Set along the peaceful Polist River, Staraya Russa holds the ideal appeal of the nineteenth century, when Dostoevsky composed a significant part of The Brothers Karamazov there. The town is the setting for the novel where you can visit the roads and churches the characters frequented and the home of Dostoevsky himself. There is additionally a bunch of historical centres worth looking at.
Before we jump into things that can be enjoyed in Staraya Russa, let us get to know more about Staraya Russa.
More About Staraya Russa
Old Russian legend lets us know about two siblings Rus and Sloven, who, four centuries prior, set off from the Black Sea to establish another country; Sloven made Veliky Novgorod, while Rus’ town on the opposite side of Lake Ilmen proceeded to become Staraya Russa.
The town, obviously, is not exactly that old, having been established some place around the tenth century, yet is regardless perhaps the oldest city. Its engineering mirrors its primes as a significant player in the salt exchange and well-off city of the Novgorod Republic, and again as a trendy nineteenth century spa resort.
It has consistently pulled in visitors from great distances abroad. Today, it attracts guests who try to follow the strides of probably the best author and maybe the person who established the best connection abroad, Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky.
On the proposal of his companions, he and his significant other picked Staraya Russa as the spot for their late spring dacha. There, Dostoevsky could get away from the stifling lanes of St. Petersburg and the impulse to gamble, a habit that had depleted his accounts and wellbeing.
Things to Do in Staraya Russa
A visit to Staraya Russa is an unquestionable requirement for all fans of Fyodor Dostoevsky as the incomparable Russian author spent numerous summers at his home there and composed a few of his works in this entirely commonplace city.
However, even without the Dostoevsky interface, Staraya Russa makes an extraordinary holiday destination because of its community enchant and the awesome instances of chapel architecture that have survived right up until today.
Here are things that can be enjoyed in Staraya Russa:
1. Visit Museum Manor Medieval Rushanina
The museum-reconstruction of medieval residence, where the inhabitant of Staraya Russa is used to live. Like thousand years prior, they still produce salt which is bubbled from the mineral water.
The museum is made based on archaeological research. All structures of the museum are duplicates of typical medieval structures: houses, bathhouses, workshops, salt bottling works, a safe house for domesticated animals, as well as components of urban improvement — a withering and an asphalt.
The historical centre is likewise utilized for scientific studies in which medieval specialty advancements are reproduced — salt creation, metallurgy and producing, and weaving. Sightseers can likewise participate in them.
2. Go to Dostoevsky Memorial House Museum
It is an impression of the Soviet authorities’ undecided disposition to the works crafted by Fyodor Dostoevsky. They overlooked his initial fiddling with radical legislative issues and hated his develop strict patriotism — that a remembrance historical centre was just settled in his local city in 1971, ninety years after his demise.
Be that as it may, on account of his universal notoriety and to creative service, this little loft historical centre goes from solidarity to quality, drawing in huge quantities of Russian and international guests.
The exhibition hall is situated at 5, Kuznechny Pereulok, by a notable food market and a couple of the moments’ stroll from the milestone Church of the Vladimir Icon, where the essayist and his family used to revere.
Dostoevsky had briefly leased lodgings in the building in his childhood, and came back with his family in 1878, living there until his demise in 1881. The core of the historical centre is a reproduction of the Dostoevsky family home completed in the late 1960s and dependent on the first draftsman’s arrangements and the recorded memories of the essayist’s friends.
The remainder of the historical centre houses an atmospheric display — re-established in 2009 — devoted to Dostoevsky’s scholarly life, as well as transitory craftsmanship displays. Connected to the exhibition hall is a little auditorium used to have gatherings, verse readings, and exhibitions by the absolute most regarded smaller drama organizations in St. Petersburg.
3. Get Immersed in Museum of North-West Front
This exhibition hall is first to cover a wail front. The fundamental topics of this exhibition hall are:
- The Demyank hostile (8 February 1942 – March 1943)
- Local battling for the “Ramushevo hall”, during this hostile
- The German occupation
- Liberation by the Red Army
The assortments are mostly comprising from gifts of Russian and German veterans. A T-26 tank, that was found in a stream close to the town of Korovitchino, is standing together with two gunnery pieces before the exhibition hall.
4. Pray at Church of George Victorious
The wooden church of extraordinary saint, St. George the Victorious, from the town of Semenovskoye, is one of the holy places of layered structure of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
It is not rare that chapels were blessed for the sake of incredible saint St. George the Victorious. Warriors and ranchers that caused most of populace in that locale to have for quite a long time considered St. George their benefactor of a holy person.
The enduring reports express that at the turn of the nineteenth century, the ward included around 26 towns with the all-out populace of around 900 occupants. There were two parochial schools at the area. The church was rebuilt and redesigned not once. As the consequence of the remaking did toward the finish of the XIX century, the exterior of the church changed.
5. Explore the Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ
Development of the sanctuary started in 1993 and went on for a long time. The sanctuary is ruled by two pirgs — towers, that are 26.7 meters high and 17 ringers are arranged in its space. The heaviness of the heaviest one is around 11 tons and it is the biggest chime in Balkan. At foot of the pirgs are houses of prayer (little chapels), devoted to St. Simeon (with baptistery) and to St. Jovan Vladimir.
One of the significant highlights of the sanctuary is absolutely its aesthetic design. It is one of the biggest and most fascinating exhibition of stone sculpture among strict structures. Frescoes are done in fresco procedure, and their experience is overlaid.
So, those are things that can be enjoyed in Staraya Russa.