In 1478, Novgorod was forcibly annexed to the Moscow Principality and more than two hundred of the most noble and influential families of Novgorodians were resettled for permanent residence in Moscow. This was done in order to avoid the appearance in the lands seized by the Grand Duke of centers of opposition to the Moscow authorities and disobedience to it. In Moscow, they were settled in the area of ​​​​modern Lubyanskaya Square, the buildings of the Federal Security Service, and the Detsky Mir store. Settlers from Novgorod built, in 1480, not far from Lubyanka Square, the Church of St. Sophia, the Wisdom of God, as the St. Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod (1040-1050). At the corner of the old Myasnitskaya Street, stood the Church of Our Lady of Grebnev, erected by Ivan III in 1472 in memory of the conquest of Novgorod. It was destroyed in 1934. In 1534-1538, when the walls of Kitay-Gorod were built, a large square formed around them, which was interrupted by the Cannon Yard near the Neglinnaya River. East of Rozhdestvenka Street to present-day Lubyanka Square, it was called Cannon Square until the 1820s. And from Bolshaya Lubyanka Street to the Varvarsky Gate - Lubyanka.

On the site of the modern Lubyanka Square in the 17th century there was a settlement of the Stremyanny Streltsy Regiment with small courtyards, wooden huts and other buildings. Right there in the northern part of the modern square stood the wooden church of Theodosius. There was a moat along the wall of Kitay-Gorod. A wooden bridge was thrown over it from the Nikolskaya gate tower to the square. Residents of the Lubyanka and Sretenka districts took an active part in the fight against the Polish-Lithuanian invaders. In 1611, under the leadership of Prince Pozharsky, they successfully fought off the Poles and "trampled them into the city." In 1662, on the fence of the Church of Theodosius, no one knew who posted a “charming letter” that convicted the abuse of power by the confidants of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich - the boyar Miloslavsky and the roundabout Rtishchev. The people accused them of speculating in copper money, which led to the extreme high cost of food. With this letter, read to the people by archer Kuzemka Nogaev, the crowd, led by Luchka Zhitky, a tax-payer of the Sretenskaya Hundred, went to the tsar in the village of Kolomenskoye. Thus began the Copper Riot. The king brutally suppressed him, and both leaders of the "rebellion" were executed at the same church of Theodosius.

During the war with the Swedes, Peter I feared the arrival of the troops of Charles XII in Moscow, and this forced him to build new large earthen fortifications around the Kremlin and Kitay-gorod in 1707-1708. The fortifications (bastions) were surrounded by a new, specially dug ditch, into which, in particular, the upper subsoil waters from the Lubyanka came. The bastions of Peter I stood until 1823, although half of the modern square to the east of them was already built up with courtyards, shops, a “barber shop” and an almshouse “on Fedoseevsky church land” already in the middle of the 18th century. The modern Myasnitskaya Street was extended to the west, to the wall of Kitay - the city in which until 1739 the first Prolomny Gates to Maly Cherkassky Lane were made, since the direct entrance to Nikolskaya Street was blocked from the east by a bastion. In 1830, in the middle of the square, a fountain of the Mytishchi water supply system was built, from which residents used buckets and barrels to draw water until the end of the 19th century, since few people had water supply in their homes.

In 1820, in the wall of Kitai-Gorod, the second Prolomny Gate was broken into the modern Lubyanka Square, from them to the Ilyinsky Gate under the Kitay-Gorod Wall, tents and stalls of Moscow second-hand booksellers were placed. In the 1880s, a horse-drawn tram passed through the square, which was replaced in 1904 by a tram. An electrical substation was equipped between the two Break Gates. V. Gilyarovsky described the square at the end of the 19th century as follows: “Lubyanskaya Square is one of the city centers. Opposite Mosolov's house was an antediluvian exchange of hired carriages in which the dead were seen off. Several more respectable carriages were also parked there; bar and businessmen who did not have their own trips, hired them for visits. The water-carriers were waiting in lines, surrounding the fountain, and, swinging buckets on long poles over the bronze figures of the sculptor Vitali, they scooped up water, pouring their barrels. I was struck by the bustle, noise and disorder of this very then-passage area of ​​​​Moscow ... by the way, and the most fetid from the parking of horses.

