MESHCHERYAKS, or MESHCHERS  , a people inhabiting eastern Russia . Nestor regarded them as Finns, and even now part of the Mordvinians (of Finnish origin) call themselves Meshchers . Klaproth, on the other hand, supposed they were a mixture of Finns and Turks, and the Hungarian traveller Reguli discovered that the tatarized Meshchers of the Obi closely resembled Hungarians . They formerly occupied the basin of the Oka (where the town Meshchersk, now Meshchovsk, has maintained their name) and of the Sura, extending north-east to the Volga . After the conquest of the Kazan Empire by Russia, part of them migrated north-eastwards to the basins of the Kama and Byelaya, and thus the Meshchers divided into two branches . The western branch became russified, so that the Meshcheryaks of the governk ments of Penza, Saratov, Ryazan and Vladimir have adopted the customs, language and religion of the conquering race; but their ethnographical characteristics can be easily distinguished in the Russian population of the governments of Penza and Tambov . The eastern branch has taken on the customs, language and religion of Bashkirs, with whom their fusion is still more complete .