Stone one-story building in the Kazan Kremlin. Kazan Kremlin: a brief description and the main attractions of the Kremlin

The Kazan Kremlin is located on the cape of a high terrace on the left bank of the Volga and the left bank of the Kazanka. The Kazan Kremlin is a complex of architectural, historical and archaeological monuments that reveal its centuries-old history: archaeological remains of the first (XII-XIII centuries), second (XIV-XV centuries) and third settlements (XV-XVI centuries); the Kremlin built of Volga limestone and brick, a number of temples and buildings with a large historical, architectural and cultural value. The territory of the Kremlin is an irregular polygon in plan, repeating the outlines of the Kremlin hill, elongated from the northwest, from the Kazanka River, to the southeast, to May 1 Square (former Ivanovskaya, after the nearby John the Baptist Monastery) and the Gostiny Dvor building (now Museum of the Republic of Tatarstan). total area the Kremlin is 1500 square meters, the circumference is 1800 m. The southern wall of the Kremlin with five towers overlooks the Millennium Square - the view of the Kremlin from this square is the most common "visiting card" of the city. The Kremlin is richly illuminated at night.

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The ancient history of the Kremlin

To this day, no written evidence of the emergence of the Kremlin has been preserved, but according to official version The city of Kazan was founded at the beginning of the 10th century. At the beginning of its existence, the Kremlin was called Kerman(tat. Kirman). There are no written sources for this.

XII-XIV centuries Bulgar fortress

The earliest archaeological finds were found in the northern part of the Kremlin, closer to Kazanka, where there was an ancient Bulgarian fortified settlement and later, within a century, the fortress of the Kazan Khanate. Researchers disagree about the dating of wooden fortifications of the most ancient period: some believe that the Bulgar trading settlement was fortified already in the 10th century, others - only in the 12th century. Regarding the nature of the fortifications, scientists also disagree, some believe that the stone walls were partially erected already in the 12th century, others believe that only in the 15th or 16th century, after the reconstruction of the Kremlin by order of Ivan the Terrible by Pskov architects. From the 2nd half of the 13th century to the 1st half of the 15th century, the Kremlin turns into the center of the Kazan Principality as part of the Golden Horde: in 1236, the Mongol hordes led by Batu invaded the Volga Bulgaria and ravaged its capital Bulgar, and in 1240 Bulgaria , like the Russian principalities, finally turned out to be subordinate to the Golden Horde. Part of the Bulgars fled to the areas of the Kazanka River and founded Iski-Kazan, a city 45 kilometers from Kazan. In 1370, the Bulgar prince Hassan laid the foundation of a fortress on the site of the modern Kazan Kremlin, which served as the residence of the Bulgar princes until 1445.

XV - first half of the XVI century. Khan's fortress

A memorial sign at the foundation of the Khan's mausoleum next to the Syuyumbike tower

The Khan's citadel was surrounded by oak (possibly in some places stone) walls, up to 9 meters thick with 4 travel towers: Nur-Ali, Yelabuga, Big Gate, Tyumen Gate. Ilisty Bulak (from the Tatar “sleeve”, a channel connecting the Kazanka River and Kaban Lake) protected the fortress from the west; and on the least defended southeast side, the fortress was surrounded by deep ditches. Kurbsky left such a description of Kazan: “and from the Kazan River the mountain is so high, even with an eye look at the cover; there is a city on it and royal chambers and mosques are very high, bricked, where their dead kings were laid, remembering in number, five of them ... ”(“ bricked ”- stone). The cathedral mosque of Kul-Sharif had, according to legend, 8 minarets. There is every reason to believe that the external appearance of the mosques was similar to the stone buildings of the same time in Kasimov and Bulgar, where the smooth planes of the walls contrast with elegant carved and ceramic inserts of decorative elements. The Tezitsky (tezik Arab. - Merchant) ditch separated the Khan's citadel from the southern part, where the building was wooden. The close khan settled here and there was a cemetery. There were madrasahs and mausoleums at the mosques.

Second half of the 16th century. Construction of the stone Kremlin by Pskov architects

tower architecture

The tower consists of 7 tiers: the first three tiers are square in plan and have open galleries, the other four are octagonal. The tower is completed by a 6-sided brick tent (height 58 meters or 34 fathoms 6 feet), which until 1917 was crowned with a double-headed eagle resting on a gilded "apple" (according to the legends of the Kazan Tatars, important documents related to history and culture were concluded in the ball Tatars). The edges of all tiers are decorated with spatulas or thin brick rollers. In the lower tier of the tower there is a through passage. On the western and eastern facades, the pylons of the lower tier have 2 attached columns of the Corinthian order, crossed in the middle of the height by "typically Russian horizontal rollers". The walls are brick, the mortar is lime, the foundation rests on oak piles. From 1917 to the 1930s, the Russian coat of arms was replaced with a crescent, in the 1930s the crescent was removed, in the 1990s the crescent was again erected on the tower.

palace church

Palace (Vvedenskaya, consecrated since 1859 in honor of the Descent of the Holy Spirit) church

In the authoritative work “Kazan in the monuments of history and culture. Ed. S. S. Aidarova, A. Kh. Khalikova, M. Kh. Khasanova, I. N. Aleeva "the authors are inclined to the version that the Palace Church" was placed on the site where the Nur-Ali mosque stood during the Kazan Khanate, however this version is based on later sources (explications to the city plan of 1768, where the temple is listed as “a church converted from a mosque”) and is one of the hypotheses of the history of the Vvedenskaya (consecrated in the 19th century in honor of the Descent of the Holy Spirit) church.

The Vvedenskaya Church was badly damaged by fire in 1815 and stood in ruins for a long time. By order of Nicholas I, who visited Kazan in 1836, the church was restored according to the "highest" project approved in 1852 as a palace at the Governor's Palace. In 1859 the church was consecrated in honor of the Descent of the Holy Spirit. The new temple accurately reproduced the constructive scheme and stylistic features of the former Vvedenskaya Church, the architectural analogues of which in Kazan can be considered the destroyed Vvedensky Cathedral of the Kizichesky Monastery, and the Resurrection Cathedral of the New Jerusalem Monastery (“Bishops’ Dacha”), which also had covered arched galleries and a stepped scheme of volumes. The palace temple of the Descent of the Holy Spirit itself with the chapel of St. Martyr Empress Alexandra occupied only the second floor, on the first floor there was a chapel in the name of Nicholas the Wonderworker, the temple icon in which was donated in the middle of the 19th century by Anna Davydovna Boratynskaya.

