russia: moscow: two monasteries

I used one Tuesday afternoon to visit two monasteries in Moscow, they were quite close to each other.

Thanks to the metro system and my own two feet, it wasn't difficult to get to the first one, Krutitskoya Patriarshe Podvorye.

Wikipedia tells me this is an operating estate of the Russian Orthodox Church, whateva that means. As far as I can tell, it was first establish in the late 13^th century, but the current historically listed buildings are from the 17^th century.

I saw one smaller church, which was directly connected to a wall/gate. The inside of the church was small, but nicely painted.

Everything else seemed to be totally abandoned, though not completely in ruins. Wikipedia also tells me part of the property was used as residential housing for a while during Soviet times.

Fun fact: the official web page of the organization says that Lavrentiy Beria was imprisoned here in 1953. Apparently this isn't at all confirmed by historians, who think his 'detention' and 'trial' were nothing but a coverup, and that he was killed on the day of his arrest.

After walking around this area for a while, I walked about ten minutes to get to my other sight of the day: Novospassky Monastery.

Novospassky Monastery claims history all the way back to the early 14^th century. If I understand correctly, one of its churches was originally in another location in the city, in another monastery.

Some of the Romanov family are buried in this monastery, though they are all from before the family became the ruling family of the Russian Empire.

During Soviet years, the monastery was a prison for a while, then a police drunk tank. (Can you imagine sleeping off a hangover in a monastery???) In the 1970s it was part of an art restoration institute before being given back to the Russian Orthodox Church in 1991.

At one time it was a wooden citadel, but now the walls are white stone/brick.