In 1934, the wall of Kitay-Gorod and the nearest houses on Nikolskaya Street were broken, the square was expanded, the fountain was removed and moved to the Neskuchny Garden. At the same time, during the construction of the subway in the lower part of the Nikolsky Gate tower, which overlooked the moat, a “rumor” was discovered - a hiding place in which, during the siege of Kitay-Gorod by enemies, the besieged listened to whether they were digging under the walls. The passage and the "hearing" was laid back in the 17th century, but through its small embrasure windows, laid with long-rotten boards, the "hearing" was filled with subsoil water, which, when digging a foundation pit for the metro station, gushed into it. The water was pumped out, and the 16th-century underground room that opened up now serves as one of the metro's ventilation chambers.

At the end of the 19th century, many insurance companies bought up land in Moscow and built tenement houses. So in 1898, a house “hanging” over Lubyanskaya Square, built as a profitable one for the Rossiya insurance company according to the project of Academician A.V. Ivanova. The house was built on the property of N.S. Mosolov. In Soviet times, in December 1918, all private insurance companies, including Rossiya, were liquidated, and their property and real estate were nationalized. In September 1919, the Cheka, the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage, began working within these walls. Because of her, the name "Lubyanka" became a household name, many thousands of Soviet people became victims of this organization.

At the beginning of the Cheka, the faithful ally of Ulyanov-Lenin, Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky, "Iron Felix", headed. F.E. Dzerzhinsky, a Polish nobleman by origin, was one of the oldest members of the Bolshevik Party. From the moment the Cheka was formed in December 1917, the "iron Felix" until the last day of his life led the apparatus for the fight against the "counter-revolution". Lubyanka Square was renamed Dzerzhinsky Square in 1926, immediately after his death. In 1958, a monument to Felix Dzerzhinsky by E.I. was erected in the center of the square. Vuchetich, and in August 1991 it was demolished.

By the end of the 1920s, the tasks of the department at Lubyanka were expanding significantly, and the staff was also growing. As a result, the Chekists are getting crowded within the walls of the house on Lubyanka Square. And at the turn of the 20-30s, the building of the former apartment building of the Rossiya insurance company was seriously reconstructed. At the same time, the Inner Prison was significantly reconstructed, which was located in the courtyard and had been functioning since 1920. Four more floors were added to it. The architect Langman solved the problem of prisoner walks in an original way by arranging six walking yards with high walls right on the roof of the building. Prisoners were lifted here on special elevators or led by flights of stairs. In 1940-1947, under the new People's Commissar Lavrenty Beria, a new administrative building was built, the project was developed by the famous Soviet architect A.V. Shchusev. The result was a complex of two houses built at different times and by different architects, but constituting a single whole. District: Central, Tver. Nearby metro: Lubyanka.

We continue our regular column - and today we are looking at a detailed photograph of Lubyanka Square, approximately 1898. High resolution photos can be downloaded from the link above.

So what does the old photograph of Lubyanka tell us about —>

Before the revolution, Lubyanskaya Square was one of the most beautiful places in Moscow. The classic view of the Kitaigorodskaya wall with two towers, the chapel of St. Panteleimon and the descending Teatralny Proyezd constantly found its way into paintings and series of postcards.

Visiting cards of Lubyanka Square until the 1930s. On the left is the Vladimirskaya tower in Kitay-Gorod. Initially, when built by the Italians in the 1530s, the towers of Kitay-gorod were flat. Add-ons with green roofs-tents appeared only in the second half of the 17th century, like the Kremlin. To the right of the tower there is a breaking gate to Nikolskaya Street, they were “broken” only in the 18th century, after the fortress had lost its defensive significance. Prior to that, Kitai-Gorod got through the gate in the tower itself. Usually the gate passage inside the tower had a knee - in the plan in the shape of the letter G, so that it would be more difficult for enemies to overcome the defense. To the right is an unnamed corner tower. Initially, there were no teeth on it, they appeared only in the 19th century, during the restoration of Moscow after the fire of 1812. They wanted to make the Kitaigorod wall look like the Kremlin wall.

