Unusual stories about the Kremlin. Interesting facts about the towers of the Moscow Kremlin

Interesting facts about the Moscow Kremlin tell the secrets and history of this building. The Kremlin is the oldest part of Moscow and the main building of history, culture and politics. At the moment, the Moscow Kremlin is the official residence of the Russian president. What is interesting and remarkable about this building?

Previously, the place on which the Kremlin is now built was called Borovitsky Hill.. Archaeologists have found settlements of people who lived at that time. The finds date back to the 2nd century BC. All this testifies that the place of the Moscow Kremlin used to be the center of life for people. During paganism, Borovitsky Hill was the Witch's Mountain. Gods were worshiped on it, various rituals were performed.
This building contains more secrets than many people think. In addition to the main building, which everyone sees, there is also a dungeon. The secret passages of the Kremlin are being studied by experienced archaeologists. Interestingly, the underground labyrinths of the Kremlin and the Garden Ring are interconnected. Archaeologists have discovered a whole underground capital. From the Kremlin dungeon, you can get to the Sparrow Hills.
In the 17th century, hanging gardens were located on the territory of the Kremlin. There were two large gardens and several smaller ones. They grew fruits, nuts, and there was a real reservoir. Water was supplied to the gardens from a water tower.
Now everyone sees the Kremlin in red. Initially, when it was just built, it was also red. However, in the 17th century it was made white. One playwright described the Kremlin in these words: "The white paint that hides the cracks gives the Kremlin the appearance of youth, erasing its past." During the World War, a proposal was made to repaint the Kremlin to camouflage it. On it they painted the walls of houses, holes in windows. Well, it was returned to the red color after the end of the war.
Today, the Moscow Kremlin occupies a leading position among the fortresses of Russia. It is considered the largest, and not only in Russia, but also in Europe.
Always on the Kremlin chimes exact time. The answer to this question lies underground. The cable from the chimes is connected to the control clock at the Moscow Institute of Astronomy.
Initially, the Kremlin was decorated with two-headed eagles.. But in 1935 they were changed to ruby stars.
The weight of one star is a ton. They are able to withstand strong winds and hurricanes. When there are windy days in Moscow, the stars rotate, changing their position, turning sideways to the wind.
The Alhill Group appraised the Kremlin, its price was $50 billion.
In the days of the tsars, anyone could visit the territory of the Kremlin. Tickets were also issued to visit the Kremlin palaces.
Now the Kremlin is the center of Moscow, a sensitive facility. Interestingly, until the middle of the last century, Muscovites lived in it. In 1955, a law was passed prohibiting residence in the Kremlin. The last inhabitants of the Kremlin left it in 1962.
The Museum of Applied Arts was opened in 1955, everyone could visit it. Another grand building on the territory of the Kremlin is the Palace of Congresses. But he is not taken seriously, they say, against the background of other buildings, he is like a "glass".
Like all ancient buildings, the Kremlin is full of secrets. Basically, all the secrets and mysteries are connected with the dungeon. There is no exact map of the dungeon, it is lost. Archaeologists have not been able to study many corridors until our time. In the dungeon, there was the library of Ivan the Terrible. However, many books and documents were never found. There is an opinion that it simply burned down, or lies in one of the unexplored corridors.
When Napoleon Bonaparte attacked Russia, the Kremlin suffered huge damage. The French invaders were looking for valuables, they looted churches and burial places. And when Napoleon retreated, he partially blew up the walls and towers. The Kremlin was restored only in the 18th century. The October Revolution also brought destruction. The Kremlin was bombarded.
The Kremlin has 20 completely different towers. Each of them has its own history, name. They were rebuilt in the same style, of which the Nikolskaya Tower stands out. It is made in the Gothic style.

We hope you liked the selection of pictures - Interesting facts about the Moscow Kremlin (15 photos) online of good quality. Please leave your opinion in the comments! Every opinion matters to us.