The alternation of 4 and 8-sided volumes, the stepped structure of the church itself, is consonant with the stepped architecture of the Syuyumbike tower, surpassing the watchtower in the richness of decoration.

Governor's Palace

Presidential (formerly Governor's) Palace

The Palace of the Kazan Governor is located in the northern part of the Kremlin, in the place where in ancient times there was the palace of the Kazan khans, and in the 18th century - the chief commandant's house. The building was built in the 40s. XIX century in the so-called. pseudo-Byzantine style. The project of the “house of the military governor with premises for the imperial apartments” was compiled by the famous Moscow architect A. K. Ton, the author of the project of the Grand Kremlin Palace and the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow. The palace consists of the main building and the circumference of services adjoining the courtyard. The construction of the palace was supervised by the architect A. I. Peske, sent from St. Petersburg, who rebuilt Kazan after the city fire of 1842. The interior decoration was carried out under the guidance of the architect M. P. Korinfsky, one of the architects of the Kazan Imperial University complex. The center of the main façade is a risalit completed by a front with three keeled arches. The building has two porches on 2 order columns with arched doorways. The first and second floors are divided by a row of order pilasters and arched window openings. The façade is a semicircle in plan and has a passage to the courtyard of the palace. The eclectic decor of the building combines elements of Russian classicism (corinthian division, rustication of the 1st floor, general symmetry), baroque (unfastening of the entablature over the beams of columns of the main risalit, the nature of the pediments of the porticos) and Old Russian architecture (hanging weights of the twin arches of the windows of the 2nd floor, keeled zakomaras of the central risalit, the nature of the figured supports of the arched suspension passage to the Palace Church). In Soviet times, the building housed the Presidium of the Supreme Council and the Council of Ministers of the TASSR.

The building of government offices (provincial office)

The 2-storey building of the governor's office - government offices - is located on the right side of the main Kremlin street and the Spasskaya Tower. The project was drawn up by V. I. Kaftyrev, who was sent by the Senate to Kazan in 1767 to detail the general plan of the city, developed by the commission of St. Petersburg and Moscow after the great fire in Kazan in 1765. The second floor was the main one, where high officials and important visitors climbed front staircase, and where the "audience" hall was located in front of the "judicial chamber" - the central hall with 4 windows. Adjacent to it were the "secret" and "secretary", in the remaining rooms were "principal servants". The building has a basement floor with vaulted rooms. For access to the long courtyard between the building of government offices and the eastern section of the Kremlin wall, the building has two through passages dividing the building into 3 sections. On the north side of the building adjoins the building of the former Consistory.

Blagoveshchensky cathedral

Cathedral of the Annunciation and the bell tower at the beginning of the 20th century

Built in the 16th century by Pskov architects Ivan Shiryai and Postnik Yakovlev. The white-stone cross-domed cathedral was originally almost 2 times smaller than the modern temple, which expanded as a result of several reconstructions. The arch rests on 6 round pillars, as in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin. The domes of the cathedral in the 16th century were helmet-shaped. At the end of the 16th century, side aisles were added to the temple: the northern one in the name of St. Peter and Fevronia of Murom and southern in the name of St. princes Boris and Gleb, connected by a porch, which went around the central cuboid volume of the cathedral.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, a number of alterations radically changed the appearance of the cathedral, especially the view from the west side. In 1736, the helmet-shaped domes were replaced with onion ones, and the central dome was completed in the form of the so-called "bath" in the Ukrainian Baroque style. Next to the cathedral stood the Church of the Nativity, built in 1694 under Metropolitan Markell of Kazan. By 1821, the Church of the Nativity of Christ was very dilapidated and the technical commission proposed to build a new warm church in its place. Emperor Nicholas I, who visited Kazan in 1836, proposed to build a new warm refectory of the Annunciation Cathedral on the site of the Nativity Church, expanding the cathedral to the west. According to the project of the Kazan provincial architect (1834-1844) Foma Petondi (1794-1874), the cathedral was expanded to the west, north and south, for which the one-story refectory and the old porch of the 18th century were demolished. This reconstruction made the cathedral more convenient for prayer, but greatly changed its original harmonious appearance. Since then, the exterior of the cathedral has not changed, except for the destruction of the porch of the cathedral, built according to the project of F. Petondi, demolished after the revolution, and the magnificent 5-tier bell tower of the 17th century, which kept the largest bell of Kazan, destroyed by the communists in 1928. Its weight was 1500 pounds (about 24570 kg).

Ensemble of the Spaso-Preobrazhensky Monastery

Transfiguration Cathedral of the Spassky Monastery at the beginning of the 20th century

Founded in the 16th century by St. Barsanuphius. The fraternal building has been preserved in the northern part of the monastery; a brick fence on the eastern side of the monastery, the temple of St. Nicholas the Ratny reconstructed in the forms of the 19th century (which served as a teahouse in the military unit located here in Soviet times); basement of the Cathedral of the Transfiguration blown up in the 1930s; the foundation of the monastery bell tower destroyed after 1917 with the church of St. Barbarians in the lower tier.

Consistory building

The building of the spiritual department in the XIX century. In Soviet times, the building housed the Ministry of Health of the TASSR.

The history of the creation of the Kazan Kremlin dates back to the 11th-12th centuries. Initially, the fortress was built as a defensive structure of the Volga Bulgaria to protect against enemy attacks. Trade rows were located here, a mosque was built, the Kremlin was the main decoration of the square. But everything was destroyed and burned in 1552 during the attack of the troops of Ivan the Terrible. After the conquest of Kazan, the new ruler ordered to rebuild the Kremlin building on Kazan Hill and restore the appearance of the administrative center.