Behind the gate you can see the huge chapel of St. Panteleimon. Yes, this is not a church, but a chapel, it was the largest in Moscow. It was built by the architect Kaminsky in 1883. All this was mercilessly demolished in 1934, during the construction of the first subway line. Now the area is unrecognizable. The place of the chapel is now an empty space, the Nautilus shopping center stands on the site of the house next to the chapel.

View of Teatralny Proezd. To the right is a jagged section of the Kitaygorod wall, where the roadway is now. A blind tower is visible, the gates of which were laid back in the 18th century. Behind it you can see the edge of the Chelyshi hotel, which stood on the site of the Metropol. And a larger building opposite, on the site of the Moscow Hotel. To the right in the distance is Okhotny Ryad and the facade of the Nobility Assembly, which was rebuilt at the beginning of the 20th century, and after the revolution turned into the House of the Unions. And close to the right is the corner of the Lubyansky Passage, where Detsky Mir now stands.

Teatralny proezd was one of the busiest streets in Moscow, sometimes there were even traffic jams from carriages and spans.

In the middle of the square stood a water-folding fountain of 1834, the authorship of the sculptor Vitali, decorated with sculptures of playing boys. In the 19th century, water-folding fountains and pavilions were arranged in many Moscow squares. All of them were connected to the Mytishchi water pipeline, and it was from them that people carried buckets of water for their needs. The Mytishchi water pipeline was modernized 2 times, the last time in the 1890s, and only after that they began to massively supply water to houses. But, even by 1911, only 20% of Moscow houses were equipped with running water. Many still in the Soviet years continued to take water from these fountains.
The most famous fountains, decorated with sculptures by Vitali, stood on Teatralnaya, Lubyanskaya and Varvarskaya squares. There was only one left - in the square on Theater Square. This fountain was transferred from the Lubyanka in the 1930s to the site in front of the Neskuchny Palace (Academy of Sciences).

A typical gas lantern is visible in front of the fountain, this one stands a little closer to the shooting point.

Until the middle of the 19th century, lanterns in Moscow were oil and kerosene. In 1865, the English company of Bouquet and Goldsmith received a concession for the construction of a gas plant and lighting the streets of Moscow with flowing gas. The British built a plant with four round brick gas tanks, which we now know as Arma (near the Kursk railway station). In December 1865, several test lanterns were lit on the Kuznetsk bridge, and by 1868 there were already about 3,000 such lanterns on the streets of Moscow. They remained until 1932. Now this can be seen in the Museum "Lights of Moscow". And according to his model, many new electric lamps were installed as part of the reconstruction of Moscow streets in 2015-16.

Lubyanka Square is an expensive place and cab drivers are not easy here. In its pure form, on sprung carriages and "dutik" wheels (tires with pressure)

Among the cabbies are their Moscow show-offs. All have bays and blacks, and one has a white “deuce”. Probably took more.

At the water-folding fountain you can see the barrel of a water carrier - an everyday Moscow detail, which completely disappeared from the streets already in Soviet times.

In Teatralniy proezd, you can see a traffic jam from horse cars.

As in many African and Asian countries, and now in Moscow, one could sometimes see how people carry a decent burden on their heads, and in the foreground a person seems to be talking on the phone, and what he was actually holding to his ear more than 100 years ago will remain a secret.

How to get to Lubyanskaya Square: st. metro Lubyanka, trolleybuses 9, 48, 2, 12, 33, 25, 45, 63.

Lubyanskaya Square is located in the center of Moscow, not far from the Kremlin. The square is surrounded by: Theater passage, Nikolskaya street, Novaya square, Lubyansky passage, as well as Myasnitskaya, Bolshaya Lubyanka and Pushechnaya streets.

