Borovitskaya Tower (also Predtechenskaya, Chertolsky Gate, Borovitsky
Gate) is a tower and travel gate in the southwestern part of the Moscow
Kremlin. It opens to the square of the same name and the Alexander
Garden next to the Big Stone Bridge. The name of the tower presumably
comes from the ancient forest that covered Borovitsky Hill in the early
history of Moscow.
The Borovitsky Gate is chronologically one of
the very first buildings in Moscow, they existed back in the wooden
fortress of Dmitry Donskoy. The tower above the gate was built in 1490,
during the reconstruction of the Kremlin from white stone to brick. The
author of the project was the Italian architect Pietro Antonio Solari.
The hipped roof with a tiled roof was added in the XVII century, until
1935 it was decorated with a gilded double-headed eagle. There has been
a ruby star on the spire since 1937.
The gates in the tower were
preserved and served for household needs: on their side there was a
gentle descent to the Neglinka, in the Middle Ages they passed through
to the Stable and Granary yards. In the XXI century, of all the Kremlin
Gates, only the Borovitsky ones remained passageways — they are used by
the motorcade of the President of Russia.
The main name of the gate and tower comes from the ancient forest that covered the slopes of the river and the Kremlin (Borovitsky) hill at the time of the founding of Moscow. Another source indicates that "Borovitskaya" is named from the tract. The name "Chertolsky" was fixed due to the location near Chertol — the area around Borovitsky hill with ravines and gullies.
Borovitsky Hill, on which the gate and the tower are located, is the
historical center of Moscow. Archaeologists have discovered Bronze Age
sites in its vicinity, and since 1147 the first chronicle evidence of
the city of Yuri Dolgoruky has been found. During the reign of Prince
Ivan Kalita in 1339-1340, the first oak fortifications were built around
the settlement on the hill. Under Dmitry Donskoy in 1366-1368, they were
replaced by the white-stone Kremlin, in which, presumably, the first
Borovitskaya Tower was located. This is confirmed by the record of the
construction of the first stone church of St. John the Baptist in Moscow
in 1461. According to the chronicles, she stood "under the forest, at
the Borovitsky gate." The historian of the XIX century Ivan Kondratiev
directly calls the site where the Borovitsky Gate was built the center
of the foundation of Moscow:
This place is <...> the makovitsa of
the Kremlin Hill, its center, <...> there is the first historical tract,
around which the vast White Stone subsequently stretched.
The Borovitsky Gate was laid down as an economic, rear entrance to
the Kremlin, so it attracted little attention from chroniclers and
little information about their early history has been preserved.
Presumably, during the reconstruction of the Dmitry Donskoy fortress
into stone, new ones were laid in the wall on the site of the former
wooden gate, but they left the same name. The following episode
testifies to the economic importance of the gate:
Grand Duke
Vasily III, having fallen ill on the way and wanting to enter Moscow
secretly so that the foreign ambassadors who were there would not see
him in weakness and exhaustion, went to the Borovitsky gate, from where
he got directly to his chambers through his business courtyards,
inaccessible to the outside eye.
The founder of Russian
archaeology, historian Ivan Zabelin, wrote about the Borovitsky Gates:
In all likelihood, at the initial time they opened the way not
directly to the mountain, but only to the Hem of the Kremlin, as it is
noticeable now by the laid arch in the Borovitskaya Tower, which later
led to the same Hem.
However, from the point of view of
fortification in the early history of Moscow, the Borovitsky Gate was a
reliable part of the Kremlin. During the Russian-Lithuanian wars, the
army of Grand Duke Algirdas unsuccessfully besieged the fortress twice,
and after the third time a truce was concluded on the terms of Dmitry
Donskoy.
The Borovitsky Tower, from which the modern look comes, was built in
1490 by the Italian architect Pietro Antonio Solari, who arrived from
Milan to Moscow at the invitation of Ivan III. The tower received a
laconic four-sided shape and was decorated only with a number of widths
and blades along the upper diameter. A low wooden tent crowned the
building. During this period, a wide street ran from the Borovitsky Gate
to the Grand Ducal Palace, and a wooden bridge was thrown from the river
to the White City.
