Alexander Nevsky Lavra

Peter I founded the monastery in 1710 where he believed Alexander Nevsky had won a battle in 1240 - the site was wrong, but the foundation stood, and Nevsky's relics were brought here in 1724. It is one of only a handful of Russian monasteries with lavra status. Two cemeteries flank the entrance. The Lazarevskoye is the older, holding eighteenth-century figures including Lomonosov and the architects Rossi, Voronikhin, Quarenghi and Starov. The Tikhvinskoye, reorganised in the Soviet period as a Necropolis of Masters of Arts, holds Dostoevsky, Tchaikovsky, Glinka, Mussorgsky, Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov and Karamzin - and the reorganisation involved moving graves and monuments from demolished cemeteries elsewhere in the city, so some markers no longer stand over the person named. The monastery itself is active, with the Trinity cathedral of 1790 and a working seminary.

What you actually see

• The Tikhvinskoye necropolis - Dostoevsky, Tchaikovsky, Glinka, Mussorgsky and Borodin.
• The Lazarevskoye - eighteenth-century graves including Lomonosov and Rossi.
• The relocations - Soviet-era moves that separated some monuments from the burials.
• The Trinity cathedral - the 1790 church at the centre of a working monastery.

When to go

May to September; the cemeteries are best walked in dry weather. Two hours. The necropolises close earlier than the grounds.

Honest expectations

The two necropolises are ticketed, separately from the free monastery grounds. Some monuments were moved in the Soviet period and do not mark actual graves. It is a working monastery with dress rules. Paths are uneven.

Nearby

Nevsky Prospekt runs west from the gates; the Neva is north.