From the annals of 1480 it is known that after the Novgorod Republic fell and was forcibly annexed to the Moscow principality, the most well-born and influential Novgorodians were resettled in Moscow. By decree of Tsar Ivan III, immigrants from Novgorod were ordered to settle in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe current Lubyanka. Novgorodians gave the name to this area - it came from Lubyanitsy - a district of Novgorod. At the same time, the church of St. Sophia was built in the likeness of the ancient St. Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod (1040-1050), and a little earlier, in 1472, in honor of the conquest of Novgorod, at the corner of Myasnitskaya Street, at the behest of Ivan III, the church of the Grebnevskaya Mother of God was built ( destroyed in 1934).

When the Kitaigorod wall was erected in 1534-1538, a large square was formed, divided into two parts. The part that ended with the Cannon Yard and was located east of Rozhdestvenskaya Street and up to the current Lubyanskaya Square was called Cannon until the 20s of the 20th century. And the area from Bolshaya Lubyanka Street to the Varvarsky Gates was called Lubyanka.

In the northern side of the current Lubyanka Square in the old days there was a wooden church of Theodosius. In 1662, on its fence, unknown persons posted a letter in which they accused the boyar Miloslavsky and the devious Rtishchev, close associates of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, of abuse of power. The letter said that they were speculating in copper money, and this caused food prices to rise. This letter was read by archer Kuzma Nogaev to a large gathering of people, after which the indignant crowd, led by the Sretenskaya Hundred tax collector Suka Zhitky, moved to the royal residence of Kolomenskoye. This event went down in history as the Copper Riot. The king brutally dealt with his instigators, executing them at the church of Theodosius, from where the rebellion began.

During the war with the Swedes, Peter the Great built new earthen fortifications around the Kremlin and Kitay-gorod. These fortifications existed until 1823, but half of the current Lubyanka Square, located to the east of the bastions, was already built up in the middle of the 18th century. In 1820, the second Prolomny Gate was made opposite the square. Along them to the Ilyinsky break gates second-hand booksellers settled with their tents. In 1830, a water intake fountain of the Mytishchi water pipeline was built on Lubyanskaya Square. Since running water in the houses of that time was a rarity, Muscovites took water from the fountain for domestic needs.

The journalist and Moscow historian V. Gilyarovsky wrote that at the end of the 19th century Lubyanskaya Square was one of the centers of Moscow. There was an exchange of carriages of funeral services, among them there were quite decent carriages for gentlemen who did not have their own departure. Water carriers fussed at the fountain, collecting water into their barrels with the help of special buckets-scoops with long handles.

In the 1880s, horse-drawn rails were laid across Lubyanskaya Square, and in 1904 the horse-drawn tram was replaced. In 1897-1898, according to the project of Academician A. Ivanov, on the land owned by N.S. Mosolov built the building of the Insurance Company Russia, overlooking the facade of Lubyanka Square.

After the October Revolution, this pale yellow brick building was nationalized and housed the All-Russian Emergency Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage, later renamed the Committee of State Security of the USSR, and today - Russian. For some time the square was called Nikolskaya, and in 1927, after the death of F.E. Dzerzhinsky, the founder of the Soviet state security service, the square was renamed Dzerzhinsky Square, and only in 1991 the historical name was returned. The history of this building is interesting. In the 30s of the 20th century, it underwent reconstruction, and the prison in the courtyard, which had been functioning since the post-revolutionary years, was also updated. Four floors were built over the prison, and for prisoners to walk on the roof of the house, six walking yards with high walls were equipped. In the 40s, at the initiative of L. Beria, the building was reconstructed according to the project of the architect Shchusev.

In 1934, the Kitaygorod wall was broken along with the adjacent houses on Nikolskaya Street. The fountain was moved to Neskuchny Zad, due to which the square became more spacious. In 1958, a monument to Dzerzhinsky was erected in the center of the square, the author of which was E.I. Vuchetich. In 1991, the monument was dismantled and moved to the Park of Arts on Krymsky Val. In October 1990, a monument to the victims of the Gulag was erected on Lubyanka Square. The monument is a large stone brought from Solovki.