In the 18th century, the Kazan Kremlin received the last enemy attack - Emelyan Pugachev in 1773 and defended its positions. The enemy retreated, but archaeologists still find the consequences of the destruction today.

After the creation of the Republic of Tatarstan in 1992, the Kazan Kremlin became the first presidential residence. Active work began to restore the cultural and historical heritage: buildings were restored, museum complexes were opened. In 2000, a unique museum under open sky was listed cultural heritage UNESCO.

The main attractions of the Kremlin

One of the bright sights of the Kazan Kremlin was the Kul Sharif mosque. Built of snow-white marble, the mosque is decorated with blue domes and minarets. The mosque got its name in honor of the national hero of Tatarstan - Imam Khul Sharif. The imam took a direct part in the defense of the mosque during the attack of the troops of Ivan the Terrible and was killed. The mosque was burned down and rebuilt for the 1000th anniversary of Kazan. Construction took a long 9 years and became the main event in the anniversary year of the capital. The Kul Sharif complex covers an area of ​​about 19,000 sq.m. and consists of a mosque, a foundation stone and an administrative building. The mosque can accommodate 1,500 people, and the surrounding area - up to 10,000 people.

The Spaso-Preobrazhensky Monastery and the Annunciation Cathedral of the Kazan Kremlin were built in the middle of the 16th century, the latter was rebuilt, reconstructed and restored several times. Currently, work is underway to connect these complexes to the Museum of Archeology of Tatarstan.

Another attraction of the Kazan Kremlin is the Siyumbike Tower, which is part of the Presidential Complex. The tower, 58 meters high, has a peculiar slope to the side by 1.8 m from the axis. Thanks to the fortification works carried out in 1998, it was possible to stop the fall of the tower.

Excursions around the Kazan Kremlin

The Kazan Kremlin is located in the central part of the capital of the republic. You can get here at public transport to the stop "TsUM", or by metro to the station "Kremlevskaya".

Entrance to the territory of the Kazan Kremlin is free for all visitors. Here you can order both group and private tour. You will be taken to all the important places and told a lot of interesting information about the history of the fortress.

Kazan Kremlin

In the UNESCO lists, it is listed as "the only surviving Tatar fortress." But, in order not to mislead you, let's tell the truth. In front of you is a Russian fortress, built on the site of the Tatar one by Pskov masters Ivan Shiryai and Postnik Yakovlev, nicknamed Barma.

The Tatar fortress was cut down from wood. Eyewitnesses describe oak walls in two rows, between which sand and stone were poured. The stone houses in the Kremlin itself and in the suburbs surrounding it were built from river rubble, which is “afraid” of fire and crumbles. Therefore, after the capture of Kazan, the city was built completely anew and today, alas, apart from the foundations, not a single building from the period of the Kazan Khanate has been preserved in it!

So we see spasskaya tower and on its sides - two later reconstructed turrets. In the one on the right, there was once a "Black" prison, in the basement of which the Yaik Cossack Emelyap Pugachev was kept.

Here he was imprisoned for the fact that "having drunk a pian, in taverns he called himself an empire." The prisoners got food for themselves, and so Pugachev walked all day long around the city with an escort, begging for alms. The soldier accompanying him was old and blind, and soon the Cossack fled. Right there in the city, he hid in a hole, then the Old Believers - "kindred souls" - transported him to the other side of the Volga, from where he went to the free Yaik. Just a year later, in July 1774, the Cossack returned as an “empiricist” and laid siege to the city. But Pugachev was prevented by the unbearable heat that prevailed that summer. The heat was such that "haystacks flared up in the meadows, and gunpowder in guns, and people were saved standing up to their necks in the river." Fire and looting started. Pugachev could no longer gather together his drunken army!

The Spasskaya Tower has survived to this day in its original form. Only the Outside Chapel was lost, which was, as it were, “stuck” in front of the entrance to the tower, and the double-headed eagle that crowned its top until the revolution of 1917, and a deep ditch was also filled up, over which a drawbridge was thrown. The tower itself was not always white stone, at one time it was painted with ocher.

Now let's enter the Kremlin. Pay attention to the thickness of the walls and the fastening loops left from the fortress gates. We are located on the shortest street in Kazan (about 500 meters long), which is named after the Red Commissar Yakov Sheinkman, who was shot by white Czechs near the walls of the Kremlin. The rebellious regiment of Czechs, in August 1918, knocked the Reds out of the city for two days, during which time the entire gold reserve of the Russian Empire disappeared from the vaults of the Kazan Bank, which was transported here shortly before from Moscow. They say that gold was taken from Kazan on sixteen carts towards the city of Laishev. Part of the supply was lost there ...

Near Kazan, Yaroslav Gashek, who later became a famous writer, went over to the side of the Reds. True, here he introduced himself by the name of his literary hero - Josef Schweik! He was appointed commandant of Bugulma, where, according to eyewitnesses, he zealously set to work. He passed sentence on the enemies of the revolution and carried it out himself. Here he got married, however, leaving the borders of Russia and filling out a questionnaire, he put in the column "marital status" - "single".

In Prague, in the homeland of Hasek, this blood-red "page" of his biography is well remembered, and in Bugulma, on the contrary, they are even proud that he "managed" it so well. In a provincial town, grateful descendants opened in the building of the former commandant's office literary museum Yaroslav Hasek.

Kul Sharif Mosque

To our left, if you follow the signs, there is a passage to the Kul Sharif Cathedral Mosque - this is the largest religious building of Muslims in the north-east of Russia.

“... The wide popularity of Kul Sharif in the last period of the existence of the Kazan Khanate is confirmed by many historical sources, as well as information preserved in the people's memory and summarized by Shigabutdin Marjani. Based on them, it can be argued that Kul Sharif in the khanate on the eve of its fall was the head of the Muslim clergy, the supreme seid. Andrei Kurbsky, describing the episode connected with the capture of Kazan by the Russian army in 1552, calls him in a European way "great biskup", that is, a bishop, and adds that the Tatars themselves consider Kul Sharif "the great anaryi", or "amir".