02.01.2018

The Moscow Kremlin is perhaps the most famous landmark in Russia, and St. Basil's Cathedral standing next to it on Red Square is the most recognizable symbol of the country. Foreign tourists come here without fail and residents of the city come with pleasure. The Moscow Kremlin is famous not only for its colorful architecture and historical value, but also for its mysterious legends, curious facts and interesting rumors.

The walls of the Kremlin are built in the shape of a triangle. According to legend, at this place, on the way from Kiev to Vladimir, Prince Yuri Dolgoruky had a vision - a motley three-headed beast, and the Greek philosopher accompanying him explained that this meant the appearance of a triangular-shaped fortress city, where people from different tribes would flock.
The first walls of the Kremlin were built in the 13th century from logs and covered a site with a perimeter of about 850 meters and an area of 3 hectares, inside which all of the then Moscow was located.
White stone walls appeared under Dmitry Donskoy in the 14th century, because wooden ones were unstable before fires, and a century later they were replaced with red brick ones.
The Kremlin towers were built primarily for defense, so some were equipped with drawbridges or even traps: an iron grate lowered and closed the exit as soon as the enemy passed through the gate into the tower.
St. Basil's Cathedral is sometimes considered part of the Moscow Kremlin, but it is located outside the walls - opposite the Spasskaya Tower and is not a single 10-domed temple, but 9 separate single-domed churches surrounding the high central one itself. Each has its own name, and among themselves they are connected by transitions.
Of the 20 towers of the Kremlin, all have their own name, except for two, respectively, the 1st and 2nd Nameless.
Initially, the towers were named after the boyars or builders of fortresses, as well as nearby churches.
The Spasskaya Tower was called Frolovskaya - in honor of the temple on Myasnitskaya Street, where its gates went.
The legend about Napoleon's stay in Moscow is connected with the Spasskaya Tower. At first he tried to drive through the gate on horseback and in a cocked hat, but the headdress was blown away by the wind: the entrance was considered holy because of the icon of the Almighty Savior (Smolensky), located above the arch, it was forbidden to drive or pass with a covered head. And when trying to set fire to the tower, the wick was flooded with a gushing downpour. And the whole military campaign, as you know, ended ingloriously.
The icon hanging on the Spasskaya Tower was considered lost since the 30s of the XX century, but in 2010 it was found, moreover, in its place, above the gate, where it should have been. The image was skillfully hidden behind a metal mesh and plaster in order to save it from destruction. The icon was discovered with the help of probing.
The Taynitskaya tower got its name from a secret well with water. The entrance to the fortress through it was equipped very cunningly: breaking through the gate from the side of the river, the enemy only got into the outhouse-firing room, and the real passage was located on the side.
In 1613, the first pressurized water supply system in Russia was built in the Kremlin - in the Vodovzvodnaya Tower. With the help of a lifting mechanism (the wheels were rotated by horses), water rose through pipes into a stone tank, and from it was distributed to all the fortresses.
Until 1831, between the Blagoveshchenskaya and Vodovzvodnaya towers, there was a Port Washing Gate: a small passage through which laundresses made their way to the river. The remains of the opening can be seen from the inside of the wall.
The Kutafya Tower is the only entrance to the Kremlin open to visitors. Trinity Bridge leads from inside the fortress. Now the Alexander Garden is spread under it, and once the river Neglinka flowed.

The Moscow Kremlin keeps many more secrets and even slowly reveals them to our contemporaries. For example, in 2007, during the excavations, 5,000 different historical relics were discovered, including medieval birch bark letters. And these are certainly not the last finds that can tell about ancient Moscow.

Every capital of the world has a howling architectural symbol. Moscow also has such a symbol - the Kremlin. Many interesting facts about the Kremlin are described by Russian historians, writers, and architects. So, for example, Mikhail Fabricius, a soldier of the Russian Empire in the 19th century, devoted a whole series of books to this legendary architectural monument.