In 1499, under the leadership of Solari, a
wall was erected from Borovitskaya to the corner Vodovzvodnaya tower. In
the XVI—XVII centuries, through the Borovitsky Tower they drove to the
Granary and Stable yards. In the plans of the city during the reign of
Boris Godunov, a stone arch bridge and a strelnitsa on the side of the
Moskva River have already been marked near the Borovitskaya Tower.
In 1510, it was decided to straighten the riverbed and bring it
closer to the walls, then a canal was dug from the Borovitskaya Tower to
the Moskva River. Thus, the southwestern part of the Kremlin became less
vulnerable in the event of a siege.
In the XVI century, there
were numerous household buildings on the territory between the Troitsk
and Borovitsky gates: cooks, honey factories, soap houses and small
huts. Adjacent to them were the Nourishing, Fodder and Bread Palaces,
around which there were over thirty basements, cellars and glaciers.
Initially, the Borovitsky Gate was fortified weaker than other
entrances to the Kremlin, since it was already located in an
advantageous place from the point of view of fortification. The section
of the wall between them and the Corner Arsenal Tower was on a high
hill, and in the direction of the Sviblovaya Tower it was protected by a
moat from the Neglinnaya to the Moskva River. Around the Trinity
Strelnitsa, Aleviz the Old placed the vylaz and rumors — underground
secret rooms that allowed him to approach the besiegers unnoticed and
eavesdrop on their plans. Presumably, the Borovitskaya Tower was
surrounded by the same caches. During excavations in the XIX and XX
centuries, the remains of numerous underground passages and rooms were
indeed discovered, but their identification and classification are
complicated by the lack of references in the chronicles and numerous
reconstructions of towers that took place throughout the history of the
Kremlin. Since the foundation of the first fortress on Borovitsky Hill
and up to the present, the cultural soil layer has grown by three to
five, in some places — eight meters. For example, in 1894, an
underground arched span without a foundation was opened on the Kremlin
section from Borovitskaya to the Armory Tower. The researchers concluded
that it was designed to drain soil waters at the site of the former
ravine at Neglinnaya — one of those for which the Borovitsky Gate was
called Chertolsky.
According to the Inventory of Dilapidated Buildings in 1646, by that
time the internal stairs in the Borovitsky Tower had collapsed, bricks
crumbled in some places, the descending roof and the ceiling above it
were broken. A similar document from 1667 indicated that "the vaults are
intact, and the tower crumbled around a fathom." Under Tsar Mikhail
Fedorovich, gardens were laid out in the Kremlin, and on Neglinnaya
Street at the Borovitsky Gate "there were even vines, lemon, laurel and
fig trees."
On April 19 (according to some sources — April 16),
1658, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich issued a decree renaming the Borovitsky
Gate to the Forerunner Gate, in honor of the nearby church of John the
Baptist "On the Bor".
The most significant change in the
appearance of the Borovitsky Gate occurred in the period from 1666 to
1680. Then a new top was built at the tower: a tiled tent on three
four-sided tiers and one octagonal. Each of them was decorated
individually. The first tier with a belt of machicolations was decorated
with flies, the second and third were decorated with squares and
circles, Gothic battlements, and in the corners — windows with columns
and pediments in the form of kokoshniks. In the same years, a branch
arch was added, a new arch of the gate was located in it, and the old
passage was laid. An iron grating was placed in the arch, and the bridge
over the Neglinnaya River was dismantled and replaced with a lifting
one. The last important change in the appearance of the tower in the
XVII century was made in 1688: then for the first time a gilded
double-headed eagle was installed on its spire.
In the XVIII century, the Kremlin still had a defensive significance
— during the Northern War, Charles XII threatened to attack Moscow, so
on June 1, 1707, by order of Peter I, additional strengthening began.
Earthworks were poured from the side of the Moskva River, and a bastion
was built at the Borovitsky Gate, facing the bridge of the same name at
an acute angle.
