Ilmen, Freshwater lake in Novgorod Oblast, Russia.
Ilmen is a freshwater body in the center of the Novgorod lowlands, receiving water from roughly fifty rivers. The main tributaries include Msta, Pola, Lovat, Psizha and Shelon, which drain from the surrounding hills into the basin.
The water stood under German occupation between 1941 and 1944 during World War Two. Soviet troops liberated the region after three years of heavy fighting along the shores and access routes.
The name comes from Finnic words meaning air lake, chosen by early settlers to describe the wide, open water surface. Russian explorers later adopted this term and used it as a pattern for naming other lakes across the country.
Passenger boats run during summer for roughly ninety days on routes between Veliky Novgorod, Staraya Russa and Shimsk. Navigation depends on water level, which changes with rainfall and snowmelt in spring.
The surface shifts between 733 and 2,090 square kilometers (283 and 807 square miles) depending on inflow, meaning the shoreline sometimes moves several kilometers. This change creates temporary islands and wide shallow zones that vanish during wet years or appear in dry months.
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