The most exciting facts:

In the 19th century, anyone could visit the Kremlin for the purpose of sightseeing. It was a kind of excursion;
Since the advent of Soviet power, more than 28 buildings have been destroyed on the territory of the Kremlin;
In the period from 1918 to 1955 the Kremlin was closed to the public;
Experts claim that the value of this unique property is 50 billion US dollars;
More than a hundred types of excursions are offered to tourists by Kremlin guides;
The Kremlin is the largest active fortress in Eurasia;
Until 1980, the Kremlin was not red, but white;
During the Second World War, the walls of the fortress were disguised as ordinary houses;
M-shaped battlements of the walls were characteristic of Italian defensive structures. In another way, they are called "dovetail";
They say that the spirit of Stalin and Lenin are frequent guests of the Kremlin;
Until the middle of the 20th century, people lived on the territory of the fortress. In 1955, such residence was banned. The last resident was evicted in 1962.

Kremlin towers

The Spasskaya Tower got its name due to the fact that it kept the icon of the Savior Not Made by Hands. Previously, the icon was located in the city of Khlynov. The holy image saved the inhabitants of the city from the plague. In the 17th century, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich decided that the icon should be kept in the Kremlin as a talisman. So in 1812, the image of Nicholas the Man-Made saved the tower from destruction.
Nikolskaya tower. It was named after Nicholas the Wonderworker, whose icon has been kept in the walls of the tower since its construction (1491). The holy image protected the tower from wars and destruction. And during the revolution of 17, the icon was not damaged at all, despite the fact that the tower was badly destroyed.
Moskvoretskaya and Troitskaya towers were the place of execution of the boyars during the reign in the 16th and 17th centuries.
The Constantino-Eleninskaya tower lost its defensive function and became a prison (15th century). The people called it "torture".
Royal tower. In the 17th century, Ivan the Terrible oversaw the torture and executions that were carried out for the amusement of the tsar.

Kremlin stars

It is not known exactly why the star became the symbol of the Kremlin. It was Leon Trotsky, who was fond of esotericism, who believed that the five-pointed star has powerful energy.

The installation of stars was not an easy task, since tower cranes that reached a height of more than 72 meters did not exist. Therefore, machine builders designed special cranes that were mounted on the upper tier of the towers. First, the double-headed eagles were dismantled, and then the five-pointed stars were installed. By the way, few people know why the double-headed eagle was a symbol of the Russian Empire for a long time. And here's the thing. When the Turks conquered Byzantium, Moscow became the Orthodox capital. Sophia Palaiologos (niece of the Byzantine prince) was given as a wife to Ivan III. Therefore, the coat of arms of Byzantium - the double-headed eagle - became the coat of arms of Russia.

Each star weighed over a ton. The architects were simply afraid that the tops of the towers would not withstand. Therefore, it was decided to reinforce the vaults of the towers with brickwork and metal structures. The stars were mounted on special bearings that allowed the stars to rotate in the direction of the wind.

This is far from an incomplete review of interesting facts about the Kremlin. The history of the monument is closely connected with the history of Russia. The fortress, together with the people, went through a difficult and thorny historical path, therefore it rightfully deserved to be a symbol of the capital.

1. Taynitskaya tower

The first tower, which was laid during the construction of the Kremlin, was Taynitskaya. The Taynitskaya tower is so named because a secret underground passage led from it to the river. It was intended to be able to take water in case the fortress was besieged by enemies. The height of the Tainitskaya tower is 38.4 m.

2. Vodovzvodnaya tower

Vodovzvodnaya tower - so named because of the car that was here once. She raised water from a well, arranged at the bottom to the very top of the tower into a large tank. From there, water flowed through lead pipes to the royal palace in the Kremlin. The height of the Vodovzvodnaya tower with a star is 61.45 m.

3. Borovitskaya tower

At the Vodovzvodnaya Tower, the Kremlin wall turns away from the river. Here on the corner stands another tower - Borovitskaya. This tower stands near Borovitsky Hill, on which a pine forest grew a long time ago. From him came its name. The height of the tower with a star is 54.05 m.

