In connection with repair and restoration work, visitors enter the Kremlin through the Trinity Gate, exit - through Spassky and Borovitsky. Visitors enter and exit the Armory through the Borovitsky Gate.

From June 6

The passage to the New Kremlin Square is temporarily closed.

From May 15 to September 30

The Moscow Kremlin museums are switching to summer operating hours. The architectural ensemble is open to the public from 9:30 to 18:00. The Armory is open from 10:00 to 18:00. Tickets are sold at the box office from 9:00 to 17:00. Closed on Thursday. Electronic tickets are exchanged in accordance with the terms of the User Agreement.

From May 15 to September 30

The exhibition of the bell tower "Ivan the Great" is open to the public.

In order to ensure the safety of monuments in unfavorable weather conditions, access to some cathedral museums may be temporarily limited.

We apologize for any inconvenience caused.

Address: Russia Moscow
Start of construction: 1482
Completion of construction: 1495
Number of towers: 20
Wall length: 2500 m.
Main attractions: Spasskaya Tower, Assumption Cathedral, Bell Tower of Ivan the Great, Annunciation Cathedral, Archangel Cathedral, Faceted Chamber, Terem Palace, Arsenal, Armory Chamber, Tsar Cannon, Tsar Bell
Coordinates: 55°45"03.0"N 37°36"59.3"E
Object of cultural heritage of the Russian Federation

In the very heart of Moscow, on Borovitsky Hill, the majestic Kremlin ensemble rises. It has long become a symbol not only of the capital, but of all of Russia. History itself decreed that an ordinary Krivichi village, located in the middle of the forest, eventually turned into the capital of a mighty Russian state.

The Kremlin from a bird's eye view

The Kremlin or Detinets in ancient Rus' was the name given to the central, fortified part of the city with a fortress wall, loopholes and towers. The first Moscow Kremlin, built in 1156 by Prince Yuri Dolgoruky, was a wooden fortress surrounded by a moat and rampart. During the reign of Ivan I, nicknamed Kalita (money bag), oak walls and towers were erected in Moscow and the first stone building was laid - the Cathedral of the Assumption of Our Lady.

View of the Kremlin walls from the Kremlin embankment

In 1367, Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy surrounded the Kremlin with a powerful fortress wall made of white limestone. Since then, the capital has received the nickname “White Stone Moscow”. Large-scale construction began under Ivan III, who united a significant part of the Russian lands around Moscow and built a residence worthy of the “Sovereign of All Rus'” in the Kremlin.

Ivan III invited architects from Milan to build fortifications. It was in 1485 - 1495 that the existing walls and towers of the Kremlin were built. The top of the walls is crowned with 1045 battlements in the shape of a “swallowtail” - they have the same appearance as the battlements of Italian castles. At the turn of the 15th - 16th centuries, the Moscow Kremlin turned into an impregnable massive fortress, lined with red brick.

View of the Kremlin from the Bolshoy Kamenny Bridge

In 1516, a moat was dug along the fortifications overlooking Red Square. After the Time of Troubles, the towers were decorated with tents, giving the Kremlin a modern look.

The miraculous return of the shrine of the Moscow Kremlin

The main one of the 20 towers of the Moscow Kremlin is rightfully considered Spasskaya, created by the Italian architect Pietro Antonio Solari. The Spassky Gate has long been the main entrance to the Kremlin, and the chimes placed in the tower's tent are known as the main clock of the country. The top of the tower is crowned with a luminous ruby ​​star, but after the collapse of the USSR there are increasingly calls to remove the star and erect a double-headed eagle in its place. The tower got its name from the icon of the Savior of Smolensk over the gate.

View of the Kremlin from the Bolshoi Moskvoretsky Bridge

The icon was revered by saints, so men, passing through the gate, in front of the image of the Savior had to take off their headdress. Legend has it that when Napoleon was passing through the Spassky Gate, a gust of wind tore the cocked hat off his head. But the bad omens did not end there: the French tried to steal the gilded robe that adorned the image of the Savior of Smolensk, but the ladder attached to the gate overturned, and the shrine remained unharmed.

