All objects in Ryazan region (Russia). Lost Ryazan

There is no point in hiding that abandoned villages and other populated areas are the object of research for many people who are passionate about treasure hunting (and not only). There is a place for those who like attic searching to roam, to “ring through” the basements of abandoned houses, to explore wells, and much more. etc. Of course, the likelihood that your colleagues or local residents have visited this locality before you is very high, but, nevertheless, there are no “knocked out places”.

Reasons that lead to the desertion of villages

Before starting to list the reasons, I would like to dwell on the terminology in more detail. There are two concepts - abandoned settlements and disappeared settlements.

Disappeared settlements are geographical objects that today have completely ceased to exist due to military actions, man-made and natural disasters, and time. In place of such points one can now see a forest, a field, a pond, anything, but not standing abandoned houses. This category of objects is also of interest to treasure hunters, but we are not talking about them now.

Abandoned villages precisely belong to the category of abandoned settlements, i.e. towns, villages, hamlets, etc., abandoned by residents. Unlike the disappeared settlements, the abandoned ones for the most part retain their architectural appearance, buildings and infrastructure, i.e. are in a state close to the time when the settlement was abandoned. So people left, why? A decline in economic activity, which we can see now, as people from villages tend to move to the city; wars; disasters of various types (Chernobyl and its environs); other conditions that make living in a given region inconvenient and unprofitable.

How to find abandoned villages?

Naturally, before heading headlong to the search site, it is necessary to prepare a theoretical basis, in simple words, to calculate these most likely places. A number of specific sources and tools will help us with this.

Today, one of the most accessible and fairly informative sources is Internet:

The second quite popular and accessible source- These are ordinary topographic maps. It would seem, how can they be useful? Yes, very simple. Firstly, both tracts and uninhabited villages are already marked on fairly well-known maps of the Gentstab. It is important to understand one thing here: a tract is not only an abandoned settlement, but simply any part of the area that is different from other areas of the surrounding area. And yet, on the site of the tract there may not be any village for a long time, but that’s okay, walk around with a metal detector among the holes, collect metal garbage, and then you’ll get lucky. Not everything is simple with non-residential villages either. They may not be completely uninhabited, but may be used, say, as summer cottages, or may be occupied illegally. In this case, I don’t see any point in doing anything, no one needs problems with the law, and the local population can be quite aggressive.

If you compare the same map of the General Staff and a more modern atlas, you can notice some differences. For example, there was a village in the forest on the General Staff, a road led to it, and suddenly the road disappeared on a more modern map; most likely, the residents left the village and began to bother with road repairs, etc.

The third source is local newspapers, local people, local museums. Communicate more with the natives, there will always be interesting topics for conversation, and in between, you can ask about the historical past of this region. What can locals tell you about? Yes, a lot of things, the location of the estate, the manor’s pond, where there are abandoned houses or even abandoned villages, etc.

Local media is also a fairly informative source. Moreover, now even the most provincial newspapers are trying to acquire their own website, where they diligently post individual notes or even entire archives. Journalists travel a lot on their business and interview, including old-timers, who like to mention various interesting facts during their stories.

Don’t hesitate to visit provincial local history museums. Not only are their exhibitions often interesting, but a museum employee or guide can also tell you a lot of interesting things.

Ryazan. June 1st. State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company "Oka". There is no more life in these settlements, and in place of houses there is an open field. Over eight years, more than 350 ghost villages have appeared in the Ryazan region. There are even more where the inhabitants can literally be counted on the fingers of one hand.

In a thick woolen scarf and a warm vest with the same stick - at 87 years old her legs have become completely weak - Katerina Glebovna Stegunova sits for hours on the rickety porch and listens to see if anyone is coming.

There are few guests in Khripenki - a car shop on Sundays, and children and grandchildren from the city on visits. When the mosquitoes are completely gone, Grandma Katya will hide in the upper room and remember how big her native village used to be, with 120 houses in lace trim.

And then gradually everything began to disappear. Her neighbor from the hut opposite is also Katerina, only Arkhipovna, three years younger than her namesake. She is shy for the camera, but remembers how she worked as a milkmaid for 40 years at the local collective farm “Verny Put”, how prosperous the village was and what was left of it: there are only four residents in Khripenki: they are two women Katya, and grandfather Grigory and his son.

During his almost century-long life, Grigory Konstantinovich did not see anything - he devoted four and a half years to the war, which he ended on the Soviet-Japanese border. Then he worked - sowing, plowing, taking care, as he says, of the collective farm calves and sheep. And now all I have to worry about is stocking up on enough firewood and fixing the well.

Last year, under the state program to support veterans, a mine was dug next to the house, but the water is not the same - my son brings it from neighboring Mikhaly. But if there is still a glimmer of life in this village, then neighboring Goritsy has turned into a ghost village. There was one house, and even that burned down in the fires of 2010.

The village is very old; it was mentioned in written sources back in 1629. Even within the memory of the residents of Khripenok, Goritsy had a church and its own considerable parish. By historical standards, the village was alive only recently.

Collective farms died, schools closed, people left for the cities. According to the 2010 census, in the last eight years alone, dead villages in the Ryazan region have increased by 84%. There are now 361 settlements in the region where there is not a single inhabitant, and another 1,100 are on the verge of extinction. These include Khripyonki.

Katya’s grandmothers and grandfather Grigory are from here, from their native houses, which they built themselves and cut out patterned platbands with their own hands, of course, they will not leave anywhere. But new residents are unlikely to come here. And in the future, these ancient Ryazan villages, the salt and flavor of the Russian hinterland will remain only historical names on maps, attracting treasure hunters.

I want to tell you about the land of Ryazan, the Meshchersky region, which is rich in beauty and antiquity.

From Moscow to Ryazan on different roads and different estimates from 170 to 198 km.

I lived in the Lovech Hotel (as it is written in the Petit Futet guide – the main hotel of the city)! :-))) It has become even more modern (I already stayed there three years ago): Wi-Fi (wireless Internet) was added to the key in the form of a magnetic plastic card throughout the entire hotel (albeit with steep prices - 200 rubles per hour! ). But on the 7th floor there is an Internet cafe (50 rubles for 5 MB: approximately 40-60 minutes).

In the lobby above the elevators there are three clocks showing the time in Moscow, London and New York!

The cheapest single room (economy class) costs 1,300 rubles. The buffet breakfast, included in the price, is surprisingly generous (from cereals, sprats, pickled tomatoes smaller than olives to canned pineapples and peaches)!