The supreme seid Kul Sharif died during the capture of Kazan by the Russians in 1552 during the battle with them. Marjani, relying on folk legends, reports that Kul Sharif with his followers, united in a special military unit "regiment", consisting of young dervishes and Sufis, defended up to the building of the madrasah, then, retreating, climbed onto its roof, where he was stabbed and fell down. So the life of this outstanding personality of the era of the Kazan Khanate was tragically interrupted.

Cathedral of the Annunciation in the Kazan Kremlin

If, during the construction of the Kul-Sharif Cathedral Mosque, archaeologists tried to restore the religious building destroyed during the siege, then they should have taken as a basis St. Basil's Cathedral on Red Square in Moscow, built "for the conquest of the Kazan and Astrakhan khanates", since there is an assumption that after the conquest of the Kazan Khanate, the same Pskov masters who rebuilt the Kazan Kremlin erected a reduced copy of one of the enemy’s architectural symbols in the very center of Moscow. However, for some unknown reasons, then they began to build the main Orthodox (Epiphany) Cathedral on the land of the Gentiles.

The consecration of the five-domed Cathedral took place in 1562. For the construction, according to the Kazan scribe book, "1148 rubles 24 kopecks and a half was spent, and iron was bought for 100 rubles." In the forms of the Cathedral, one can feel the influence of the styles of Pskov, Vladimir and Moscow architecture.

Since then, all the royal persons have been here for divine services. Russian Empire from Peter I to Nicholas II. Today, the Cathedral has been restored and is open to the public, church services are held here.

Tower Syuyumbike

Now, from the Cathedral of the Annunciation, we will proceed to the falling tower of Syuyumbike (Syuyum is a female name, and bika, or bike is a respectful appeal to an adult woman).

It really falls towards the Presidential Palace, on which you see the flag of Tatarstan with the coat of arms - a white leopard. Why they chose this particular animal, one can only guess, because snow leopards have never been found on the fauna-rich land of Tatarstan.

The deviation of the tower from the main axis is 1.98 meters. This slope is clearly visible next to the Annunciation Cathedral.

Tower Syuyumbike- an architectural and spiritual symbol of Kazan. Her image can be found on many emblems of various Tatar societies, for example, the Association of Tatars in America. We can also recall the analogue of the Tatar tower in Moscow - this is the building of the Kazan railway station.

No written sources containing mention of the time of construction of the tower and its original purpose have been found. On the earliest plans of the city of the 18th century, it is shown as the entrance to the courtyard of the commandant's house, which stood on the site of the "old tsar's court".

Favorable location of the building on the very high point hill suggests its use as a watchtower. Inside, narrow staircase galleries are made in such a way that only one archer could hold back a whole enemy detachment with a spear. A supply of stones, tow, resin, spears and arrows, as well as provisions would allow a small group of defenders to hold the siege for a long time.

Before the revolution, the Syuyumbike tower was open to tourists and served as observation deck. On the oak door of the upper tier, there is an inscription made by a certain traveler - “Gavrilov was here”.

Some researchers are inclined to believe that the Syuyumbike tower with "non-Russian architecture" was built by Pskov craftsmen on the foundation of the high seven-tiered gates, which were dilapidated during the capture of Kazan, installed at the entrance to the Khan's Palace. Perhaps the Russian masons were struck by the shape of the gate and they did not rebuild it, but only restored its former appearance. On the one hand, it was the front gate, on the other - a watchtower, on the third - a minaret for calling for Friday prayers, as well as for announcing Khan's decrees to the people. There is another version according to which the tower structure is a mausoleum or a memorial mosque.

Many legends are associated with the Syuyumbike tower. There is a legend that it was built on the burial site of three Muslim saints, to the graves of which locals and dervishes went to worship. And recently, at the foot of the tower, archaeologists unearthed the burial places of the khan's period, where the last Kazan khans rest, including Safa Giray, who died in 1549. A legend passed down by the Tatars from generation to generation tells about the weeping of Queen Syuyumbike over the resting place of her beloved husband.

Folk tales depict Syuyumbike as an indescribable beauty, having heard about which, Ivan IV sent ambassadors to her with a proposal to become a Moscow queen. And the refusal of Syuyumbike was the reason for the Russian campaign against Kazan. When the Russian troops besieged the city, the proud khansha agreed to the marriage on the condition that within a week the archers would be able to raise a tower above all the minarets of the "Pearl of the East". The requirement of the princess was fulfilled on time. Seven days - seven tiers! During the wedding feast, the bride expressed her desire to take a last look at native city from the height of a seven-tiered tower. She climbed to the highest platform and rushed down.

In fact, it was much more prosaic. After the capture of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible, by order of the Russian Tsar, she was forcibly married off to the Kasimov Khan Shah-Ali, who was pro-Moscow. This marriage served the king as the best reason for refusing her father, the Nogai Khan Yusuf, who requested the return of his daughter and grandson Utyamysh. About him, the king wrote to the khan "we hold your grandson for my son." In fact, he was separated from his mother and baptized. In one of the Moscow monasteries, the grave of Syuyumbike's son has been preserved, a new name is engraved on the slab - Simeon.

Monument to Russian soldiers who died during the capture of Kazan by the troops of Ivan the Terrible

From the site near the Syuyumbike tower, you can see the Kazanka River, which flows into the Volga a few kilometers from here. If you look closely, you will see an acropolis monument standing in the water, resembling a small pyramid, erected in 1823 in memory of the capture of Kazan. In 1552, the bodies of dead soldiers were brought here, into a hastily dug mass grave. Despite the fact that not only the Orthodox, but also the Gentiles, who went over to the side of the Russian Tsar, took part in the siege of the city, they buried everyone indiscriminately and buried them in a Christian way. Later, a chapel was built over the grave, and after the flood of the Kuibyshev reservoir, the water came up to the monument, turning it into an island.

