Afanasy Nikitin
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Afanasy Nikitin (Афана́сий Ники́тин in Russian) (? - 1472) was a Russian traveler and writer and the first European to document his visit to India. He described his trip in a narrative known as the Voyage Beyond the Three Seas. In 1955, the local authorities of Tver erected a bronze monument to Afanasy Nikitin on the shores of the Volga River.
In 1466, Nikitin left his hometown of Tver on a commercial trip to India. He traveled down the Volga River, reached Derbent, then Baku and later Persia by crossing the Caspian Sea, where he would live for one year. In the spring of 1469, Nikitin arrived at the city of Ormus and then, crossing the Arabian Sea, reached the sultanate of Golconda, where he would live for 3 years. On his way back, Nikitin visited the African continent (Somalia), Muscat, Trabzon and in 1472 arrived at Feodosiya by crossing the Black Sea. On his way to Tver, Nikitin died not far from Smolensk in the fall of that year.
During his trip, Nikitin studied the population of India, its social system, government, economy, religion, lifestyles, nature. The abundance and trustworthiness of Nikitin's factual material used to provide a valuable source of information about India.de:Afanassi Nikitin eo:Afanasij Nikitin ru:Никитин, Афанасий