LUBYANSKAYA SQUARE - DZERZHINSKY SQUARE

The old name of the square - Lubyanka, or Lubyanskaya - can tell a lot about the history of this area of ​​Moscow. By the way, this toponym is one of those few old names" that, having already been replaced by new ones, are still preserved in the memory of some Muscovites: Okhotny Ryad, Manezhnaya Tsdoschad, Nikolskaya, Maroseyka, Ilyinka, Pokrovka streets, etc. Many Muscovites also remember the old name of Dzerzhinsky Square.

So, Lubyanskaya, Lubyanka. When and how did this Moscow toponym arise, what is its meaning, is it connected by its formation with any characteristic feature of the ancient capital?

The origin of the name Lubyanka has not yet been precisely clarified, because no, there are a sufficient number of historical facts, documented.

For example, the version according to which the name of Lubyanka Square is connected with the fact that since 1704 the city provided places for selling vegetables and fruits in bast huts is not convincing. This is not true, since the word Lubyanka as the name of the area is mentioned in historical sources much earlier, already in the 15th century.

The most popular and well-reasoned hypothesis is currently considered to be the one whose supporters claim that the name Lubyanka did not originate in Moscow, but in another city, and is thus a transferred toponym. According to this assumption, the roots of the name should be sought in ancient Novgorod. There was a Lubyagshtsa or Lubyanka street. The church of St. Sophia, "the wisdom of God" (like the St. Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod 1045-1050). Byiz Lubyanskaya Square, at the corner of Myasnitskaya Street (now Kirov Street), stood the Church of the Grebnevskaya Mother of God, also built in connection with the fate of Novgorod.

In general, this part of the territory of Moscow was in a certain period - after the annexation of Novgorod - inhabited by "living people", immigrants from Pskov and Novgorod. It is noteworthy that the Church of the Presentation, located on the corner of Bolshaya Lubyanka and Kuznetsky Most, was called "in Pskovychi". In the Russian chronicles there is a record that after the annexation of Novgorod in 1478 and Pskov in 1510, noble families of Pskov and Novgorodians moved to Moscow in the area of ​​interest to us.

Thus, it can be assumed that the settlers brought with them the usual geographical name and “grafted” it into the Moscow toponymic landscape. As for the form of the name, the Novgorodian Lubyanica on Moscow soil could well have changed to Lubyanka: under the influence of the then productive Moscow model “nominal basis + -k (a)”, the mud Petrovka, Sretenka, Stromynka, Varvarka, Dmitrovka, Ilyinka, etc. Not however, the possibility of the name Lubyanka appearing directly in Moscow, without its transfer from outside, is also excluded.

In terms of its meaning, the name is apparently connected with the word lub (or bast), which used to mean in the Russian language of the 14th-16th centuries. "the inner bark of linden and other trees", as well as a product made from bast - "bast box, a measure of loose and other bodies \ Bast, as you know, was also used as a material for writing. The document itself, written on the bark, for example, a letter could be called bast There were also known derivatives of lub - a collective lubie. In the dictionary of V. I. Dahl, the word lubyanet is also mentioned - "harden, scrawl, turn into a bast", for example: "Arable land grows luby in drought. The river lubyane freezes)".

Talking about the toponyms Lubyanka, Lubyanskaya Square, one can hardly pass by a number of interesting facts from the hysteria of Moscow and Russia associated with this area of ​​the capital, past the remarkable toponymic landscape - the names of streets adjacent to the former Lubyanskaya Square.

A little-known fact from the history of Lubyanka Square is that, apparently, even during the time of Ivan the Terrible, a streltsy settlement was set up here. The well-known historian of Moscow S.K. on the site of Lubyanka Square and Lubyansky Square there were already two streltsy settlements,

At the beginning of the XVII century. residents of the Lubyanka and Sretent areas did not take an active part in the fight against the Polish-Lithuanian invaders. In 1644, under the leadership of Pozharsky, they successfully fought off the Poles and "trampled them into the city."