4. Gun tower

Once upon a time, ancient weapons workshops were located next to it. They also made precious dishes and jewelry. The ancient workshops gave the name not only to the tower, but also to the remarkable museum located next to the Kremlin wall - the Armory. Many Kremlin treasures and simply very ancient things are collected here. The height of the Armory tower is 32.65 m.

5. Kutafya and Trinity Towers

If we go a little further along the walls of the Kremlin, we will see the Trinity Bridge. It was thrown across the Neglinnaya River many centuries ago, even before it was hidden underground. Troitsky Bridge leads to the gates of one of the tallest Kremlin towers - Troitskaya.

6. Kutafya tower.

In the old days, this was the name of a clumsily dressed woman. The tower was decorated already in the seventeenth century. Prior to this, Kutafya was very harsh, with drawbridges at the side gates and hinged loopholes. She guarded the entrance to the Trinity Bridge. The height of the Trinity Tower with a star is 80 m. This is the highest tower of the Moscow Kremlin. The Kutafya Tower is only 13.5 m high. This is the lowest tower of the Kremlin.

7. Corner Arsenal Tower

From a distance, it seems round, but if you get closer, it turns out to be not so at all, because it has 16 faces. This is the corner Arsenal tower. Once she was called Sobakina, by the name of a person who lived nearby. But in the 18th century, the Arsenal building was erected next to it, and the tower was renamed. There is a well in the dungeon of the corner Arsenal tower. He is over 500 years old. It is filled from an ancient source and therefore there is always clean and fresh water in it. Previously, there was an underground passage from the Arsenal Tower to the Neglinnaya River. The height of the tower is 60.2 m.

8. Middle Arsenal Tower

It was built in 1493-1495. After the construction of the Arsenal building, the tower got its name. Near the tower in 1812 a grotto was erected - one of the attractions of the Alexander Garden. The height of the tower is 38.9m.

9. Nabatnaya tower

Once upon a time, sentinels were constantly on duty here. From a height, they vigilantly watched - if the enemy army was coming to the city. And if danger was approaching, the sentinels had to warn everyone, strike the alarm bell. Because of him, the tower was called Nabatnaya. The height of the alarm tower is 38 m.

10. Royal Tower

It is not at all like other Kremlin towers. There are 4 columns directly on the wall, and on them there is a peaked roof. There are no powerful walls, no narrow loopholes. But they are of no use to her. Because the tower was not built for defense at all. According to legend, Tsar Ivan the Terrible liked to look at his city from this place. Later, the smallest tower of the Kremlin was built here and called it the Tsarskaya. Its height is 16.7 m.

11. Constantino-Eleninskaya Tower

It was built in 1490 and used for the passage of the population and troops to the Kremlin. Earlier, when the Kremlin was made of white stone, another tower stood in this place. It was through her that Dmitry Donskoy with the army went to the Kulikovo field. The new tower was built for the reason that there were no natural barriers on its side outside the Kremlin. It was equipped with a drawbridge, a powerful diversion archer and a passage gate, which after, in the 18th and early 19th centuries. were disassembled. The tower got its name from the church of Constantine and Helena, which stood in the Kremlin. The height of the tower is 36.8m.

12. Senate Tower

The Senate Tower at first did not have a name, and received it only after the construction of the Senate building. After that, they began to call her the Senate. The tower was built in 1491, its height is 34.3 m.

13. Nikolskaya Tower

It was built in 1491. architect Pietro Antonio Solari to strengthen the northeastern part of the Kremlin, not protected by natural barriers. It had a gate, it had a retractable archer with a drawbridge. The name of the Nikolskaya Tower comes from the name of the icon of St. Nicholas, installed above the gates of her barbican. The height of the tower with a star is 70.4m.

14. Petrovsky tower

The Petrovsky tower was built to reinforce the southern wall, as it was the most frequently attacked. She received her name from the church of Metropolitan Peter at the Ugreshsky Compound in the Kremlin. The height of the tower is 27.15m.

