Zaraysk Kremlin

Zaraysk kremlin was built between 1528 and 1531 as part of the southern defensive line, and it is a plain rectangle - about 185 by 125 metres, seven towers, brick on a white stone base - which makes it small by comparison with Moscow, Kolomna or Novgorod. Its distinction is that it is complete: the entire circuit survives with no gaps, which is true of only a handful of Russian kremlins, because Zaraysk was too small and too poor for anyone to quarry it or build over it. Inside are two churches, the Nikolsky of 1681 and the John the Baptist of 1904, and a museum whose collection includes finds from the Zaraysk Palaeolithic site excavated nearby - among them a bison figurine carved from mammoth ivory around twenty thousand years ago, one of the oldest works of art found in Russia. The town outside is nineteenth-century merchant Russia, largely unaltered and very quiet.

History

Vasili III had the kremlin built in 1528-1531, after the Principality of Ryazan, Moscow's buffer to the south, lost its independence in 1503, and in 1681 Feodor III allowed St. Nicholas Cathedral to be rebuilt in place of the old timber church. Restoration ran from 1987 to 1993, the kremlin museum was founded in 1998, and the Upper Paleolithic site outside the walls has yielded a bison figurine and two mammoth ivory Venus figurines (Wikipedia, Zaraysk Kremlin).

Highlights

• The complete circuit - one of the few Russian kremlins surviving with no gaps in its walls.
• The scale - a rectangle of about 185 by 125 metres with seven towers.
• The ivory bison - a Palaeolithic carving around twenty thousand years old in the museum.
• The town - nineteenth-century merchant streets largely unaltered around the walls.

When to go

May to September. Two to three hours. Three hours from Moscow by road, with limited public transport.

What to expect

Small - the whole kremlin is walked in twenty minutes. Zaraysk is a long way from Moscow with poor public transport. The town has minimal visitor facilities. The wall walk and museum keep limited hours.

Nearby

Kolomna is north; the Osyotr river runs below the walls.

Key facts