The paper discusses the Russian and foreign historiography of the Russian-Turkish war of 1735-1739 and the naval studies in it, which plague the history of the Don and Dnieper flotillas. The analysis of the published works demonstrates the beginning of interest in this military conflict at the end of the 18th century by foreign historians, and then Russian. The historiographic base of the war of 1735-1739 was formed at the end of XIX - beginning of XX centuries. The historians of the Navy reproduced the existing model of research and concentrated on the publication of sources at this time. In Soviet times, the study of the war almost stopped. The naval context of the war has ceased to be in the field of view of Soviet historical science. New impetus to the development of historiography is identified at the beginning of the XXI century. Russian and foreign historians publish many works and significantly expand the list of problems. There is a widespread presence of the naval theme, emphasizing the fact that mo