15. Commandant's Tower

It was built in 1495. Its first name - Kolymazhna - received from the Kolymazhny courtyard of the Kremlin. In the 19th century, when the commandant of Moscow began to live in the Kremlin, not far from it, they began to call it Komendantskaya. The height of the tower is 41.25m.

16. Annunciation tower.

According to legend, the miraculous icon of the Annunciation was previously kept in this tower, as well as 1731. the Church of the Annunciation was attached to this tower. Most likely, the name of the tower is associated with one of these facts. In the 17th century for the passage of laundresses to the Moscow River, a gate was made near the tower, called Portomoyny. In 1831 they were laid down, and in Soviet times the Church of the Annunciation was dismantled. The height of the Annunciation Tower with a weather vane is 32.45 m.

17. Spasskaya Tower (Frolovskaya)

It was erected on the spot where the main gates of the Kremlin were located in ancient times. It, like Nikolskaya, was built to protect the northeastern part of the Kremlin, which had no natural water barriers. The passage gates of the Spasskaya Tower, at that time still Frolovskaya, were considered “holy” by the people. They did not pass through them on horseback and did not pass with their heads covered. Regiments marching on the march passed through these gates, tsars and ambassadors were met here. In 1658 The Kremlin towers have been renamed. Frolovskaya turned into Spasskaya. It was named so in honor of the icon of the Savior of Smolensk, located above the gate of the tower from the side of Red Square, and in honor of the icon of the Savior Not Made by Hands, located above the gate from the Kremlin. In 1851-52. a clock was installed on the Spasskaya Tower, which we still see. Kremlin chimes. Chimes are called large clocks that have a musical mechanism. At the Kremlin chimes, bells play music. There are eleven of them. One large one, it marks the hours, and ten smaller ones, their melodious chime is heard every 15 minutes. There is a special device in the chimes. It sets the hammer in motion, it strikes the surface of the bells and the sound of the Kremlin chimes sounds. The mechanism of the Kremlin chimes occupies three floors. Previously, the chimes were wound by hand, but now they do it with the help of electricity. The Spasskaya Tower occupies 10 floors. Its height with a star is 71 m.

The Moscow Kremlin is the largest surviving and active fortress in Europe. And like any fortress, the Kremlin keeps its secrets.

Why at this place?

People lived on Borovitsky Hill (where the Kremlin was later built) long before the founding of Moscow. Archaeologists have found on the territory of the Kremlin the sites of people who lived here in the Bronze Age, that is, the 2nd millennium BC. Near the Archangel Cathedral, sites from the Iron Age were also found, which may indicate that this place did not cease to be the center of life for a very long time.

The Vyatichi, who settled here in the 10th century, obviously did not come out of nowhere. Here, in a conveniently located place at the intersection of two rivers (Moscow and Neglinnaya), there were parking lots and ritual structures.

It is characteristic that in the pagan period Borovitsky Hill was called the Witch's Mountain, a temple was located here. It was on the site of the temple that the first Kremlin was founded.

Borovitsky Hill was an ideal site for the construction of a border fortification, since both water and land routes converged here: land roads led towards Novgorod and Kiev.

Underground Kremlin

In addition to the Kremlin, which is visible to everyone, there is another Kremlin - underground. The system of hiding places and secret passages in the Kremlin area was studied by many researchers. According to the research of the famous Russian archaeologist and researcher of "underground Moscow" Ignatius Stelletsky, underground structures under the buildings of the 16th-17th centuries located within the Garden Ring are connected to each other and to the Kremlin by a network of underground labyrinths.

And initially the plan of the underground capital was created by the Italian architects of the Moscow Kremlin - Aristotle Fiorovanti, Pietro Antonio Solari and Aleviz Novy. In particular, Stelletsky wrote: “All three architects, as foreigners, could not leave Moscow and had to lay down their bones in it ...” The archaeologist discovered a well-coordinated system of 350 underground points, thanks to which, for example, it was possible to get from the Kremlin even to Sparrow Hills.

