battle of the Pyana – August 2, 1377, on the Pyana River (Perevoz)
In the spring of 1377 it became known that Arapsha, a prince of the Blue Horde, was preparing a campaign against the Nizhny Novgorod lands. The Nizhny Novgorod prince Dmitry Konstantinovich (father-in-law of Dmitry Donskoy) immediately notified Moscow, and an army led by Dmitry Ivanovich (Dmitry Donskoy) hastily arrived from there. However, since nothing more was heard of Arapsha, he returned home, leaving behind the regiments of Pereyaslavl, Yuryev, Murom, and Yaroslavl under their respective commanders.
The great army set out from Nizhny Novgorod toward the Wild Field, but trusting in its sheer numbers, let its battle readiness slip. The Russian warriors made camp along the Pyana River (right bank), stretched over roughly three kilometers (Novy Perevoz, Konoplyanka, the Stud Farm). The battle took place here and then shifted to the left bank, into the area between the Kuracha and Pyana rivers.
Through their own carelessness, the Russians were utterly routed by the Tatars. (To this day, on the road between Perevoz and Bolshoe Murashkino, near the village of Shpilyovo, a rise is called "Knyazha Gora" — "Prince's Hill." This is unquestionably connected with the Battle of the Pyana. There is a theory that the prince chose this spot as his observation post, then departed without anticipating battle, leaving behind his memory — or alternatively, that he was killed here and may even have been buried on this spot.
An ancient chronicle describes the event thus: "Having crossed the Pyana River, the commanders received word that the Tatar bands that had appeared beyond the Pyana were very small in number, and that Arapsha himself was at Volchya Voda on the Kama, near the town of Birsk — still very far away."
This rumor was likely spread by the Mordva. The credulous commanders believed it and decided to amuse themselves on the Perevoznaya steppe as if at home in peacetime: they cast off their armor, donned light clothing, and set about hunting fish and birds and indulging in drunken revelry. The common soldiers followed their example. The entire camp, from the commanders down to the last fighting man, gave itself over to carousing and merrymaking. Meanwhile, the enemy was not idle and prepared to exploit the carelessness of the Russian commanders and their whole army.
On the first of August, the Russians' debauchery intensified still further (on account of a certain feast day). On the second of August, the Tatars and Mordva struck the Russians from five directions. Caught unawares, the commanders and soldiers, having had no time to take up their weapons, fled toward the Pyana; the enemy pursued them, cutting and hacking, giving no quarter. The Russian prince Pimeon was cut down, while Ivan, who had leapt into the Pyana on horseback, drowned in its waves. The same fate befell a great many boyars and fighting men.
On that fateful day, the Tatars trumpeted their victory over the bones of Christians. Then, leaving their prisoners under reliable guard, they marched on Nizhny Novgorod. But the terrible news of the massacre beyond the Pyana reached Nizhny Novgorod before the Tatars appeared at its walls: a handful of soldiers who had escaped death and captivity brought it.
Terrible panic gripped the princely capital; no one thought of defending it. Prince Dmitry Konstantinovich fled to Suzdal.
According to the chroniclers, 32 churches burned in Nizhny Novgorod at that time. On August 7 the Tatars ceased burning and pillaging the city, and drove the women and children off into bondage.
The Mordva marauders, seeing the devastation of Dmitry Konstantinovich's lands, likewise sought to profit from the situation; they poured into the Volga region and began plundering it, but were harshly punished: Boris Konstantinovich (brother of the Nizhny Novgorod prince) gave chase and, on the Pyana, destroyed nearly all of them — partly by slaughter, partly by drowning — and then, in winter, together with his nephews Vasily and Simeon and the Moscow commander Sviblo, marched deep into the Mordva settlements, burned and plundered them, slaughtered a great many of their inhabitants, took some prisoner, and laid waste to the entire Mordva land.
Yet the calamities of the Nizhny Novgorod Principality did not end there: the following year new Tatar hordes appeared, along with Mordva warriors. Thus within two years the flourishing Nizhny Novgorod lands were turned into wastelands strewn with corpses and ashes.
From 1779 Perevoz was an uyezd (county) town; in 1798 the uyezd was abolished and Perevoz became a non-administrative town. In 1926 Perevoz was reclassified as a selo (a larger village) and renamed Pyansk Perevoz. Only in 1962 was the settlement elevated to the status of an Urban-type settlement. By Law of Nizhny Novgorod Region No. 159-Z of January 15, 2001, the settlement's city status was restored and Perevoz became a city of district significance.
Achievements
Several years ago, Perevoz was the site of the first open-air ice stadium with artificial ice in Nizhny Novgorod Region. In 2007, the city of Perevoz won the regional landscaping and urban improvement competition.