During the years of Soviet power, the icon was removed from the tower. For more than 70 years, the shrine was considered lost, until in 2010, restorers discovered a metal mesh hiding the image of Christ under a layer of plaster. On August 28, 2010, on the feast of the Dormition of the Virgin Mary, Patriarch Kirill solemnly consecrated the newly found icon above the gates of the Spasskaya Tower.

Beklemishevskaya Tower

Legends and myths of the Kremlin

From time immemorial, the Moscow Kremlin was not only a symbol of the unlimited power of the sovereign, but also a place about which legends were written. Over the long history of the Kremlin churches and towers, so many legends have been created that would be enough for a whole book.

The most famous legends tell about secret dungeons and underground passages. It is believed that they were invented by Italian architects who designed and built the Kremlin walls and towers. Many underground rooms have been preserved under the former Chudov Monastery, which until the 1930s was located in the eastern part of the Kremlin Hill.

These are passages, interiors of temples and long galleries. Today, some of them are flooded with groundwater.

Eternal flame at the walls of the Kremlin

There are rumors among Muscovites that previously branched underground passages led outside from each of the Kremlin towers. The same secret passages connected all the royal palaces. When builders began digging a large foundation pit for the State Kremlin Palace in the 1960s, they discovered three underground passages dating back to the 16th century. The dungeons were so wide that you could drive a cart through them.

Underground passages were found during every major reconstruction. Most often, voids, gaps and labyrinths were walled up or simply filled with concrete for safety reasons.

Spasskaya Tower

One of the secrets of the Moscow Kremlin is also connected with its dungeons. For several centuries now, historians and archaeologists have been struggling with the mystery of the disappearance of the library of Ivan IV the Terrible, which is also called Liberia.

The Russian sovereign inherited a unique collection of ancient books and manuscripts from his grandmother Sophia Paleologus, who received these books as a dowry.

The discovery of books in storage facilities located underground was not an accident. When Sophia Paleologus arrived in the city in 1472, she saw the terrible consequences of the fire that raged in Moscow two years earlier. Realizing that the library she brought could easily perish in a fire, Sophia ordered a spacious basement, which was located under the Kremlin Church of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary, to be equipped for storage. After this, the valuable Liberia was always kept in dungeons.

View of Cathedral Square and Ivan the Great Bell Tower

Cathedrals of the Moscow Kremlin - “altars of Russia”

Today the Moscow Kremlin is both the place of work of the President of the Russian Federation and a historical and cultural museum. The historical center of the Kremlin is represented by Cathedral Square with three cathedrals— Uspensky, Arkhangelsk and Blagoveshchensky. An old proverb says: “The Kremlin rises above Moscow, and above the Kremlin there is only the sky.” That is why all the people honored the tsar’s decrees, which he proclaimed in the Assumption Cathedral.

This temple can rightfully be called the “altar of Russia.” In the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin, the kings were crowned kings, the next head of the Russian church was elected, and in the tombs of the temple the relics of Moscow saints found eternal rest. The Archangel Cathedral, from 1340 until the 18th century, served as the tomb of Moscow princes and kings.

Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin

Under its arches, tombstones are placed in strict order on white stone slabs. The Annunciation Cathedral was the personal house of prayer for the Moscow princes: here they were baptized, confessed, and got married. According to legend, the grand ducal treasury was kept in the basement of this temple. The Cathedral Square is surrounded by the Ivan the Great Bell Tower, Faceted and Patriarchal Chambers. Meetings of the Boyar Duma and Zemsky Sobors were held in the Faceted Chamber, and the office of the Holy Synod was located in the Patriarchal Palace.

Sights of the Moscow Kremlin

The younger buildings of the Kremlin include the Grand Kremlin Palace, built in the mid-19th century by order of Emperor Nicholas I. Today, the ceremonial residence of the President of Russia is located within its walls.

