TROITSOKOSAVSK, a town of Asiatic Russia, in the Buriat-Mongol A.S.S.R., in sr° 28' N., 106° E., on the Kiakhta river near its junction with the navigable Selenga, which forms a waterway from Asiatic Russia to Mongolia. Two miles south of it is Russian Kiakhta, on the frontier, which adjoins Chinese Kiakhta or Mai-mai-Chen, a walled town with a large market place, and 1 o m. N., at the confluence of the Kiakhta and Selenga, is Ust-Kiakhta. It was formerly the great route by which Chinese tea entered Russia; and its December fair, when Russian leather, furs and wool were exchanged for tea, was very important. From 1689 to 1727 the trade was a Government monopoly, but from then till 186o trade was thrown open to private merchants and as all trade across the Chinese frontier was by law compelled to pass through it, the town increased greatly in importance. In 186o, however, the whole frontier was declared open, and Kiakhta declined ; the Transbaikal railway further diminished its impor tance. The combined population of Troitsokosaysk and Kiakhta
was only 8,9o3 in 1926. Gold and osmiridium are found in the district, and salt is worked. A railway is projected to link Ver khne-Udinsk with Kiakhta, and this might restore the prosperity of the town, as there is a great market for leather in Mongolia, which has no tanneries; raw hides are often sent via this route to be dressed and re-exported. The altitude is 2,600 ft., and the climate severe (average January temperature, F, average July, 67.1° F, and of the annual rainfall of II in., 7.5 fall in July and August). The town was a storm centre in the post 1917 period, and was the scene of the massacre of Boo Bolshevik prisoners in 1920 by order of the Cossack ataman Semyonov.