During the preparations for the coronation of
Catherine II on August 11, 1762, the State Superintendent's Office
received an order to repair the tower and prepare it for decoration with
solemn illumination. Architect Ivan Michurin and carpenter Erich Gampus
were appointed responsible for these works. A detailed estimate has been
preserved, in which they listed the necessary materials: 36 pounds of
paint and 400 lanterns of different colors were needed to decorate the
facade alone. Presumably, during this period, the tower received a
Gothic design. It has been preserved for almost half a century,
including during restoration under the direction of architect Ilya
Yegotov in 1805.
Like many other buildings of the Kremlin, the
Borovitskaya Tower was damaged in the Patriotic War of 1812. During the
withdrawal of Napoleon's troops from Moscow, it was not mined, but the
explosion of the neighboring Vodovzvodnaya Tower at Borovitskaya
collapsed the tent top. In the post-war years, from 1816 to 1819, the
restoration of the Kremlin took place under the leadership of architect
Osip Bove. In 1817, the Borovitsky Gate was repaired, during this period
the Gothic decorations were removed from the tower.
In 1821,
Neglinnaya was enclosed in a pipe, and the Alexander Garden was laid out
in its place. The tower's drawbridge lost its significance and was
dismantled.
In 1847, it was decided to dismantle the ancient Church of the
Nativity of John the Baptist on the Bor, since it prevented access to
the newly built Grand Kremlin Palace. Architects Vladimir Bakarev,
Fyodor Richter and Nikolai Chichagov were given the task to rebuild the
interior of the Borovitsky Tower and move the church altar there. The
city treasury allocated ten thousand rubles for the construction.
On the inner side of the Kremlin Wall, a chapel with a tent porch
was attached to the tower, on the top of which a copy of the cross of
the ancient church was placed. The original was placed above, under a
special umbrella, and a white stone plaque was hung next to it with the
inscription "This ancient cross of the Church of the Nativity of John
the Baptist, built in 1461, was moved to its present location in 1847."
A second sign was installed below, at the level of the travel gate:
By the order of His Most Pious Sovereign Emperor Nicholas I, the Church
of the Nativity of John the Baptist, built under Grand Duke Vasily the
Dark in 1461, which was subject to destruction by time and the explosion
of 1812, was moved to this building of the tower above the Forerunner
Borovitsky Gates according to popular legend and consecrated by Filaret
Metropolitan of Moscow in May 1847
The church and chapel occupied
the entire lower massif of the tower, they were connected by a large
stone staircase. Four bells from the dismantled temple were placed in
the tent top. A separate spiral staircase was left in the southwestern
part of the Borovitskaya Tower for access to the upper tiers. On May 2,
1848, the new church was consecrated. The society reacted ambiguously to
the destruction of the ancient building and the debate about the
expediency did not subside even after the final arrangement of the
tower. In October 1848, the contractor Leonov, who took part in the
reconstruction, also proposed to transfer five more bells to
Borovitskaya: four from the cannons assembled for melting and one former
large sentry from the Trinity Tower. It was cast in 1686 by the master
Fyodor Motorin, some time after installation, the bell collapsed in a
fire, breaking through two arches, and lay idle for a long time.
At first, the services were held only twice a year — on June 24 and
August 29, but were gradually reduced to one. In the kiosk above the
gate there was an icon of St. John the Baptist.
In 1863, the tower was reconstructed again: the basement was moved,
the walls, white stone decorations and images above the gate were
repaired. During this renovation, many decorative elements were
destroyed.
Since 1865, Moscow began to be converted to gas
lighting, the first building to use the new illumination was the
Archangel Cathedral of the Kremlin. In 1866, when laying pipes from the
Moscow Gas Plant in the passage of the Borovitsky Gate, the vault of the
basement collapsed, instead of repairing it, it was dismantled and
covered with rubble and construction debris.
Almost thirty years
later, in 1894, Prince Nikolai Shcherbatov led the excavations in the
underground part of the Borovitsky Gate. A chamber eight meters long and
with ceilings of 11 meters was found under the right ledge of the tower.