But the roads in Ryazan were terrible and still are - there are such potholes and potholes on the central streets of the city that you feel sorry for the car and after ten minutes of driving you want to get out and move on foot. And what is characteristic is that this phenomenon is historical, one might say traditional; back at the end of the 19th century, local journalists wrote about Ilyinskaya Square (now Cathedral Square) that it was intended “to break the philistine legs... it has not been repaired or swept since the time of the Tatar invasion...”! :-)))

In terms of road quality, the Ryazan region ranks third in the country from the bottom!

The Ryazan region includes 25 districts, 4 cities of regional subordination: Ryazan, Kasimov, Sasovo, Skopin and 8 cities of regional subordination: Korablino, Mikhailov, Novomichurinsk, Rybnoye, Ryazhsk, Spas-Klepiki, Spassk-Ryazansky and Shatsk.

As of February 1, 2008, the population of the region was 1 million 163.6 thousand people. And it is constantly decreasing, since the number of deaths is 2.2 times higher than the number of births.

The area of ​​the Ryazan region is 39.6 thousand square meters. km, which is slightly less than Switzerland, but a third more than Belgium (and 6.5 times less than the Anadyr region of Chukotka)!

Currently, 510.8 thousand residents live in Ryazan.

There are several hypotheses about the origin of the word Ryazan: 1. From the name of the Mordovian Erzya tribe. 2. From the word “rezan” - this is the name of the pieces into which Arab dirhams were divided, which were in use in trade with Arab merchants. 3. From the word “cut”, because the Vyatichi who lived here were cut off from other principalities on the one hand by hordes of nomads, on the other by forests.

By far the most significant place in the city is the Kremlin. Entrance to its territory is free. The Kremlin is divided into two parts: the larger one belongs to the Ryazan Kremlin museum-reserve, the smaller one belongs to the active Spassky Monastery (enclosed by powerful walls with towers). Unfortunately, the museum administration and the diocese still cannot reach agreement on the issue of dividing the monuments. :-(

The Nativity of Christ Cathedral is the oldest stone structure in the Kremlin and dates back to the 15th century. Initially it was called Uspensky, then Old Uspensky, and finally in the 18th century it received its current name. Rebuilt many times. The cathedral contains the relics of a huge number of saints and even Ilya Muromets! I attended the service on Easter night.

The Archangel Cathedral was also built in the 15th century. It was the prince's house church and the burial vault of bishops. It burned several times and was restored again. Now the cathedral hosts an exhibition dedicated to ancient Russian art.

The Assumption Cathedral is very beautiful and is considered the most significant work of “Naryshkin (Moscow) baroque” architecture. It is an object of cultural heritage of federal significance. For its construction, the famous project of the Assumption Cathedral in the Moscow Kremlin was used (which, in turn, was based on the Assumption Cathedral in Vladimir!). Built by the famous Russian architect Yakov Bukhvostov. It was built over 6 years - from 1693 to 1699. Although it should be noted that the very first construction began back in 1648. Then in 1687 the builders changed. And in 1692, the almost completed cathedral collapsed.

The cathedral has a unique 25-meter iconostasis of 7 rows of icons, a total of 155! Unfortunately, the cathedral is only open in the summer and I was not able to see the iconostasis. :-(

The Church of the Holy Spirit was built in 1642 - the only building that has survived from the Dukhovsky Monastery, founded in the 15th century.

Spaso-Preobrazhensky Cathedral was built in 1702. It houses the state archive of the Ryazan region.

There is also a very elegant five-domed Epiphany Church, built in the mid-17th century. It houses the archives of the Civil Registry Office.

The Kurgan Bell Tower is the latest building of the Kremlin: it was erected from 1789 to 1840. Architects changed like gloves - Vorotilov S.A., Ruska L.I., Bindeman, Visconti and Ton proposed their projects; the final project was presented by the Ryazan governor N.I. Voronikhin himself, funding was periodically suspended. The height of the bell tower is 83.2 meters, the length of the spire is 25 meters. An observation deck is equipped on the third tier, offering a beautiful view of the Kremlin and Ryazan.

The Bishop's Palace, also known as Oleg's Palace (once the wooden palace in which Prince Oleg Ivanovich Ryazansky lived was located on this site), was built in the 17th century. This is the largest building in the Kremlin. Now there is a historical exhibition of the museum-reserve, which houses the chain mail of Prince Oleg and the staff of Peresvet (I’ll tell you about it below).

The singing building was built in 1658. It got its name because of the performances that the singers held here.

In the Kremlin there is also a hotel for the nobility (the theological seminary is located here), a hotel for the mob (exhibition halls and museum storage), a house for parables, stables, a carriage house, a consistory building, a barn, a forge, and a cooperage.

From Petrova Street, next to the Kremlin, there is a beautiful view of the Kremlin, the Trubezh River and the surrounding area. There is also a very beautiful (already almost completely restored) Spaso-Yarskaya Church. Nearby, perhaps, the most beloved monument to Sergei Yesenin by the townspeople is a must-visit place for all newlyweds. This fall (October 2) the monument will turn 33 years old. Yesenin is depicted as if buried to the waist, with a mournful look and arms spread out (people like to climb and sit on the right one).

I never tire of being amazed at how strong the Russian people are at making up their minds! In almost any city, monuments are overgrown with everyday stories and funny remarks are put into the mouths of the depicted heroes! In Ryazan they came up with the following. On Lenin Street there was a monument to Academician Pavlov, in whose mouth they put the phrase: “Well, Seryozha, how about a little?”, and Yesenin seemed to answer him: “So there’s nothing!” – the poses of both monuments are very consistent with such a dialogue (Pavlov’s right arm is energetically bent at the elbow, Yesenin’s arms are spread to the sides)! :-))))))))))))

I went to the regional art museum named after. Pozhalostina I.P. (57 Svobody St.) – founded in March 1913. It has a very rich collection of paintings, which includes paintings by almost all famous domestic artists (Repin, Shishkin, Savrasov, Levitan, Surikov, Aivazovsky, the Makovsky brothers, Serov, Kramskoy, Tropinin, Korovin, Malyavin, Kustodiev, Saryan, Venetsianov, Perov and others ). There is even a painting by Jan Simon Peynas (c. 1583–1631) “The Prophet Elisha and the General Naaman,” who is considered Rembrandt’s teacher!