Why was it decided to arrange the burial of soldiers in this place? According to chronicle sources, it was here that the headquarters of Ivan the Terrible was located (by the way, the tsar was only 24 years old at the time of the siege). From his royal tent, he led the capture of the city. There is a version that an underground manhole led from the tent of Ivan the Terrible to the walls of the Kremlin. Allegedly, it existed even before the revolution, and Nicholas II himself, when he was visiting the sights of the city, descended into it, but blockages prevented him from going to the Kremlin. Be that as it may, one thing is certain that the engineer Butler, who was specially brought to undermine the fortress walls with "Apglitz bombs", approached the wall unnoticed along the dug passages and laid barrels of gunpowder under its base. After the explosion, two breaches were formed. One of the explosions thundered just under the wall, which overlooks the monument-tomb.

Kazan was besieged by a 150,000-strong army against 33,000 defenders, and the Russian Tsar had 160 cannons, as well as engineer Butler with his "infernal machines."

On October 2, 1552, the Kazan Khanate was annexed to the Russian kingdom, and the last Khan, Yadyger, was taken into captivity.

Ivan the Terrible was sewn a Kazan hat from ferrets, which were found in abundance in local forests, and decorated it with precious stones from the Khan's staff.

Apart from a dozen pebbles, nothing of value was found in the Khan's palace. The treasury was empty, which then gave rise to a legend about a treasure at the bottom of Lake Kaban.

They say that the king got only the khan's library with Arabic folios. They replenished his legendary collection of rare books, which, however, are still being sought.

It was the fifth siege by the Russians of the capital of the Kazan Khanate. The previous ones ended in failure (once even the cunning khan, like Kutuzov, ordered the surrender of the capital to the enemy troops. A month later he entered the city back and rebuilt on the site of the ashes new town better than before!).

The fifth trip was much better prepared. Above the Volga, on the island of Sviyazhsk, a fortress was built in advance for wintering troops and storing weapons and fodder. A temple and a monastery were also erected here to conduct missionary activities among the “non-Christs”. Rooks, loaded with everything necessary for the siege of the city, regularly went from Sviyazhsk to Kazan. Today, the island of Sviyazhsk can be reached both by water on a sightseeing boat, and by land. A bulk dam leads to the island from the side of the village of Vasilyevo. Sviyazhsk has retained the charm of a Russian province; services are held in its darkened churches. Several dozen monks support life on an island forgotten by civilization. Here, on the church vaults painted by icon painters, you can see a rare image of St. Christopher the pseudo-headed... but with a horse's head.

Taynitskiye gate

On the left side of the Syuyumbike Tower is the Cannon Yard (the inscription says this on the weather vane). Blacksmith workshops have been located here for a long time, where chain mail, armor, arrowheads and spearheads, swords were made, and cannons and cannonballs were cast.

Now let's head down to Tainitsky gate. One glance is enough to understand that we have not a remake, but a really old fortress building. Inside it you will hear the rumble of footsteps and feel the coolness of the past. Pay attention to the thickness of the walls and massive fastenings for gates and bars, and also to the characteristic cranked - from left to right - passage to the fortress. This was done so that the enemy army, armed with swords and shields, during the siege would turn out to be its unprotected side to the garrison of the fortress. After all, as usual, the shield was held in the left hand, and the sword in the right!

The Taynitskaya tower was erected in the 16th century on the site of the Nur-Ali tower blown up during the siege of Kazan. She got her new name from the blown up secret passage to the spring, from which the besieged took water. Ivan the Terrible, after the capture of Kazan, solemnly entered the city through these gates.

Coin of St. Wenceslas and the 1000th anniversary of Kazan

In 1997, during excavations on the territory of the Kazan Kremlin, archaeologists found a lead coin, which, according to the largest numismatist in Europe, Czech researcher Yarmila Haskova, was made in Prague. The most plausible date of minting can be considered 929-930. At that time, jewelry was made from lead. In addition, there is a hole on the coin. This allows us to conclude that the coin was also used as a decoration. The coin is unique - the only one in the world. According to this archaeological find, it was proved that Kazan is more than a hundred years old.

(EGROKN)
object № 1610053000(Wikipedia DB)

The territory of the Kremlin is an irregular polygon in plan, repeating the outlines of the Kremlin hill, elongated from the northwest, from the Kazanka River, to the southeast, to 1 Maya Square. It is located on the cape of a high terrace on the left bank of the Volga and the left bank of the Kazanka.

Khan's Citadel ( Ark) was surrounded by oak (possibly in some places stone) walls, up to 9 meters thick with 4 travel towers: Nur-Ali, Yelabuga, Big and Tyumen gates. Ilisty Bulak (from Tat. "sleeve", a channel connecting the Kazanka River and Lake Kaban) protected the fortress from the west; and on the least protected south-eastern side, the fortress was surrounded by deep ditches.

Andrey Kurbsky left the following description of Kazan: “and from the Kazan River the mountain is so high, even with an eye look at the cover; there is a city on it, and royal chambers and mosques are very high, bricked, where their dead kings were laid, remembering in number, five of them ... "("murovannye" - stone).

The cathedral mosque had, according to legend, 8 minarets, madrasahs and mausoleums (durbe) were located at the mosques. There is every reason to believe that the external appearance of the mosques was similar to the stone buildings of the same time in Kasimov and Bulgar, where the smooth planes of the walls contrast with elegant carved and ceramic inserts of decorative elements.

The tower consists of 7 tiers: the first three tiers are square in plan and have open galleries, the other four are octagonal. The tower is completed by a 6-sided brick tent (height 58 meters or 34 fathoms 6 feet), which until 1917 was crowned with a double-headed eagle resting on a gilded "apple" (according to the legends of the Kazan Tatars, important documents related to history and culture were concluded in the ball Tatars). The edges of all tiers are decorated with spatulas or thin brick rollers. In the lower tier of the tower there is a through passage. On the western and eastern facades, the pylons of the lower tier have 2 attached columns of the Corinthian order, crossed in the middle of the height by "typically Russian horizontal rollers". The walls are brick, the mortar is lime, the foundation rests on oak piles. From 1917 to the 1930s, the Russian coat of arms was replaced with a crescent, in the 1930s the crescent was removed, in the 1990s the crescent was again erected on the tower. The tower is included in the list of forty falling towers of the world. Its deviation from the vertical is 2 meters. The deviation occurred due to subsidence of the foundation in one part. To date, the fall of the tower has been stopped.

