IRBIT, a town of the Uralsk Area of the R.S.F.S.R. in lat. 57° 38' N., long. 63° 6' E., at the junction of the Irbit and Niza rivers which drain into the Tura, a tributary of the Irtish. The Niza is navigable as far as Irbit in spring. It is famous for its fair held since 1643 from Feb. 8 to March 10, the clearing house for Siberian furs, wools and hides, and for tea from the east. A large proportion of the fur comes from west of Lake Baikal and of the wool from the Kirghiz steppe : what is not sold is sent on to the fair at Nizhni-Novgorod. The skins include squirrel, rab bit, sable, ermine, brown bear, kolonok, grey wolf, fox, badger, black cat, Orenburg marmot, Petchora, Yenisei and Obdorsk white fox, reindeer, mink and marten, and sales amount to £730,000 to £830,000 per annum. Until Jan. 1917 the town was 8o m. from
the railway, but in that year a branch from Sverdlovsk (Ekaterin burg) to the Tavda river was opened, which will ultimately link up with Tobolsk. The Irbit fair was the first to be reopened (1922) after the 1914-21 war and civil war. The population was 20,064 in 1897, dropped to 9,647 in 1920, was 11,719 in 1926.