Which Kremlin tower is the most important?

According to most people, the main tower of the Moscow Kremlin is Spasskaya, but is it really so? It is logical to assume that priority should belong to the tower that was built first.

The first of the towers of the modern Kremlin was Taynitskaya, founded in 1485. For the first time in Russia, brick was used for fortification construction. This tower got its name from the secret passage leading from the tower to the Moscow River.

For a long time, the Tainitskaya Tower was of great importance for Muscovites - on the feast of the Epiphany, a Jordan was cut through in front of it in the Moscow River. The royal exit to the Jordan was one of the most solemn ceremonies.
Until 1674, there was a striking clock on the Taynitskaya Tower, it was from here that the bells were rung in case of fire, until 1917 a cannon was fired from the Taynitskaya Tower every day at noon.
Why was the Taynitskaya Tower the first? This is due to the fact that the tower became the central one for the southern wall of the Kremlin, that is, it faced Jerusalem (because of this, the Jordan was cut through in front of it).

Leonardo and the Kremlin: what is the connection?

It is well known that the Kremlin was built by the Italians. Their names are well known. One of the main architects was Pietro Antonio Solari. He came from a family of architects who worked in Milan with Leonardo da Vinci. Worked with the great da Vinci and Antonio himself. Some historians, comparing historical evidence, do not even exclude the possibility that Leonardo personally participated in the construction of the Kremlin.

The first to put forward this hypothesis in the late 80s of the twentieth century was the historian Oleg Ulyanov, who spent his whole life dealing with the history of the Kremlin. There is no direct evidence of this theory, but more and more indirect evidence is being found, starting with almost exact matches in the drawings of a Florentine with rare elements of the Kremlin walls, to "blank spots" in da Vinci's biography from 1499 to 1502. Dmitry Likhachev showed great interest in the version of "Leonardo's hand".

hanging gardens

Few people know, but for a long time real hanging gardens were located on the territory of the Moscow Kremlin. Already in the 17th century, there were two large and several small (indoor) riding gardens on the roofs and terraces of palaces. According to Tatyana Rodinova, an employee of the Moscow Kremlin Museum, hanging gardens were located on the roof of the now-defunct Embankment Chambers on an area of 2.2 thousand square meters.

Here, not only fruits and nuts were grown, but also a pond with a mirror area of 200 square meters was arranged. In this place, the young Peter the Great received his first navigation skills. Since that time, even the names of those who were responsible for the "garden structure" have been preserved: Stepan Mushakov, Ivan Telyatevsky and Nazar Ivanov.

Water for the hanging gardens came from the Vodovzvodnaya Tower, where a mechanism was installed to raise water from the Moskva River. From the well installed in the tower, water was supplied through lead pipes to the Kremlin itself.

Red or white?

The Kremlin was originally red, but in the 18th century it was whitewashed in the fashion of the time. Napoleon also saw him white. The French playwright Jacques-Francois Anselot was in Moscow in 1826. In his memoirs, he described the Kremlin as follows: "The white paint that hides the cracks gives the Kremlin an appearance of youth that does not correspond to its form and crosses out its past." The Kremlin was whitewashed for the holidays, the rest of the time it was, as they liked to say, covered with a "noble patina".

An interesting metamorphosis happened to the Kremlin during the Great Patriotic War. In the summer of 1941, the commandant of the Kremlin, Major General Nikolai Spiridonov, proposed repainting all the walls and towers of the Kremlin - for camouflage. No sooner said than done. Academician Boris Iofan undertook the execution of the project: artificial streets were built on Red Square, walls of houses and black "window holes" were painted on the Kremlin walls. The mausoleum turned into a natural house with a gable roof.

The Kremlin became red again after the war, in 1947. The decision was made personally by Stalin. In principle, it was logical: red flag, red walls, Red Square...