Palace (Vvedenskaya) Church

In the authoritative work “Kazan in the monuments of history and culture. Ed. S. S. Aidarova, A. Kh. Khalikova, M. Kh. Khasanova, I. N. Aleeva "the authors are inclined to the version that the Palace Church" was placed on the site where the Nur-Ali mosque stood during the Kazan Khanate, however this version is based on later sources (explications to the city plan of 1768, where the temple is listed as “a church converted from a mosque”) and is one of the hypotheses of the history of the Vvedenskaya (consecrated in the 19th century in honor of the Descent of the Holy Spirit) church.

The Vvedenskaya Church was badly damaged by fire in 1815 and stood in ruins for a long time. By order of Nicholas I, who visited Kazan in 1836, the church was restored according to the "highest" project approved in 1852 as a palace at the Governor's Palace. In 1859 the church was consecrated in honor of the Descent of the Holy Spirit. The new temple accurately reproduced the constructive scheme and stylistic features of the former Vvedenskaya Church, the architectural analogues of which in Kazan can be considered the destroyed Vvedensky Cathedral of the Kizichesky Monastery, and the Resurrection Cathedral - the New Jerusalem Monastery ("Bishops' Dacha"), which also had covered arched galleries and a stepped scheme of volumes. The palace temple of the Descent of the Holy Spirit itself with the chapel of St. Martyr Empress Alexandra occupied only the second floor, on the first floor there was a chapel in the name of Nicholas the Wonderworker, the temple icon in which was donated in the middle of the 19th century by Anna Davydovna Boratynskaya.

The alternation of 4 and 8-sided volumes, the stepped structure of the church itself, is consonant with the stepped architecture of the Syuyumbike tower, surpassing the watchtower in the richness of decoration.

Now here is the Museum of the History of the Statehood of the Tatar People and the Republic of Tatarstan.

Presidential palace

The Palace of the Kazan Governor is located in the northern part of the Kremlin, in the place where in ancient times there was the palace of the Kazan khans, and in the 18th century - the chief commandant's house. The building was built in the 40s. XIX century in the so-called. pseudo-Byzantine style. The project of the “house of the military governor with premises for the imperial apartments” was compiled by the famous Moscow architect K. A. Ton, the author of the project of the Grand Kremlin Palace and the Temple of Christ the Savior in Moscow. The palace consists of the main building and the circumference of services adjoining the courtyard. The construction of the palace was supervised by the architect A. I. Peske, sent from St. Petersburg, who rebuilt Kazan after the city fire of 1842. The interior decoration was carried out under the guidance of the architect M. P. Korinfsky, one of the architects of the Kazan Imperial University complex. The center of the main facade is a risalit, completed by a front with three keeled arches, possibly similar to the architecture of the Khan's palace. The building has two porches on 2 order columns with arched doorways. The first and second floors are divided by a row of order pilasters and arched window openings. The façade is a semicircle in plan and has a passage to the courtyard of the palace. The eclectic decor of the building combines elements of Russian classicism (corinthian division, rustication of the 1st floor, general symmetry), baroque (unfastening of the entablature over the beams of columns of the main risalit, the nature of the pediments of the porticos) and Old Russian architecture (hanging weights of the twin arches of the windows of the 2nd floor, keeled zakomaras of the central risalit, the nature of the figured supports of the arched suspension passage to the Palace Church).

During the Soviet period, the building housed the Presidium of the Supreme Council and the Council of Ministers of the Tatar ASSR. Currently, it is the residence of the President of the Republic of Tatarstan.

Kul Sharif Mosque

The fraternal building has been preserved in the northern part of the monastery; a brick fence on the eastern side of the monastery, the temple of St. Nicholas the Ratny reconstructed in the forms of the 19th century (which served as a teahouse in the military unit located here in Soviet times); basement of the Cathedral of the Transfiguration blown up in the 1930s; the foundation of the monastery bell tower destroyed after 1917 with the church of St. Barbarians in the lower tier, the foundation of the church of St. Cyprian and Justinia.

The building of government offices (provincial office)

The 2-storey building of the governor's office - government offices - is located on the right side of the main Kremlin street and the Spasskaya Tower. The project was drawn up by V. I. Kaftyrev, who was sent by the Senate to Kazan in 1767 to detail the general plan of the city, developed by the commission of St. Petersburg and Moscow after the great fire in Kazan in 1765. The second floor was the main one, where senior officials and important visitors climbed the main staircase, and where the “audience” hall was located in front of the “judicial chamber” - the central hall with 4 windows. Adjacent to it were the "secret" and "secretary", in the remaining rooms were "principal servants". The building has a basement floor with vaulted rooms. For passage to the extended courtyard between the building of government offices and the eastern spindle Kremlin wall, the building has two through passages dividing the building into 3 sections. On the north side of the building adjoins the building of the former Consistory.

Cannon yard complex

The ensemble of the cannon yard consists of four buildings. One of the largest Russian factories for the manufacture and repair of artillery pieces was located here. The Kazan cannon factory contributed to the victory of Russian weapons in the war of 1812. After the fire of 1815, the factory ceased to exist. Recently, the Museum of Weapons - the Spirit of the Warrior was opened here.

Consistory building

The building of the spiritual department in the XIX century. In Soviet times, the building housed the Ministry of Health of the TASSR.

bishop's house

Arena

The drill arena for conducting the exercises of the Kazan Military School was built in the 1880s according to the project of 1881, made in St. Petersburg. The engineering solution of the roof of the building made it possible to cover a significant area (18 x 56 meters) with single-span truss structures. After the 2003-2006 Restoration in the building is supposed to arrange storage and reading room of the Museum of Ancient Books and Manuscripts.

