Novodevichy Convent

This convent is probably the best known in Moscow. Along the street from Sportivnaya Metro station the convent stands in its walled grounds on the bank of the Moscow River. As you approach from the metro station along the kiosk lined street you can see the skyscapers of Moscow City in the background contrasting sharply with the golden domes and crosses of the UNESCO listed convent.

The convent comprises of the Cathedral of Our Lady of Smolensk, the Church of the Transfiguration and a Six Tiered Bell Tower, together with the Lopukhn Palace, the guardhouse museum and the Mariinsky Chambers. The best place to get a global picture is from across the river (next time!) so here you can see the small chapel that stands just before the cathedral in the oldest part of the convent.

The convent was founded in 1525 to celebrate the recapture of Smolensk in 1514 by the Grand Prince Basil III. Many aristocrats took their vows here and it became a nunnery of nobility sheltering many ladies from the Russian royal families who had been forced to take the veil.

The convent was occupied by Napoleon's troops in 1812 and they tried to blow it up but the nuns saved it from destruction. It was later used as a female prison before becoming a museum during Communism. In 1994 nuns returned to the convent and in 1995 religious services resumed.

Tolstoy used the convent in two of his most famous books - in War and Peace Pierre was to be executed under the convent walls and in Anna Karenina Konstantin Lyovin (Levin, one of the main characters) meets his future wife ice skating near the monastery walls.

The Novodevichy cemetery, just outside the convent grounds was opened in 1898 due to lack of space within the convent grounds. The cemetery quickly became the burial place of choice for Russia's leading cultural figures and politicians. Anton Chekhov, Mikhail Bulgakov, Nikita Khrushchev and Boris Yeltsin are all buried here.