BRYANSK (BRIANSK), a town and province in the Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic. (I) The province has an area of 4o,926sq.km. The boundaries are :—north-west, Smolensk; north-east, Kaluga; east, Orlov; south-east, Kursk; south-west, Chernigov; west, Gomel. Pop. (1926) urban rural 1,815,127. Sands and tenacious clays predominate, with marshy land, and there is much deciduous forest. Beekeeping, timber trade, tar and pitch industries are carried on in the forest areas, and in the sown areas the crops include rye, oats, barley, wheat, hemp, potatoes, hops, vegetables, tobacco and fruit. In dustries are increasing and there are factories for iron goods, machinery, ropes (especially at Karachev), leather, soap, tobacco and chemical produce.
(2) The town of Bryansk, Lat. 53° 13' N., Long. 34° 25' E., pop. (1926) 25,068, is at the limit of navigation of the Desna river, in the centre of a lowland plain with branching valleys carved out of the plateau by the Desna and its tributaries, espe cially the Bolva. It is a railway junction (six lines) and north of the town are the Maltsov iron works, glass factories and rope works, employing thousands of workers. There are also saw mills, flour mills and timber factories. It trades in timber, tar, pitch, hemp and cattle. It is an old city, mentioned in 1146 as Debryansk, afterwards forming a separate principality, which ended in 1356. After the Mongol invasion of 1241, it was in the power of Lithuania and did not become Russian till the 17th century.