Tyr is a settlement in Ulchsky District of Khabarovsk Krai

Khabarovsk Krai

Khabarovsk Krai is a federal subject of Russia , located in the Russian Far East. It lies mostly in the basin of the lower Amur River, but also occupies a vast mountainous area along the coastline of the Sea of Okhotsk, an arm of the Pacific Ocean. The administrative center of the krai is the...

, Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

, located on the right bank of the Amur River, near the mouth of the Amgun River

Amgun River

Amgun River is a river in Khabarovsk Krai, Russia which flows northeast and joins the Amur River from the left near its mouth. The length of the river is 723 km. The area of its basin is 55,500 km². The Amgun is formed by the confluence of the Ayakit and Suduk Rivers. Its main tributary...

, about 100 kilometres (62.1 mi) upstream from Nikolayevsk-on-Amur

Nikolayevsk-on-Amur

Nikolayevsk-on-Amur often romanized as Nikolayevsk-na-Amure, is a town and the administrative center of Nikolayevsky District of Khabarovsk Krai, Russia located on the Amur River close to its liman in the Pacific Ocean...

.

Tyr has been known as a historically Nivkh ("Gilyak") village, since no later than the mid-19th century.

Tyr's main claim to fame is that its location had been visited by both Yuan

Yuan Dynasty

The Yuan Dynasty , or Great Yuan Empire was a ruling dynasty founded by the Mongol leader Kublai Khan, who ruled most of present-day China, all of modern Mongolia and its surrounding areas, lasting officially from 1271 to 1368. It is considered both as a division of the Mongol Empire and as an...

 and Ming Dynasty

Ming Dynasty

The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...

 expeditions, which sailed down the Sungari

Songhua River

The Songhua or Sunggari River is a river in Northeast China, and is the largest tributary of the Heilong River , flowing about from Changbai Mountains through Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces. The river drains of land, and has an annual discharge of .As the Second Songhua River, it joins the...

 and Amur Rivers to establish a foothold in this region. Both times the visitors built temples and monuments on the spectacular Tyr Cliff south of today's settlement.

The remains of the Yuan era temple unearthed at the site by modern archaeologists date to the 1260s, while the two Ming temples, built during the Amur expeditions by the admiral eunuch Yishiha

Yishiha

Yishiha was a eunuch in the service of the Ming Dynasty emperors of China who carried out several expeditions down the Sungari and Amur Rivers, and is credited with the construction of the only two Ming Dynasty Buddhist temples ever built on the territory of today's Russia.- Early life:It is...

, were constructed in 1413 and 1433–1434, respectively.

The Ming Dynasty stelae and a column

Yongning Temple Stele

The Yongning Temple Stele is a Ming Dynasty stele with a trilingual inscription that was erected in 1413 to commemorate the founding of the Yongning Temple in the Nurgan outpost, near the mouth of the Amur River, by the eunuch Yishiha. The location of the temple is the village of Tyr near...

, put at the Tyr cliff by Yishiha, could still be seen in situ by the members of Russian Amur expeditions in the 1850s, but in the late 19th century the stelae were moved to the Arsenyev Museum in Vladivostok

Vladivostok

The city is located in the southern extremity of Muravyov-Amursky Peninsula, which is about 30 km long and approximately 12 km wide.The highest point is Mount Kholodilnik, the height of which is 257 m...

. A number of archaeological excavations have been conducted at the site since.