Guardhouse building

It is located in the southeast corner, to the right of the main entrance of the Spasskaya Tower. The building was built in the 19th century on the site where, since the 18th century, there was a stone storehouse - a warehouse of military property at the provincial office, which stood nearby. The architecture of the building is extremely ascetic.

Lost buildings and structures of the Kazan Kremlin

• The 17th century bell tower of the Annunciation Cathedral (destroyed in 1928, had 5 tiers and served as a storage place for the largest bell of pre-revolutionary Kazan),
• Transfiguration Cathedral (blown up in the 1930s);
• Bell tower with St. Barbarians in the lower tier (destroyed after 1917),
• Church of St. Cyprian and Justinia.

Archaeological research of the Kazan Kremlin

The basis for archaeological research was laid in the 19th century by Kazan local historians, professor of KSU (now KFU) N.P. Zagoskin and P.A. Ponomarev, who studied the foundation pit on the site of the building of the Junkers School under construction. Significant archaeological excavations were carried out in the 1920s. N. F. Kalinin and N. A. Bashkirov. Systematic studies conducted since 1971 under the leadership of L. S. Shavokhin and A. Kh. Khalikov made it possible to determine the stratigraphy of cultural deposits. In the 1990s, a number of archaeological studies were carried out, in particular, they did not confirm the version that the Cathedral of the Annunciation was allegedly built on the site of the main mosque of the Khanate: no archaeological foundations from the period of the Kazan Khanate were found under the cathedral.

Opening hours: daily from 08:00 to 20:00.

History of the Kazan Kremlin

In the oarlock of the Volga and Kazanka rivers one of most beautiful cities Russia - Kazan. The beginning of the history of the city is associated with the growth of the Bulgar kingdom and the development of the Volga-Kama basin by the Bulgars. In a strategically advantageous place, on the Kremlin hill, the first defensive structures were erected at the turn of the 10th-11th centuries. The fortifications were a palisade of logs pointed at the top and a four-meter ditch dug in front of it, more than fourteen meters wide and an earthen rampart three meters. The Bulgar city was called upon to protect against the raids of the Russian principalities on the Volga trade route. Over the next 250 years, the importance of the outpost of the Bulgar state increased many times, which led to the expansion of the city. Settlements began to appear outside the walls of the fortress. During the Golden Horde, Kazan lost its function as a frontier bastion, becoming the center of the trade routes of the middle Volga region.
Having survived the collapse of the Golden Horde, Kazan turns into the Kazan Khanate. This is no longer that small settlement within the walls of the fortress. The city spilled out beyond the boundaries of the fortress, surrounding the Kremlin hill with trading settlements, settlements of artisans. The number of residential buildings increased rapidly along with the number of townspeople. Architects were in a special position, whose hands created the uniqueness of the ancient city.Numerous mosques, high minarets, luxurious palaces rulers in their beauty combined the traditions of the Bulgar era and elements of Turkish and Italian architectural mastery. Muslim traditions served as the basis of the cultural life of the khanate. At that time, Khan's Kazan was a large city with a highly developed culture.

In 1552, the army of Ivan IV, after a long siege, turned the flourishing city into ashes. The surviving townspeople were evicted behind the fortress walls. The city and its environs were settled by Russian settlers. On the remnants of former glory, a completely different one quickly appears. Kazan. By the beginning of the 17th century, the area of ​​the settlements had doubled, and the walls of the Kremlin would forever take on today's outlines. The city turns into administrative center large assigned territory. Kazan becomes one of the most impregnable citadels of the now Russian Empire. Ivan IV sent Yakovlev and Shiryai to restore the city, who built St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow. By the end of the 16th century, there were no more wooden defensive structures left - stone ones were rebuilt instead.
As the Russian Empire grew Kazan Kremlin lost the military component, acquiring the administrative one. The Pugachev uprising delivered the last military upheavals to the Kazan Kremlin. The rebels shelled the Kremlin with artillery for two days, but they were never able to capture it. The city architecture, as well as the internal buildings of the Kremlin, were finally formed by the middle of the 19th century - in this form they have survived to this day.

The complex of buildings of the Kazan Kremlin

Spasskaya Tower

The front gate to the fortress is located in Spasskaya tower. The same architects Yakovlev and Shiryay erected the tower in 1556. Its height is 47 meters. There is a straight arched opening in the tetrahedral base. The fourth octahedral tier, with arched openings on each side, is a belfry in which an alarm Kremlin bell. From here - from a height of 30 meters - a wide view of the whole of Kazan opens. A brick cone with a five-pointed star is laid out on top. In the third - also octahedral - tier there is a chiming clock. It is noteworthy that the first clock, installed in the 18th century, was arranged on the contrary - the dial rotated around static hands. In 1780 they were changed to a traditional counterpart. The clock now on the walls of the Spasskaya Tower was installed in 1963. While the chimes begin to beat, the snow-white walls are painted crimson.

Spaso-Preobrazhensky Monastery Complex

In the southeastern part Kremlin there is a monastic complex, in its center is the skeleton of the destroyed in the 20s of the last century Cathedral of the Transfiguration. At the foot of the central wall of the cathedral is the cave of the monastery, which has served since 1596 as the resting place of the Kazan wonderworkers. The fraternal building borders the monastery fence. Monastic cells were built in 1670. Later, the treasury house and the gallery were completed. The church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker of the Armed Forces and the chambers of the archimandrite are located near the western fortress wall. The church building was reconstructed in 1815 according to the project of A. Schmidt, while the basement of the 16th century was preserved.

Presences

The provincial office, the project of which was developed by the Moscow designer V.I. Kaftyriev, appeared on the land of the Kremlin at the end of the 18th century. There are offices for receptions and living rooms of the governor's family. On the second floor at one time there was a chic throne room with choirs for musicians. In the place where in the XV-XVII centuries there was the Sovereign's Court, in the middle of the XIX century a guardhouse was built. Today, the rooms of the former office house the Department of External Relations of the President of the Republic, the Arbitration Court and the Central Electoral Commission.

