Historically Ingria (Inkeri) comprises the area along the basin of the river Neva, between the Gulf of Finland, the Narva River, Lake Peipsi and Lake Pskov in South-West, and Lake Ladoga in North-East. The traditional border to Karelia followed Rajajoki/Systerbäck in North-West.
The ancient Novgorodian land Vod was called Ingermanland by the Swedes, Anglicized to "Ingria". It is said to be named after the daughter Ingegärd/Ingigerd of the Swedish king Olof Skötkonung (995-1022). She got married in 1019 to Yaroslav I the Wise, the ruler of Novgorod.
In the early 1700s the area was reconquered by Russia in the Great Northern War after about 100 years in Swedish possession. On the place of the Swedish town Nyen close to the Neva river's estuary at the Gulf of Finland, the new Russian capital Saint Petersburg was founded in 1703.
In 1710 Ingria was designated as the Province of Saint Petersburg (in 1927 the Leningrad Province, but in 1991 Leningrad changed name again back to Saint Petersburg, despite region is still called Leningradkaja oblast' ).
The Votes, along with the Izhorians (Ingrians proper), are the indigenous people of historical Ingria (Inkeri in Finnish). Another people of the area are the "Ingrian Finns", descendants from Lutheran emigrants from present-day Finland of the 17th century. These populations were all wiped out of Ingria during the Soviet period, outnumbered by a numerous Russian population.
The term Ingrian is mainly used for the Izhorians, but sometimes confusingly also for Ingrian Finns.