🏛 Zvenigorod Gorodok and the Dormition Cathedral

Звенигород, ул. Городок, 1

An ancient hillfort with the ramparts of the Zvenigorod kremlin above the Moskva River; the Dormition Cathedral on the Gorodok was built around 1400 and preserves fragments of frescoes linked to Andrei Rublev.

Zvenigorod is first mentioned in Ivan Kalita's will of 1339.
Prince Yuri Dmitrievich made Zvenigorod the capital of his appanage and lived here almost permanently until 1425.
The 8-metre ramparts were coated with clay: a 70° slope only needed to be doused with water to become impregnable.
The Gorodok was taken by the Tatars, by Tokhtamysh in 1382 and by Edigei in 1408.
The cathedral is the first of the four surviving white-stone Moscow churches from the turn of the 14th–15th centuries.
In 1918 three icons of the “Zvenigorod Deesis”, attributed to Rublev, were found here; they are now in the Tretyakov Gallery.
In 1837 the cathedral's gables were cut down for a four-pitch roof; the restoration begun after 2009 brought back all nine gables.

Part of these routes

Zvenigorod: monastery, Gorodok and the Moskva River