Part of your dream has come true - you are in Moscow, in the heart of our country. First of all, guests of our capital visit Red Square and the Kremlin. Excursions are not held around the clock, but everyone wants to take a walk through historical places. The capital's Kremlin occupies a large area. To avoid getting lost and confused in historical buildings, you will need a map of the Moscow Kremlin.

How to get to the territory of the capital fortress

If you travel by metro, it is most convenient to get off at the station “Biblioteka im. Lenin". Next, head to the sign for Manezhnaya Street. Coming to the surface, you will find yourself in the Alexander Garden - it is located near the western wall of the palace. Any diagram of the Kremlin shows the tourist that the entrance to it is through. On the right hand there will be ticket offices, where you buy tickets for visiting.

After walking a little, you will see that the Trinity Tower is adjacent to the wall of the fortress, which is connected to the previous one by a bridge. It once flowed underneath it. Several centuries ago, it was enclosed in an underground sewer to develop the Alexander Park.

After passing through the guard of honor at the Trinity Tower, you will find yourself on the square of the same name.

The Kremlin: a map for a walk. Start

There are many tasks located around Trinity Square. To the left of it is the Arsenal building, or Zeichhaus (in German, “armor house”). The armory house is considered a relatively young building, as it began to be built at the beginning of the 18th century. Next to the Zeichhaus, according to the idea of ​​Peter the Great, various military weapons are exhibited, including French cannons.

To the right of the square, the State Kremlin Palace has been erected, where various pop concerts are held, and the main Christmas tree of the country is installed.

The territory of Detinets is divided into squares and streets. The Kremlin is beautiful. Its scheme is clear and simple. Walking straight along the same Trinity Square, you can see Senate Square on the left behind it. Behind this square in the park is the Senate itself. All possible passages to it are closed, since this building is the working residence of the head of the Russian Federation.

Exit from the palace

The Moscow Kremlin is huge. Its diagram looks like an irregular quadrangle. Behind the Armory in the corner of the fortress rises, named after the hill on which it stands. Through this building there is an exit from the Kremlin.

This is where the excursion can end, since further it is possible to walk only along the various towers on the walls of the fortress (Blagoveshchenskaya, Tainitskaya, 1st and 2nd Bezymyannye, Petrovskaya, etc.).

The Moscow Kremlin is grandiose. The diagram, unfortunately, cannot convey these majestic expanses and scales of temples, palaces and chambers, but it will help the traveler plan a route for visiting historical sites of interest.

In connection with repair and restoration work, visitors enter the Kremlin through the Trinity Gate, exit - through Spassky and Borovitsky. Visitors enter and exit the Armory through the Borovitsky Gate.

From June 6

The passage to the New Kremlin Square is temporarily closed.

From May 15 to September 30

The Moscow Kremlin museums are switching to summer operating hours. The architectural ensemble is open to the public from 9:30 to 18:00. The Armory is open from 10:00 to 18:00. Tickets are sold at the box office from 9:00 to 17:00. Closed on Thursday. Electronic tickets are exchanged in accordance with the terms of the User Agreement.

From May 15 to September 30

The exhibition of the bell tower "Ivan the Great" is open to the public.

In order to ensure the safety of monuments in unfavorable weather conditions, access to some cathedral museums may be temporarily limited.

We apologize for any inconvenience caused.

The Moscow Kremlin is located in the very center of Moscow, on the high bank of the Moscow River. Its powerful walls and towers, golden-domed temples, ancient towers and palaces rise above the Moscow River and form a beautiful architectural ensemble.

“Above Moscow there is the Kremlin, and above the Kremlin there is only sky,” says the old proverb. The Kremlin is the most ancient part of Moscow, currently the residence of the highest government bodies of Russia and one of the main historical and artistic complexes of the country.