A separate exhibition of the museum is dedicated to icons (XVI-XIX centuries). One of the most ancient is the carved icon “Archangel Michael” (early 16th century) from the Church of the Intercession in the village of Putyatin, Sapozhkovsky district, Ryazan province. An extremely laconic, devoid of signs of naturalism, the austere figure of the archangel in armor, with a sword, with outstretched wings and a red cloak is inscribed in an ark with a complex profile. Until now, the relief depicting the Archangel Michael occupies a very special place in the art of the Ryazan region, and not only that. As far as we know, researchers have not yet identified a single carved icon on this topic.

There are also many pieces of sculpture; amazingly beautiful pieces of furniture and porcelain are on display (the Meissen porcelain is especially striking).

A funny moment: when I arrived (alone, unaccompanied), the only visitors to the museum were a lady and a teenager, who soon left. I wandered through the halls for about two hours, and during this time there were no more visitors (but there is a caretaker in each hall!). So, after an hour and a half, the director appeared, who at first simply watched me, talking with the caretakers, and then could not stand it, came up to me and, with an apology characteristic of a certainly cultured person, asked where I was from. I said that I was from Moscow. He said that he drew attention to me because I was looking too closely at the paintings. I immediately explained that I am not some kind of specialist or expert, but just look for myself, what is called “for the soul.” He said that he was very pleased and invited me to visit them again. It felt so nice... :-))))

Visited the museum-estate of Academician I.P. Pavlov. (Pavlova St., 25-27). A very interesting museum of an outstanding scientist Nobel laureate - I recommend it to everyone! In addition to the house in which the Pavlov family lived, there is another one, the exhibition in which tells about Pavlov’s scientific activities, called the House of Science.

In recent years, Ryazan has been enriched with two sculptural monuments of horse riders - Prince Oleg Ivanovich Ryazansky on Cathedral Square and Evpatiy Kolovrat at the intersection of Lenin and Svoboda streets.

On Seminarskaya Street I liked the building (house no. 15), which will soon be 100 years old. Previously, the Romanov School was located here, and now it is the Faculty of Law and Political Science of the Ryazan Pedagogical University.

On the opposite side of the street (Seminarskaya street, 22/6) there is a museum of the history of airborne troops - it is considered one of the most interesting museums in the city. Much to my regret, I didn’t get into it because it was closed for renovations. :-(

I really liked the building of the former Ryazan Theological School (Sobornaya St., 7), built in the mid-19th century. Now the lyceum is located here. Not only is it beautiful, it is also literally imbued with history: the already mentioned first Russian Nobel Prize laureate I.P. Pavlov studied here, and much later, the famous Soviet poet Konstantin Simonov; taught by another Nobel laureate, Alexander Solzhenitsyn; N.K. Krupskaya performed.

There are many beautiful wooden houses in the city.

In Ryazan there is a regional drama theater, which dates back to 1787! The building, located on Teatralnaya Square, is very impressive and monumental; somehow it’s hard to believe that it was built only in 1961. I went to the play “The Fool” based on the play by Lope de Vega - I liked it. Compared to Moscow prices for theater tickets, they are given for free here - a ticket in the first row of the stalls costs 350 rubles!

I was very amused by one information road sign, which, in principle, informs that the roads to the right and left lead to dead ends, but for some reason the dead ends are marked in different colors - one, as expected, is red, but the other is yellow! :-))) The version that it burned out in the sun does not stand up to criticism, because... in this case, both should have burned out. I showed a photo of this sign to the former head of the traffic police of the Ryazan region - he didn’t tell me anything shedding light on this mystery! :-)))))

I visited a small town in Russia - Kasimov. Population 33.9 thousand people. The distance from Ryazan is about 170 km (from Moscow about 280 km).

This city has a very interesting and rich history, which is only five years younger than Moscow (1152, by the way, like Kostroma)! He also owes his birth to the Suzdal prince Yuri Dolgoruky. It was then called Gorodets Meshchersky. In the 14th century, it, together with the Meshchera lands, became part of the Moscow possessions. In 1376, the Tatar-Mongols completely destroyed the city. The place chosen for the restoration of Gorodets was located slightly upstream of the Oka. It was then that it got another name - New Lower City (lower in relation to Moscow). This is where the current Kasimov stands. And it received this name in the 15th century in honor of the Tatar prince Kasim, who received it in 1452 from the Moscow prince Vasily II the Dark for providing military assistance in many battles, in particular against the khans of the Golden Horde. The area surrounding 200 miles around became the Kasimov Khanate, which was also called the Kasimov Kingdom.

It was quite unique. Firstly, unlike other Tatar khanates formed during the collapse of the Golden Horde, it was created by Moscow on its territory and was intended to protect the eastern borders of Rus'. Secondly, there was no dynasty of rulers here: they were all appointed and removed by the choice of Moscow sovereigns, based on political considerations.

At the same time, there was also a Russian town in Kasimov, ruled by a governor - there was a hut, a Pushkar courtyard, and a messenger courtyard. And since 1567, when Tsar Ivan IV the Terrible issued a charter to the residents of Kasimovskaya Yamskaya Sloboda, granting them self-government, a third, administrative part of the city took shape, directly subordinate to Moscow.

The Khanate was liquidated in 1681. Over the 229 years of its existence, 14 rulers from different Tatar dynasties were on the throne.

One of the most famous is Sain-Bulat, the great-grandson of the Khan of the Golden Horde Akhmat, who participated in almost all the military campaigns of Ivan the Terrible. In 1573, he converted to Christianity and was named Simeon Bekbulatovich. After baptism, he was deprived of the Kasimov kingdom, but Ivan the Terrible left him the royal title, and in 1575 Ivan the Terrible proclaimed him “Tsar and Grand Duke of All Rus',” as well as “Grand Duke of Tver.” Ivan the Terrible began to call himself “Ivan the Prince of Moscow” and “servant Ivashka.” Tsar Simeon, terrified of his unpredictable “subject,” did not dare to take a step without his sanction. All this, naturally, was nothing more than a political masquerade, and a year later Ivan the Terrible simply dismissed Simeon Bekbulatovich from his great reign and granted him an inheritance in Tver and named him Grand Duke of Tver.

In the center of the city on Sovetskaya Square stands the Ascension Cathedral, striking in its beauty. It was built in 1854-1862 according to the design of Voronikhin N.I. (the one who built the Kurgan Bell Tower in the Ryazan Kremlin).

I visited the local history museum (the main exhibition is in the building on Cathedral Square, 7/8) and climbed the minaret of the old Tatar mosque (Victory Square, 8; there is a branch there - the ethnography of the Kasimov Tatars). This mosque was built in 1467 (!) under the first Khan Kasim. From that building, only the minaret and the foundation of the mosque have survived. By the 18th century, the mosque itself had become very dilapidated and was dismantled. In 1768, responding to the petition, Catherine II ordered by decree “to build a mosque for the Tatars in that city for prayer...” and a new one-story mosque was built on the old foundation.