Junker School

To the left of the court building there is an arena built according to the same project as in St. Petersburg. The building was used for military training. Today, the Institute of Literature and Art named after Ibragimov is located within its walls. Behind the arena is the school building itself. The architect Pyatnitsky built it as a barracks for cantonists. In 1861, the building was transferred to the military department, which opened a cadet school on its basis.

Hermitage-Kazan

The exhibition center is located on the third floor of the school. Exhibits of painting, graphics, arts and crafts, historical and cultural collections are exhibited here. The Center has a signed cooperation agreement with the State Hermitage Museum. Cycles of thematic lectures are held in the lecture hall of the center.

Museum of Natural History

In the halls of the museum there are expositions that tell about the diversity of the fossils of our planet, the history of the evolution of vertebrates. Also, the exhibits allow you to see the path of the Earth from the moment of birth to the end of the Carboniferous period, to replenish basic knowledge in the field of astronomy.

Museum-Memorial of the Great Patriotic War

The museum will tell about the contribution of Tatarstan to the victory over Nazi Germany. There are expositions of personal belongings of the heroes, captured weapons, finds of search expeditions to the places of fierce battles. There is an electronic database of 430,000 countrymen who were captured and died on the battlefields.

Khazine Gallery

The National Art Gallery occupies a large part of the building of the former Junkers College. Works of the Kazan art school are exhibited within the walls of the building. The exhibits of the founder of Tatar professional art Baki Urmanche and the Soviet artist Haris Yakulov occupy a special place in the gallery. In the works of artists, a two-century period of the historical development of the region can be traced.

Kul Sharif Mosque

The main mosque in Kazan is located in the courtyard of the school. Four minarets are directed to the sky at 57 meters, and the capacity of the building is one and a half thousand people. The minarets are made in turquoise color, which gives the complex a light image. In addition to the mosque, the complex houses a large open library-museum of Islam, the imam's office and a publishing center. A small rounded building with a turquoise dome on the south side of the mosque is nothing more than a fire station, stylistically related to architectural ensemble. Kul Sharif was created in 2005 - as a recreation of the legendary multi-minaret shrine of the Kazan Khanate. The amount needed for the construction of the mosque was donated by the citizens and enterprises of the city. In 1552, the last defenders of Kazan died in a battle with the Russian army near its walls. The name of the last imam Kul Sharif, he defended his city to the last breath and died.

Artillery Yard

Behind the school and the mosque is the Cannon Yard, namely its southern building. It is the oldest building of the ensemble - it appeared at the beginning of the 17th century. In the 19th century, an artillery factory began to operate here. Restoration was carried out here last year. The creation of the museum exposition has begun Cannon Yard a. Now the complex hosts permanent exhibitions, chamber performances and demonstrations of fashion collections. Next to the southern building there is a fragment of a brick building on a stone foundation. The depth of the object corresponds to the Khan era of the Kremlin. In those years, houses and buildings were erected here.

Blagoveshchensky cathedral

Blagoveshchensky cathedral is the oldest stone building in Kazan, which has come down to our times. It was consecrated in 1562. The lines of the cathedral clearly trace the trends of Vladimir, Pskov, Moscow and Ukrainian architecture. Initially, the helmet-shaped domes on the side domes were replaced in 1736 with bulbous ones. The central dome is made in the Ukrainian baroque style. In the basement of the main part of the temple organized a museum of Orthodoxy of the Volga region. A short distance away is the house of the bishop - it was built on the site of the palace of the Kazan bishops in 1829. The ensemble is closed by the consistory, which was rebuilt from the bishop's stables. In the center there is a small cozy square, where after the attraction is included in the list world heritage the international organization UNESCO erected a monument to the builders of the Kazan Kremlin.

Governor's Palace

The complex was built in 1848 - as a cloister for the Kazan governor with royal chambers for distinguished guests. Supervised the construction of K.A. Tone, who became famous for his work of the Cathedral of Christ and the Grand Kremlin Palace in the capital of Russia. On this very spot stood the Khan's palace ensemble. The second floor of the palace has a transition to the Palace Church. Previously, it was called Vvedenskaya, it was built in the 17th century. A museum of the history of the statehood of the Tatar people has been opened inside the church building, and the president of the Republic of Tatarstan now lives in the governor's palace.

Tower Syuyumbike

Tower Syuyumbike is a symbol of Kazan. The name belongs to the Tatar queen - the wife of the last two khans of Kazan. According to legend, Ivan the Terrible, having heard about the unearthly beauty of Syuyumbika, sent his messengers with a proposal to become the Queen of Moscow. Having been refused, the formidable tsar captured Kazan. The proud girl agreed to the proposal of the king, but put forward a counter condition: that in seven days there should be a tower that would dwarf all the minarets of the city in height. Ivan the Terrible fulfilled the desire of his beloved. During the feast, Syuyumbike wished goodbye to take a look at her native city from a height new tower. Climbing to the highest platform, the proud girl rushed down like a stone. This story may explain the fall of the tower - the builders were in a hurry, and they calculated the foundation incorrectly.
Outwardly, it resembles the Borovitskaya tower of the Moscow Kremlin. Reliable data on the time of appearance of the attraction has not been preserved today. The tower consists of five tiers, decreasing in size. The last levels are octahedrons topped with a tent in the form of a truncated octahedral pyramid and a spire with a gilded crescent. From the ground to the spire - 58 meters. In the last century, three large-scale reconstructions were carried out due to the fall of the tower. The deviation of the spire from the vertical today is 1.98 meters.

Taynitskaya tower

Down from Syuyumbike stand Taynitsky entrance gate. This name was given to the gate because of the dungeon leading to the source, which was used by the inhabitants during the siege of the city. Previously, the tower bore the name of Nur-Ali (the Russians called it "muraleeva"), it was blown up during the capture of the Kremlin. It was through these gates that Ivan IV entered the Khan's monastery lying in ruins. The tower was restored, but received architectural processing in the 17th century. Now on the upper tier there is a cafe "Muraleevy Vorota".

Kazan Kremlin can not leave indifferent any of its visitors! The interweaving of cultures and epochs here comes out and takes on a material form that you can touch, and therefore feel belonging to.