In the past, it was divided into three floors, the upper one had a
number of embrasures, laid by the XIX century. There was an exit from
the chamber to the Imperial Square, probably it was sealed up when the
chapel was moved to the tower. The second underground chamber was found
under the passage of the gate, its walls were asymmetrical, and the
height reached six meters. From the side of the Moskva River,
Shcherbatov discovered the foundation of the first diverting strelnitsa
during the reconstruction of the Kremlin under Ivan III.
Forgotten over many centuries of Kremlin history, numerous hiding
places, rumors, filled-up basements and underground chambers due to the
suffusion and heaviness of the upper layer began to lead to soil
failures, as was written in the newspaper Novoye Vremya in 1984:
...
the Kremlin dungeons were once connected to each other by corridors and
undoubtedly had several exits to the surface of the earth <...> one of
them inside the Kremlin, namely from the second basement at the
Archangel Cathedral, at the stairs to the now paved roadway, against the
southern wall of the cathedral; the other, visible even now, is located
outside the Kremlin, under the tower above the Borovitsky Gate, in the
third section of the Alexander Garden. In this place, in the late
forties, a huge white stone basement and corridor were opened.
The Borovitsky Gate was not damaged during the shelling of the
Kremlin by the Bolsheviks. In the 1920s, the church of John the Baptist
was abolished, the porch with a tent attached to the tower was
demolished and the icon was removed from the kiosk. In the autumn of
1935, at the initiative of the Soviet government, the imperial eagles
from the Kremlin spires were replaced with gem-decorated stars with a
hammer and sickle inside. The Borovitskaya tower received a star with a
height of 3.35 meters, the span of its rays was 3.2 meters. The first
copies turned out to be fragile and did not give bright light, so they
were dismantled two years later. The new model turned out to be more
successful: a unique alloy of glass with a saturated shade and more
resistant to external influences was developed. Since 1937, the second
star has been permanently decorating the spire of the tower.
In
the late 1930s, an entire residential block was demolished at the
beginning of Znamenka Street, and the vacant space was named Borovitsky
Gate Square. In 1956, it was renamed Borovitskaya Square. By the
official visit of US President Richard Nixon to Moscow in 1972, the rest
of the Znamenka building between Mokhovaya and Manezhnaya Streets was
demolished overnight. A lawn was planted on the vacated territory, which
was nicknamed "Nixon's lawn" in the speech of Muscovites.
During
the Second World War, the Borovitsky Tower also managed to avoid damage,
despite the fact that bombs fell close to it during the shelling of the
Kremlin. In order to disguise the ruby stars on the spires were covered
with wooden shields. White stripes were painted on the gate arches to
facilitate orientation at night: the allowed speed was no higher than 5
km/ h, and the headlights had to be extinguished or darkened.
Since 1955, the Kremlin has been partially opened to tourists, and on
August 30, 1960, the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR awarded the
Borovitskaya Tower and the gate the status of an object of cultural
heritage of Russia. At the same time, the government continued to work
inside the Kremlin walls. On January 22, 1969, near the Borovitskaya
Tower, Second Lieutenant Viktor Ilyin carried out an unsuccessful
attempt on the general secretary of the party Leonid Brezhnev.
In 2010, the Andrew the First-Called Foundation found and restored
the gate icons of the Spasskaya and Nikolskaya Towers. It was planned to
explore and restore the icons of Borovitskaya and other towers.
In 2014, Russian President Vladimir Putin proposed to make free access
to the street between Troitsk and Borovitsky gates. At the same time,
the Borovitsky gates in modern times are the only permanent travel gates
of the Kremlin, they are constantly used by the presidential motorcade.
Spassky is used only for the duration of repair work. Visitors to the
Armory also pass through the Borovitskaya Tower.
In 2015, a
monument to Prince Vladimir by sculptor Salavat Shcherbakov and
architect Igor Voskresensky was erected on the square opposite the
Borovitsky Gate. The installation of the monument caused a wide public
outcry, as it violated the border of the protected zone of the cultural
heritage site under UNESCO protection.