The high round minaret tower, built of roughly hewn stones, has an open area at the top, from where a beautiful panorama of Kasimov opens up. It is opened to visitors only in the warm season (after May 9) after drying.

In Kasimov there are two preserved tombs (tekie), also called mausoleums, remarkable for their antiquity.

The tomb of Shah Ali Khan dates back to 1555 and is located in close proximity to the mosque. Shah Ali was also an assistant to Ivan the Terrible and took part in the campaign against Kazan. In 1552, he married Suimbek (Syuyum-Bika), the widow of the Kazan Khan Safa-Girey. According to legend, Suimbeka was an intelligent and unusually beautiful woman (but they say that this does not happen!). :-)))))) In Kazan she enjoyed love and fame. Shah Ali was fat and ugly in appearance, but had strength of character and nobility of soul. This marriage was concluded for political reasons and Ivan the Terrible was interested in it. Maybe this circumstance influenced the fact that the spouses did not love each other. There is a legend that Suimbeka tried to poison Shah Ali by giving him a shirt of her work and bread. But he, warned in advance about his wife’s evil intentions, ordered to put a shirt on the criminal and throw bread to the dog - before his eyes the criminal died and the dog died. Shah Ali remained alive, but Suimbeka had to languish in the palace of the Kasimov king. Shah Ali died in 1567 and was buried in a tomb that he had built for himself in advance. In addition to Shah-Ali, his beloved wife Bulak-Shad and his closest relatives are buried there. One slab is unnamed; According to legend, the khan, having buried Suimbeka, did not order her name to be written on the tombstone so that it would be erased from the memory of descendants.

The second tomb of Avgan Mohammed Sultan, the son of the Khan of Khiva, was built in 1648 at the Staroposad cemetery on the eastern outskirts of Kasimov.

Visited the samovar museum. It recently opened (September 16, 2007) and there is no mention of it in the guidebook. And the museum is wonderful. This private collection is the second largest in the country (and probably in the world). The museum exhibits 548 (!) samovars, and the entire collection numbers just over a thousand! For a long time, in our country there was only one samovar museum in Tula. And now there are two of them; Moreover, the Kasimov collection is richer than the Tula one. By the way, there is another samovar museum in the world: it’s very difficult to guess where. In Iran!

The owner of the Kasimov collection, Mikhail Petrovich, has another one - bells, and plans to open another museum! It should be noted that Kasimov’s bells were famous in Rus' (now they would say they were a brand!) on a par with Valdai’s.

Kasimov is home to Europe's largest underground liquefied gas storage facility, owned by Gazprom - gas is pumped into natural voids where it is stored as a reserve.

I visited Mikhailov. Population – 19.1 thousand people. This is one of the oldest cities in Ryazan - according to legend, it was founded in 1137 by Prince Rurik Rostislavovich and named after his son Mikhail. It was first mentioned in chronicles in 1172. The secondary foundation dates back to 1551 - in the Nikon Chronicle there is the following entry: “In the same year - 1551 in the month of August, the Mikhailov city was erected on the Prona River, and the governors were Prince Alexander Ivanovich Vorotynsky, and Mikhail Petrov, son Golovin.”

Now the city is famous for its cement plant, the products of which were used in the construction of the Kashirskaya hydroelectric power station, the Moscow metro and the first nuclear power plants.

Near the village of Krasnoe there is an estate of the same name, which belonged to the favorite of Catherine II, Alexander Petrovich Ermolov (1754-1836). To the famous commander Ermolov A.P. he was a cousin. It is interesting because the architect was Vasily Ivanovich Bazhenov, perhaps the greatest Russian architect. His creation, filled to the brim with romanticism, is immediately recognizable (especially after visiting the Tsaritsyn complex in Moscow)!

Now the Krasnoe estate is a courtyard of the Moscow Sretensky Monastery, surrounded by a fence, and a combination lock is installed on the entrance gate, so it will not be possible to get there without an agreement with the management.

Many thanks to Father Vladimir, who was very kind and gave us the tour. A wonderful person; smart, charming, modest and kind... Not only is he responsible for the entire church economy, he is also the director of a boarding school in Mikhailov, where he has about 90 children, for two dozen of whom he is the official guardian, i.e. . in fact, not only a spiritual father, but also a temporal father. This despite the fact that he has two children of his own, 3 and 4.5 years old.

The main attraction of the estate is, of course, the barnyard. What a fantasy game! An absolutely round toy fortress in a pseudo-Gothic style does not at all look like a “barnyard”. When you look at it, you can’t even believe that this is not Tsaritsino, but the distant outskirts of Ryazan: it is so magnificent. In 2005, its restoration began (almost completed, but some work still remains to be done. Now it is a monastery skete in which the monk Father Hermogenes lives. I visited it - looked at the internal house church, leafed through albums with photographs in the monastery library, had a meal in the refectory (drank tea with sweets).

There is also a very beautiful wooden holiday house in the courtyard, in which the rector of the Moscow Sretensky Monastery, Father Tikhon, stays during his visits.

But the Church of the Icon of the Kazan Mother of God, richly red in color with green domes, can be seen without difficulty (from the outside, of course, but inside only when there is a service in progress). According to legend, the temple was founded in 1785-1786 by Catherine II herself, who gave money for its construction (on its pediment there was previously an inscription “From the generosity of Catherine the Great” - I saw this in old photographs in albums in the monastery library). The inscription has not yet been restored. But the church was consecrated only in 1810. Presumably the project was developed by Bazhenov, but the construction was carried out by another architect who made his own changes. Since Bazhenov died in 1799, he could not manage the construction. In the entire appearance of the temple, only the bell spans with built-in speakers remind of Bazhenov. So, it is possible that they used his project as a basis, but completely reworked it. Not only is the church quite strict, but it also has two bells, which is rare. Notre Dame Cathedral immediately comes to mind! :-))

Father Vladimir opened the temple and even allowed us to climb the bell tower. Inside there is a rather unusual iconostasis with an antique Greek style and marble columns - beautiful!

On the road from Spas-Klepikov to Kasimov there is the village of Gus-Zhelezny, and in it stands the Trinity Church, built of white stone and built in the first half of the 19th century, of amazing beauty and originality. The temple combines features of Baroque, Classicism and Gothic. The latter is especially striking, leading many to assume that this is the Catholic Church. There is an assumption that the author of this miracle was the same Vasily Bazhenov.

