Arkhangelsk Oblast the main shipyard for the Russian Navy. Among the oldest populated places of the oblast are Kholmogory, Kargopol, and Solvychegodsk; there are a number of Russian Orthodox monasteries, including the Antoniev Siysky Monastery and the World Heritage Site of the Solovetsky Islands in the White Sea. Plesetsk Cosmodrome is one of three spaceports in Russia (the other two are Kapustin Yar in Astrakhan Oblast and Yasny in Orenburg Oblast). Arkhangelsk Oblast, which includes Nenets Autonomous Okrug, borders Kirov Oblast, Vologda Oblast, the Republic of Karelia, the Komi Republic, and the White, Pechora, Barents and Kara seas. Cape Fligely in Franz
Astrakhan Khanate including most of what is now Astrakhan Oblast and the steppeland on the right bank of Volga in present-day Kalmykia. To the south was the Caspian sea, to the east the Nogai Horde, and to the west Nogais who were theoretically subjects of the Crimean Khanate. The area was a natural center since it was the intersection of the north-south trade route down the Volga to Persia and the east-west trade route north of the Caspian. From the 6th century it was populated by various Turkic-speaking tribes. They formed two states: Old Great Bulgaria (c632-668) and the Khazars (c650-969). Following