In plan, the Kremlin is an irregular triangle. Its southern wall faces the Moscow River, to the north is Red Square, and to the north-west is the Alexander Garden. In the 14th century, cathedrals and monasteries were already built here; the Kremlin was the center of the Russian Orthodox Church. Three gigantic cathedrals were built in the 15th and 16th centuries. There's a lot to see here! In the Annunciation Cathedral there are beautiful icons and an iconostasis; the bell tower of Ivan the Great with two golden domes is visible from a distance of 30 km, it rises next to the Assumption Cathedral, not far from the cathedral stands the largest bell of the Kremlin - the Tsar Bell; The Armory houses a wide variety of treasures, including royal crowns. In addition, here is the Amusement Palace, the Senate, in the premises of which the President’s office is located.

The most famous building on Red Square is St. Basil's Cathedral, its fabulous multi-colored domes are topped with golden crosses, and a gilded dome rises above the main tower. Near the Kremlin wall there is the Mausoleum of V.I. Lenin, and people still line up to walk past his embalmed body. The space of Red Square, colorful churches and palaces, and the Kremlin walls will be remembered for a long time.

Initially, the Kremlin served as a fortification for the village that arose on Borovitsky Hill, a cape at the confluence of the Neglinnaya River with the Moscow River. Here was the oldest Moscow church - the Cathedral of the Transfiguration, or the Savior on Bor, built in 1330 for the millennium of Constantinople - “New Rome”. The temple was destroyed in 1933. Moscow princes and princesses were buried in it until the cathedral received the status of a court temple.

In 1812, Napoleon blew up the Vodovzvodnaya, Petrovskaya and First Nameless Towers, the Arsenal Tower was seriously damaged, and the extensions to the Ivan the Great Bell Tower were also destroyed. It took 20 years to restore. In the 30s of the 20th century, the double-headed eagles that crowned the main towers of the Kremlin: Spasskaya, Nikolskaya, Troitskaya, Borovitskaya and Vodovzvodnaya, were replaced with ruby ​​stars with a diameter of 3-4 m. In 1941-1942, 167 German aerial bombs fell on the Kremlin, but it almost unharmed. Since 1955, the Kremlin has been open to the public, becoming an open-air museum.

The entrance to the Kremlin is through the Kutafya Tower, which was built in 1516. The name is also associated with her short and initially nondescript appearance: “kutafya” in Dahl’s dictionary is a clumsy, ugly dressed woman.

Behind the bridge is the mighty Trinity Tower. Having passed through it, we find ourselves on a bridgehead open to all the winds, surrounded by the spacious buildings of the Arsenal, the Senate and the Palace of Congresses.

Previously, there was a highly complex medieval city with cramped, uneven streets, each quarter of which contained multiple temples and chambers, courtyards and passages. The only fragment of that incredible city is located in the passage on the right hand of the gate - this is the Amusing Palace of the mid-17th century, restored by restorers only at the beginning of this century. On its roof stands a golden-domed house church; once it was surrounded by open gardens and hanging apple orchards laid out on high stone terraces - the entire female half of the Sovereign's courtyard, which occupied the site of the current Palace of Congresses, was arranged in approximately the same strange way.

The Patriarchal Palace, which also has its own house church and probably also had a roof garden. Through its arch you can get to Cathedral Square. From here, the square reveals itself in an ancient, bright and unexpected way: straight ahead - the bell tower of Ivan the Great, on the right - the Assumption Cathedral, one of the great Russian shrines, the main temple of Rus' from the 14th century until 1918, the tomb of ancient metropolitans and patriarchs. The current building was built in the 1470s by the Italian master Aristotle. The temple is small in size (in architecture textbooks there is a popular picture where the silhouette of the cathedral fits into the gigantic outlines of the Roman St. Peter, like a little doll), but at the same time incredibly strong and large-scale - both inside and outside: the Italians knew a lot about such illusions.

Also built by the Italians on the other side of the square, the Archangel Cathedral of 1505 produces a completely different impression - close to the Assumption Cathedral in size, on the outside it is much more playful and complex, but on the inside it is cramped and mysterious. Most of its floor is occupied by the tombstones of princes and kings who reigned from the 13th to the 18th centuries. All the tombstones are of the same type, only the carved canopy over the grave of Tsarevich Dimitri - one of the most tragic losses in Russian history - stands out.