Pogost (Gusevsky or Gussky) is located 6 km from Gus-Zhelezny. Back in the 17th century, there were two wooden churches here. Now the St. Nicholas and Transfiguration churches have been preserved, as well as the bell tower, which I definitely recommend seeing - it is so charming and original. I admit honestly that I have not seen such beauty for a long time, and even in such an abandoned village. The bell tower is made in the Baroque style; On the first tier there are eight figures of saints on the walls, and eight more are located on the border of the 2nd and 3rd tiers.

Klepikovsky district is the largest in area in the region. There are 52 lakes on its territory; The largest lake in the region is Velikoye. Another lake, Beloye, has a maximum depth of 80 meters! In general, there are about 750 lakes and 875 rivers and streams in the region.

The central estate of the Meshchersky National Park is also located here. The park is located in the Klepikovsky and Ryazan districts. Meshchera is one of the most visited recreation areas in central Russia - and not for nothing, because the wealth of local forests, lakes and rivers with living creatures, fish, mushrooms and berries evokes very specific desires among hunters, fishermen and collectors of nature's gifts! :-))

The hunting industry here is not inferior to that of Zavidovo in the Moscow region (where Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev and other high-ranking officials of the state hunted); This is understandable, since it is headed by a person who went through the Zavidovo hunting school.

The city of Spas-Klepiki has only 12.9 thousand inhabitants. It received city status in 1920, but the village of Klepiki has existed as a populated area since the 16th century. The name comes from the Old Russian word klepik, which meant a knife (in another version - a wedge, a crutch).

The wonderful writer Konstantin Georgievich Paustovsky has the following lines: “...Nothing - not the purple fire of the Aegean Sea, not the pinkish marble and scarlet oleanders of Hellas, not the blue fairy-tale air of Sicily, not the golden dim haze over the immortal Paris - nothing can dull our memory of his country, but, on the contrary, brings it to an almost painful acuteness. I experienced this myself when, in the foggy pre-autumn gardens of Versailles, with their foliage blackened like old gilding, with their geometric splendor, I - I don’t know why at all - remembered the tiny town of Spas-Klepiki, and my heart ached... I’m not afraid to admit that the poetry of a sleepy summer day in such a town was closer to my heart than the majestic desertion of the Versailles gardens...”

There is still a second-class teachers' school in the city, where Sergei Yesenin studied from 1909 to 1912.

Not far from Spas-Klepikov there is a museum of wooden architecture at a children's school, which teaches artistic woodworking. Alas, I didn’t have a chance to visit there (I just drove by), but a friend who had been there said that the children’s work was beyond childishly impressive! :-)))

I visited the urban village of Shilovo, located 100 km from Ryazan. The date of formation is considered to be 1388. The population is 16.2 thousand inhabitants, but they do not want to receive city status, so as not to lose benefits for rural settlements! :-)))

The village is quite clean, there are many flower beds, and it is not for nothing that in the competition for the cleanest settlement in the Ryazan region, it repeatedly became the winner (in 2003-2005 it took 1st place)!

As local resident T. Gracheva wrote:

My village is called Shilov.
Not rich, not famous, not great,
But, as we have been doing for a long time,
The spool is small but expensive.

In Shilovo there is a very beautiful Assumption Church of the 19th century.

Also in the village on Sovetskaya Square there is a monument to the legendary Russian hero Evpatiy Kolovrat, a native of these lands.

On Evpatiya Kolovrata Street there is an original arch with a sculptural composition suspended inside it.

There is even an Internet club in the village!

As always, Sberbank is different from everyone else, located in a nice brick building with a tower.

I visited the local history museum. The guide said that in this territory in the first millennium AD. the state of Artania was located, interesting because... almost nothing is known about it. Everyone who fell into it did not return alive. :-) Its existence is known from fragmentary information left by Arab travelers. The director of the museum has a very colorful appearance - a smooth skull, a large beard and glasses. It is clear that the man is in love with his work; Together with another equally obsessed employee (and also with a big beard!), he invited me to see the open-air exhibits, among which stands out the wave stone, which is about 350 million years old. The impression is that a small wave (more likely just a ripple on the water) has petrified! He told funny stories about this stone and the priest who got it somewhere.

Believe it or not, the village even has its own anthem, the author of the lyrics and music for which is V. Novoselova. It contains these lines:

And in Shilovo the people laugh more heartily,
The sky above us is getting higher and clearer.
Let the march about Shilov touch people's hearts
And it brings faith in the best for all people.

How nice it is that provincial towns and villages are being revived and there are still people in them who are making every effort to revive the original Russian traditions and not allow everything that our ancestors have created over the centuries to sink into eternity.

In the village of Sreznevo, not far from Shilov, Izmail Ivanovich Sreznevsky, a scientist, philologist, the first doctor of Slavic-Russian philology in Russia, rector of St. Petersburg University, from whom N.G. Chernyshevsky, N.A. Dobrolyubov, D.I. Pisarev studied, was buried.

The territory of the Shilovsky district has the largest number of discovered ancient human sites. The region is the geographical center of the Ryazan region, as evidenced by a memorial sign with a tablet on a stone, installed near Shilovo.

In the village of Frolovo (along the highway to Ryazan, near the border with the Spassky district) a beautiful black marble stele was erected, again to Evpatiy Kolovrat. And next to it is a chapel. And in this village they installed a very funny pillar with indicators of directions and distances to different cities of the world, plus to the Moon and to the Sun!!!

I went to the city of Skopin, the date of its formation is considered to be 1597. Although there is an assumption that it is much older, since the “List of Russian cities far and near”, dating from 1387-1392, mentions the town of Lomikhvost. And this is exactly what the osprey was called (by the way, it is listed in the Red Book of the Russian Federation!) because when it attacks a fish above the water, it sharply brakes and its tail seems to break. And archaeological research indicates that a settlement near Skopin existed already in the 12th century.

The population of Skopin is 31.3 thousand people. The distance from Ryazan is about 100 km.

The city is famous for its pottery industry, which dates back to 1640. I asked what was the reason for such an exact date. They explained that a local scientist, historian and local historian “unearthed” chronicles in which the first mention of the potter “Dyomka Kireyev’s son Bernikov” dates back to this year.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, there were 14 churches in Skopin - it was even called “Ryazan Suzdal”; Now only three are functioning, and even those in appearance cannot be called anything but deplorable. There were also 27 factories, or rather factories, because the number of workers in most of them, as a rule, was about fifty people. Among them there was even a bell factory, which cast small bells for churches and bells for horse harnesses.