According to the
commandant of the Moscow Kremlin, Sergei Khlebnikov, in the period from
2017 to 2020, it is planned to carry out a comprehensive restoration of
all the walls and towers of the ensemble. There is also a discussion on
the project of creating an entrance complex similar to the one built in
2012 at the Kutafya Tower. According to Khlebnikov, there are no plans
to "disrupt the perception of the Kremlin's appearance." However, back
in 2013, after the construction of glass pavilions at the Kutafya Tower,
UNESCO included in its agenda the issue of excluding the Kremlin from
the list of World Heritage sites.
In 1912, historian S. P. Bartenev, in his study of the Kremlin
towers, called Borovitskaya the most peculiar of them:
Among the
many towers in Italy and other European countries, it is impossible to
find a prototype. In Russia, one can point to only one monument that
bears a resemblance to it, this is the Sumbeki Tower in Kazan. The
difference between the Borovitskaya Tower and other Kremlin travel
towers is further enhanced by the fact that its branch arch is not
placed straight, as in them, but on the side and has a prismatic, not
square shape.
In terms of the tower is divided into eight floors, the internal
stairs from the first to the fourth have 75 steps. The main body of the
tower is 16.68 meters high and is divided inside into two tiers, covered
with cylindrical arches. From the ground floor you can get into the
partially filled basement. On the second tier there are details of the
decor of the former church here, for example, the 19th-century solea.
The second, third and fourth tiers are very similar in terms of
design, they all have a closed vault with decking for windows. Only the
third one differs in height at 3.47 meters, the other two are equal —
4.16 meters. The 4.16 meter high octagon and the 18.07 meter tent are
combined into one room, their walls are pierced by long narrow rumors.
The tiers are connected by stairs in the thickness of the eastern and
northern walls. A spiral staircase in the southeast corner of the tower
runs through the entire main quadrangle from the basement to the second
quadrangle.
The branch arch has a triangular shape in terms of
shape. It communicates with the basement of the main quad. Above the
passage gate there are narrow openings that previously served for the
chains of the drawbridge over the Neglinka. In addition, the vertical
slots for the portcullis have been preserved in the gate passage.
To date, three ancient white stone coats of arms, installed under the
leadership of Antonio Solari in 1490, have been preserved on the outer
corners of the Borovitsky Gate. At the same time, their actual age may
be even greater if the sculptures were transferred from the white stone
Kremlin. The first coat of arms — Lithuanian — depicts a horseman
carrying a curved saber over his head, and symbolizes the transition of
several Lithuanian boyars under the patronage of the Moscow prince. The
second coat of arms — Kazan — depicts a leopard and also means the
transition of the khanate under the protectorate of Moscow. Both of
these political events took place several years before the construction
of the brick Kremlin began.
Historians are most interested in the
third coat of arms — the Moscow coat of arms, in the form of a
double-headed eagle under a crown. As a result of a two-year examination
of the limestone from which the sculpture is made, its creation dates
back to 1489 or 1490. Another argument in favor of the historical
originality of the coat of arms is the location of the tower masonry —
the bricks around it are lined with a special "castle". Prior to the
establishment of the exact age of the Moscow coat of arms of the
Borovitsky Gate, the oldest surviving symbol of the Russian state was
considered to be the golden seal of Ivan III. However, O. G. Ulyanov
refuted the disputed attribution, dating the white stone coats of arms
to the time of the reconstruction of the Borovitskaya Tower in 1817. In
2016, it was decided to dismantle the coats of arms and transfer them to
the Armory, and place exact copies of white limestone on the tower.
It is curious that they survived on the Borovitsky Gates on both
sides of the entrance arch, where they were brought by the Italians, the
builders of the Kremlin. These shields, in their general form, are
nothing more than a metal headpiece of a horse, and are thus a remnant
of the knight's horse equipment. (architect N.V. Sultanov, 1890)