On Cathedral Square, the nine-domed palace Annunciation Cathedral, the Church of the Deposition of the Robe with a small exhibition of ancient Russian wooden sculpture, and exhibition halls in the Assumption Belfry and the Patriarchal Palace are also open to the public. The archaeological exhibition in the basement of the Annunciation Cathedral and the lower tier of the Ivan the Great Bell Tower receive visitors for certain sessions.

The Armory Chamber and the Diamond Fund are located in another part of the Kremlin, at the Borovitsky Gate, and to view them you must buy separate tickets in advance. Unfortunately, the Kremlin Palace is closed to public access, although theoretically excursions are held there, but with a very separate appointment and for a separate fee. The working population can be content with only an external view of the Faceted Chamber - the throne room of sovereigns from the end of the 15th century, as well as a fragment of the royal residential choir visible to the right, crowned with multi-domed house churches and the ponderous bulk of the Great Palace, built in the middle of the 19th century.

The Tsar Cannon and the Tsar Bell are also located on the territory. Many people, when mentioning the square, recall the saying “shout to the entire Ivanovskaya”, believing that it was here that the Tsar’s decrees were announced. However, there is another way to decipher this saying. The Ivan the Great Bell Tower was the main Russian bell tower; it had forty bells, each with its own name. All bells were rung only on very special occasions. So the expression “to the fullest extent of Ivanovskaya” means that some task must be accomplished with all strength and completeness.

The famous monuments of foundry art - the Tsar Bell and the Tsar Cannon - are so huge that they have never been used for their intended purpose. But touching them with your hand is a good omen.

The ceremony of the horse and foot parade of the Presidential Regiment takes place on Saturdays at 12.00 on the Kremlin’s Cathedral Square and on the last Saturday of every month at 14.00 on Red Square.

And the most important thing: do not miss the first shrine of modern times, the mystical oak “Cosmos”, planted by Yuri Gagarin the day after the flight. Muscovites have long believed in its magical properties, remember: if someone goes around a tree three times, saying “Gagarin, Gagarin, fly with greetings, come back with an answer,” his children will certainly be born great cosmonauts.

By the way, the Moscow Kremlin, the main one of all Kremlins, is the only one written with a capital letter. This is the largest active fortress in Europe. Its semi-regime status is explained by the fact that the entire complex is both a monument included in the UNESCO World Cultural Heritage List and the official residence of the President of the Russian Federation.

Upon entering the Kremlin territory, visitors' personal belongings are searched. All unauthorized items will have to be handed over to the storage room located in the lower tier of the Kutafya Tower. Photography and videography, including amateur photography, is prohibited in cathedral museums. The Armory Chamber and the Diamond Fund.

History of construction

Since the time of Dmitry Donskoy, Moscow has been decorated with a white stone Kremlin (built 1368). Over the past century, its walls had become so worn out that foreigners, due to the abundance of gaping bald spots filled with logs, sometimes mistook them for wood. And this Kremlin was built in those years when they had not yet heard of Italian masters in Rus'. Having the master Aristotle Fioravanti at court, Ivan III could well have thought about how to remake the fortress so that no one would not only be able to take it, but would not even dare to approach it. However, the name of Aristotle Fioravanti never appeared anywhere among the builders of the Moscow Kremlin. However, many historians are inclined to consider Aristotle as the true creator of the master plan, who outlined the general line of the Kremlin walls, outlined the positions of the towers, laid out secret dungeons and labyrinths, and his compatriots worked on individual sections. Work on the Moscow Kremlin was carried out in a way that no fortress had ever been built in Rus'. In an area with a radius of 100 fathoms, not a single building was left around. Even churches that had stood there for several centuries were demolished. The area beyond the Moscow River opposite the future Kremlin walls was also cleared of buildings. A similar approach to construction was required by the fortification rules of those times, which came from Europe.