There is an art ceramics factory in the city, which I was lucky enough to visit! There is a museum and a shop selling clay products at the factory. In the office of director Valentin Dmitrievich Telyshev, I counted 40 diplomas! I am very grateful to him and Nina Nikolaevna Kulakova for the tour of the factory and the opportunity to try to become a potter myself. Special thanks to the artist Natalya Viktorovna Godovikova for showing how, giving the opportunity and helping to mold a simple vase from clay on a pottery wheel. Having tried it, I can say that this is not as simple a matter as it seems at first glance! My vase was dried, fired and then given to me!

Every two years, the factory hosts international festivals of pottery art (three have already been held), which bring together pottery masters from all over Russia and neighboring countries.

Many wonderful artists work here, among whom are honored artists of the Russian Federation and State Prize laureates. Their works amaze with their originality and filigree of execution! They fulfill orders from different places, making products with the symbols of those who order.

I was given a table clock with the symbol of the city, an osprey bird, as a souvenir.

There are two museums in the city: local history and Russian pottery. The latter is located on the street. Lenina, 20 and opened on September 4, 2007 (therefore not yet noted in guidebooks) and today is the only one in Russia. The collection is represented by gifts to the museum from participants in the 3rd festival of pottery art and works by masters of the Skopin Art Ceramics Factory. For now, all the exhibits are housed in one room, but as the guide and curator Irina said, there are plans to expand and open another room.

And I arrived at the local history museum (Karl Marx St., 95 - a few meters from the pottery museum) at 16.45, when it was already closed, the alarm system was set (the museum is open until 17.00, the ticket office - until 16.30) and the staff, having dressed, was about to go home. Many thanks to acting. director Alexander Anatolyevich, who instantly took off his clothes without any extra persuasion and gave a wonderful (short, as he said!) excursion for a whole hour!

I visited the monastery of St. Demetrius of Thessalonica in Zarechny (formerly an independent village, now part of Skopin), located 17 km from the center of Skopin. According to legend, the monastery was founded by Dmitry Donskoy (at baptism he received the name in honor of Demetrius of Thessaloniki), who stopped here on his way back after the victory over Khan Mamai in 1380 and built a chapel on Demetrius Mountain. And now the most interesting fact associated with this monastery: the staff made of apple wood (“Peresvet’s club”) of one of the heroes of the Battle of Kulikovo, monk of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra Alexander Peresvet, was kept here, which he left here before the battle to one hermit! They say that under Peter I, many young nobles, entering military service, tested their strength by raising him. The staff was credited with healing powers for toothache, which is why its handle was chewed off. Now “Peresvet’s baton” is kept in the museum in the Ryazan Kremlin.

The monastic brethren here have always been small, as a rule, no more than 7-8 people (now even less). The abbot, Father Ambrose, was not there and Father Olympius gave a tour of the monastery. He showed both churches - the Holy Great Martyr Demetrius of Thessalonica and the Venerable Sergius of Radonezh. The first one was built in the early 1760s and was rebuilt several times - all services are now carried out in it. The second one was built in 1770 and is still being renovated - it has not yet been consecrated, but it is much more interesting architecturally and more spacious inside. Father Olympius and I climbed the bell tower, built at the beginning of the 19th century, from where a beautiful view of the surrounding area opens up - the monastery is located on a hill and you can see all directions of the world. The passage with the stairs is very narrow and it will be difficult for people with large dimensions to squeeze into it. There are no bells yet (expensive), but they are being replaced by beaters. A bell is a rectangular plate of metal suspended on ropes, just like a bell. They are made in different sizes and thicknesses, and as a result, each one produces different sounds, by the way, the beauty of the sound is not inferior to bells.

There are a lot of beautiful blacksmith works in the monastery - the gate at the entrance, the stairs and decorations at the entrance to the bell tower and the Temple of St. Sergius of Radonezh (a very naturally made vine with bunches of grapes).

The town of Spassk-Ryazansky is located approximately 50 km from Ryazan. Opposite it, across the river, is an old settlement called Old Ryazan (we got there by ferry in cars). It was there that the city of Ryazan was previously located, founded according to legend by the Kyiv prince Svyatoslav Igorevich in 965-966 during his campaign against the Volga and Caspian Sea, when he freed the Slavs of Poochya from tribute to the Khazars. The fortress ramparts of the 10th century found during archaeological excavations confirm this version. But the first mention of Ryazan was in 1095 in the Tale of Bygone Years. Prince Oleg Svyatoslavovich, grandson of Yaroslav the Wise, after an unsuccessful internecine struggle with the princes, temporarily went to Ryazan, where he built a fortress. Arab historians of the 11th century argued that after Kyiv and Novgorod, Ryazan was “the third center of the Russian land.”

Then it was called Pereslavl Ryazansky. And only when in 1237 Batu Khan burned the city to the ground and killed almost all the inhabitants, Ryazan settled where it is now. And archaeological excavations are carried out at the site every year. By some miracle, the remains of the city gate were preserved. Well, plus embankments - embankments. In general, the views of the area there are simply stunning. In Belinsky I.V. there are wonderful words about this very place: “What captivating and, one might say, the only views that Old Ryazan and its surroundings present. Imagine a high plain that ends in such a steep, inaccessible mountain that a walking person can barely climb it, and only in some places... If you stand on the mountain facing the Oka, then such a majestic and delightful sight will appear to your amazing eyes: the soles are steep, the fast Oka, covered with barges, proudly spreads under your feet; the low, almost level opposite shore with the Oka, yellow, sandy, like a boundless sea, is lost in its space and borders the horizon on the left side... Oh, with what delight, with what pride, standing on the aforementioned steepness, I surveyed these delightful views. These places deserve to have a capital city on them!”

The village of Spasskoye, which arose on the opposite bank of the Oka River, opposite Old Ryazan, was a serf village until 1764 and belonged to the Spas-Zarechensky Monastery. The village, which became rich, paid off the monastery for a lot of money and received the status of a city.

There is a local history museum in the city.

In the Spassky district there is the village of Izhevskoye, which is famous for the fact that this is how Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky was born. There is also his museum here, which I, of course, visited (which is surprising - there is not a word in the guidebook about the village or the museum!). The museum houses the real Soyuz-22 descent module.

