Geography of Franz Josef Land per year). Though most of the land is covered by glacial ice, it does have outcrops covered with moss. The northeastern part of the archipelago is locked in pack ice most of the year round; however the ice sometimes retreats north past the islands in summer (September). Bibliography Geography of Franz Josef Land The Geography of Franz Josef Land refers to an island group belonging to Arkhangelsk Oblast of Russia. It is situated in the Barents Sea of the Arctic, north of Novaya Zemlya and east of Svalbard. At latitudes between 80.0° and 81.9° north, it is the most northerly
Novaya Zemlya the west coast was mapped. Henry Hudson was another explorer who passed through Novaya Zemlya while searching for the Northeast Passage. The islands were systematically surveyed by Pyotr Pakhtusov and Avgust Tsivolko during the early 1830s. The first permanent settlement was established in 1870 at Malye Karmakuly, which served as capital of Novaya Zemlya until 1924. Later the administrative center was transferred to Belushya Guba, in 1935 to Lagernoe, but then returned to Belushya Guba. Small numbers of Nenets were resettled to Novaya Zemlya in the 1870s in a bid by Russia to keep out the Norwegians. This population, then