And Tsiolkovsky, it turns out, was not just a genius of his time; he was able to anticipate many things that became known after his death. For example, the invention of the autopilot and the hovercraft was his doing. Long before space flights, he said that weightlessness would reign inside spaceships! It gives!!! :-))) More precisely, alas, he did. :-(

The story of his life was very, very sad. At the age of ten, he suffered from scarlet fever and became almost completely deaf, which is why he initially failed to finish school. But the guy was persistent: he began self-education (already in Moscow - in the library, which now continues to proudly bear the name of Lenin) and subsequently passed the exam to become a mathematics teacher as an external student. And then he taught at the gymnasium for 12 years!!! And the children obeyed him unquestioningly, not allowing themselves to use the fact of his deafness for their own tricks and pranks. He had a lot of his own children, but there was also a problem: most of them died in childhood, and one daughter even at the age of 22; only two daughters remained. I wonder if Tsiolkovsky had not suffered such a terrible fate (deafness at a young age), would he have become so great?..

On the territory of the Spassky district there is the only reserve in the region - the Oka State Natural Biosphere. It is one of the ten Russian nature reserves (out of 120) and was even awarded a diploma from the Council of Europe (only 4 Russian nature reserves and only 36 nature reserves in Europe have such a diploma; and if you consider that in England alone there are about 200 nature reserves, then you can evaluate this diploma by dignity). Created in 1938 with the main goal of preserving and increasing the number of muskrats (the Russian muskrat is listed in the Red Book of the Russian Federation).

The reserve has a wonderful nature museum (in the central estate in the village of Brykin Bor, 20 km from the village of Izhevskoye), where stuffed animals and birds are collected; Moreover, all of them are displayed on display in the form of a diorama. Sometimes you get the impression, especially if you look at the photographs (and I took almost all of them), that the animals are alive! :-)))

The reserve has a nursery where bison are raised and supplied to other regions and reserves. There is also a crane farm there, where they raise a wide variety of cranes (gray cranes, sandhill cranes, etc.), but the most valuable thing is the Siberian Crane (white crane), which in the whole world nests only here - wow! :-))) Although they also fly to other countries.

I took a boat ride on the Pra River - the view was like the Amazon! :-))) The fact is that the floods have flooded the area, and the trees are completely in the water - that’s why I remembered the Amazon (in a movie I once watched).

Spent the night at the reserve's hotel - in a large wooden house. The deputy director gave me the Red Book of the Ryazan Region, for which I am naturally very grateful to him.

In the same Spassky district there is the village of Kiritsy (about 55 km from Ryazan directly along the M5 highway to Chelyabinsk), where in the Derviz estate there is a children's health clinic for patients with bone tuberculosis. This is a real castle! By the way, everyone there calls him that. To be honest, I was stunned by the beauty I saw, because I could not imagine that in such a remote place you could see such beauty! :-))

Derviz S.P. - the son of a builder of the Moscow-Kazan Railway, being a wealthy man, could afford such luxury! :-) The estate was built in 1887-1889 by the famous architect Shekhtel. The ensemble of the estate quite organically combines pseudo-Gothic elements, ancient Russian tents and crenellated turrets - as a result, the entire structure looks like a cross between a Gothic castle and a Russian tower! :-)))))

Previously, there was everything here: a palace house, a horse yard, a church, hanging bridges over ravines, grottoes, a cascade of ponds. The estate has been restored for several years now, but they still cannot restore it completely. :-(((

I visited the village of Konstantinovo, the birthplace of Sergei Yesenin. A memorial house-museum of the poet was opened here in 1965. Yesenin was born in a different house, and this one was built in 1910 by his father on the site of the old one, which by that time was already dilapidated. Not far from it there is a nice “house with a mezzanine” that belonged to the local landowner L.I. Kashina, where Yesenin visited more than once and described it in the poem “Anna Snegina”. Now there is a museum here, which is called: the poem “Anna Snegina”.

And what gorgeous views of the Oka River from the high bank in Konstantinovo!

I went to the village of Poshupovo (about 50 km from Ryazan) and visited the St. John the Theologian Monastery. It was built at the end of the 17th century, but the very origin of the monastery dates back to the end of the 12th - beginning of the 13th centuries, when monks came to these places to baptize pagans. They brought with them the miraculous icon of the Apostle John the Theologian - one of the shrines donated by the Church of Constantinople as a blessing to the newly enlightened Russian land. This image became the main shrine of the monastery. He saved many times from various troubles and adversities. According to legend, through prayer before the icon, cholera was stopped in surrounding towns and villages in 1848 and 1892, and in 1865 the fire in Poshchupov was stopped. Ivan the Terrible's wife Anastasia gave birth here while traveling along the Oka River.

But the most amazing of the legends takes us back to the distant year 1237, when Batu Khan, having ravaged Ryazan, approached the monastery with the intention of robbing and burning it too. Suddenly, on the approaches to Poshupovo, Batu and his military leaders were struck by blindness (alas, temporary!). Then, in a dream, an old man appeared to Batu (this was the holy apostle and evangelist John the Theologian himself) and commanded: “Lift me up!” Khan found the icon and bowed to it, after which he regained his sight. Naturally, he immediately abandoned the execution of his criminal plan and left his golden seal on the icon, which was kept by the monks for 416 years (in 1653, when the image was temporarily in the old Assumption Cathedral of the Ryazan Kremlin, it was removed to gild the large water-blessing cup) . And in those days, perhaps, there were no cooler symbols of power - whoever has the seal is the ruler! :-)))))

St. John the Theologian Cathedral was built in the second half of the 17th century. In 1901, according to the design of the Ryazan architect Tsekhansky I.S. built a bell tower 76 meters high of extraordinary beauty. The largest bell on it weighed 545 pounds (almost 9 tons)!

The monastery houses the relics of Nicholas the Wonderworker, St. George the Victorious and other saints. Father was so kind that he not only told about the monastery, but also took him to the building where the monks’ cells are located; showed arks with the relics of various elders.

I visited the village of Elatma: only 3.5 thousand inhabitants, and the first mention dates back to 1381, when Dmitry Donskoy bought the village from the Meshchera prince Alexander Ukovich! There are several versions of the origin of the name: 1. Associated with the name of the Meshchera princess Elat. 2. Finno-Ugric – “scorched place”. 3. Tatarskoe - “a lively, comfortable place to live”!

In May 1722, Peter the Great visited here while passing through the second Azov campaign. By the way, even then there were more than 3 thousand inhabitants in Elatma! In 1778, Elatma was made a district town of the Tambov province; at that time it was the most industrial city in the province - there were glass factories, linen factories and several brick factories.

At the end of the 19th century, about 8 thousand people already lived in Elatma, there were 14 churches, 2 mosques, a synagogue, a zemstvo hospital, a city bank, a tannery, a rope factory, a candle factory, and a printing house. The decline for the city came in 1924, when, during the next administrative reorganization, Elatma lost its city status, becoming part of the Kasimovsky district.

I would like to express my gratitude to Anatoly Alekseevich Yazykov, Gennady Viktorovich Titov, Sergei Konstantinovich Epikhin, Vladimir Alekseevich Surin and many other hospitable and good people who helped me see the amazing places of the Ryazan region!

Oh, damn it, what kind of nature is it in the Meshchersky region - the soul is filled with some kind of animal subconscious joy when you see with your own eyes these lush green birch trees, steep cliffs with sandy beaches and sloping slopes, as if covered with green carpets, the blue expanse of rivers and lakes, especially in areas of spills. I would like to become a writer or poet and describe all this in order to at least give vent to my emotions, because a simple (purely informative) story does not free me from this charming captivity and does not allow the reader to fully experience the beauty of these places...

Go to this land, experience its beauty - you won’t regret it!..

Built in 1782 at the expense of the court councilor S. E. Sulmenev (husband of E. I. Chebotaeva). The church is in a dilapidated state. It is possible to climb to the roof of the temple, but be careful. In some places, floor tiles have been preserved. There is visible destruction inside. The dome is intact.

The temple was built in 1700. It is in disrepair: headless, deprived of a dome, used for many years as a water pump, worn out by time. The heavy tank of the water pump caused the wall to crumble. The other walls don't inspire confidence either; trees grow through them. The facade decor is painted. In the 30s, the temple was closed; it housed the garage of the Kostino state farm. The head of the temple and the bell tier were also dismantled in order...

In the south of the Ryazan land, 25 versts from the district town of Ryazhsk, on the left bank of the Khupta River, there once existed the village of Nikolskie Gai (Nikolo-Gai). The village got its name from the temple - the first known church, consecrated in the name of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, was built here in 1678. However, less than a hundred years later, in 1766, landowner Anna Borisovna Poluekhtova built a new wooden church. A little over a hundred years later in 1889...

Information about the village of Vnukovo in the Ryazan region begins to appear in the second half of the 17th century, and already in 1676 the Transfiguration Church, then still wooden, was listed in the village. The church building that has survived to this day was built in 1797 (parish registers that were kept in the parish have been preserved since the 1780s). According to available references in modern sources, the church was built at the expense of the local landowner P. S. Kondyreva. In the 19th century to the parish...

The church is located in the former Staronikolskaya settlement. Nowadays, mostly summer residents rest nearby, but surprisingly the church is not completely abandoned. There are icons and candles inside, next to the wall that was once the altar. It's quite clean inside. The church itself is square, made of red brick. The roof has not been preserved, the painting has also been lost. There was no plan for a bell tower. Not guarded, not fenced, entry is free.

The building was built in 1864. Before this, there was a wooden church on this site. In the 20th century, the temple was closed, and then it was converted into a granary, which lasted until about the 60s. The building was later completely abandoned. In the middle of the last century, the temple still had a dome, but it later collapsed. The building is a mess and piles of rubbish. There is zero security. The condition is in disrepair, although paintings on the walls have been preserved in some places. You can enter through...

The estate consisted of a manor house and industrial buildings located around it. The manor house was built in 1815 according to the design of the architect I. S. Gagin. Initially, the estate belonged to the merchants of the second guild, the Kazlinins. In 1815, the Kazlinins’ property was purchased at auction by D.K. Verein. His descendants owned the estate until 1894. Then it belonged to the merchant A.S. Zameshaev for a short time. In 1900, the estate was bought by...

The estate was built at the beginning of the twentieth century in the pseudo-Gothic style. It belonged to the merchant Sergei Postnikov. During Soviet times, school No. 84 was located in this building. Since 1991, the school has ceased to exist. Currently (July 2015) the building is abandoned. The interiors have not been preserved.

The third and final post about Pasha and I pavleg and Pasha dibazollll a trip to the east of the region.

1. In Akaevo Pasha pavleg I liked the well-preserved temple. He told about the church rotunda and altars, of which there are 3 (the cold main one, in honor of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and two warm ones - St. Basil and St. Martyrs Florus and Laurus).

However, who is E.I. Postelnikov, with whose funds this church was built in 1809, I think even Pasha did not know. Even more so to me) She didn’t say anything about it and the information was that she was the aunt of a certain prince V.I. Kushsheva:D

There are a lot of strawberries growing around the church. You can't see it here, but it's there)

2. You can climb the bell tower. After the revolution, like many places, the temple was closed. Now it has been reconsecrated and “renamed” from the Nativity of the Virgin Mary to Trinity. It’s not clear who they did it all for. There are not very many people around: there are about 5 residential buildings and a dozen residents left in the village.

But 100 years ago, the church parish had 517 households in 10 villages (or 3,300 people, including not only Russians, but also Mordovians and Tatars)

3. This is what the larger volume of the building looks like. The room under the dome is locked. I don’t know if services are held there

4. Several small bells hang on the bell tower. I wonder if they remained from old times or were they hung already in the 90s, when the temple was rededicated?

In general, bells in such places seem to be something unusual and beautiful. For some reason I imagined a church in gray, foggy weather. You spend the night in a village house and wake up from a ringing sound. Outside the windows is the silhouette of a church in the fog, drizzling rain and ringing, making the picture immediately more mysterious and colorful

5. Near the temple, in the thickets, the wooden remains of a parish school have been preserved. For some reason I didn’t take a picture of the general view, but inside the coat of arms of Saransk immediately attracted my attention - a fox with arrows.
The fox is a symbol of insight and cunning, the arrows are masculinity and determination.

6. An abandoned house nearby. Apparently the ivy feels great without its owners. Colorful)

7. We knock, no one is there. Let's go inside. Everything is rummaged and a mess

9. Nearby is a former street with the same abandoned houses.
Yes, by the way, the name of the village comes from the name of the first owner, and not from the surname of the former president of Kyrgyzstan)

These lands were granted to the Tatar Murza Akai Aituganovich Kugushev along with the peasants in 1639 “for the baptism of the Orthodox Christian faith”

10. The most famous natives of the village are the Ostroumov brothers, children of the rector of the temple Andrei Nikolaevich. Their house (or ruins) should have been preserved somewhere, but we couldn’t find it.

Philosopher Mikhail Andreevich (1847-1892), inspector of public schools and local school teacher Alexey Andreevich (1852-1932) and Andrei Andreevich (1856-1924) - breeder and author of the "Akaevskaya Beauty" apple variety