During the war with the Swedes, Peter I was afraid of the arrival of the troops of Charles XII in Moscow, and this forced him to build in 4707-1708. new large earth fortifications around the Kremlin and Kitay-gorod. The fortifications were surrounded by a new specially dug ditch, which, in particular, received the upper subsoil water from the Lubyanka.

One of the most devastating Moscow fires of the first half of the 18th century began from the Lubyanka: “In the fire of May 40, 1748, 1202 courtyards, 26 churches were damaged in Moscow by fire, and 96 people burned down^ and Ilyinsky Gates, in the house of Princess P. M. Kurakina, which was in the parish of the Grebnev Church on the Lubyanka "".

A curious announcement mentioning the toponym Lubyanskaya Square is found in one of the issues of the Moskovskie Vedomosti newspaper in 1846: “A huge whale, 14 sazhens in length, in a panorama located in a large booth on Lubyanskaya Square, can be seen at Shrovetide every day from 1 midnight to

“7 Smirnov V. Readings in the society of lovers of spiritual enlightenment. M., 1881.

7 p.m; between the ribs of the whale is placed a chorus of mu "dowels playing different pieces."

Well-known journalist and everyday writer of Moscow V.; A. Gilyarovsky placed in his book "Moscow and Muscovites" a special essay "Lubyanka", from which we learn that on Lubyanskaya Square between Bolshaya and Malaya Lubyanka there was a huge tenement house. A tavern "Uglich" was built nearby for the common people. The tavern was a cabbie, although it had no yard to feed the horses while their owners drank tea. Previously, as V. A. Gilyarovsky writes, Lubyanskaya Square replaced the cab yard. There was an exchange of cabbies, an exchange of carters, and along the sidewalk from Myasnitskaya to Bolshaya Lubyanka there were cabs

In the October days of 1905, rallies and demonstrations were organized on Lubyanka Square. In October 1917, battles took place on it, and from here, through Nikolskaya Street and Theater Passage (now part of Marx Avenue), the red units advanced on the Kremlin.

F. E. Dzerzhinsky was a member of the party since 1895. He was a member of the Central Committee of the party and a candidate member of the Politburo of the Central Committee. From his youth, F. Z. Dzerzhinsky took an active part in the Polish and Russian revolutionary movement, was repeatedly thrown into the royal dungeons. In February 1917, Dzerzhinsky was released from Butyrka prison. From the moment the Cheka was formed in December 1917, F. E. Dzerzhinsky, until the very last day of his life, headed the apparatus for the fight against counter-revolution (reorganized in 1922 into the GYU, then OSHU). From 1921 to 1924, he was also the People's Commissar of Railways, and from 1924 - Chairman of the Supreme Economic Council.

Lubyanka Square was renamed Dzerzhvshsky Square in 1926, immediately after his death. In 1958, a monument to F. E. Dzerzhinsky by E. V. Vuchetich was erected in the center of the square. In the center of the bronze pedestal, framed by laurel branches, is the image of a shield with a drawn sword - the emblem of the revolution that defends itself and punishes its enemies.

In 1926, not only the former Lubyanskaya Square, but also Bolshaya Lubyanka Street received a new name. Now it is Dzerzhinsky Street. F. E. Dzerzhinsky in 1918-1920 worked at number 11 on this street. And in the XVII century. Bolshaya Lubyanka Street was called Sretenka, like the entire modern street that runs from Sretensky Gate Square to Bolshaya Kolkhoznaya Square. The name, Malaya Lubyanka, has survived to this day.

25th October Street, also overlooking Dzerzhinsky Square *, received its modern name in $ 193. As you know, according to the old style, the day when the Great October Socialist Revolution took place was October 25 (according to the new style - November 7). The name of the street perpetuates exactly the date that all mankind recognized in 1917. Until 1935, the street was called Nikolskaya, as we mentioned above, after the former Nikolsky Greek monastery. Nikolskaya -! one of the oldest Moscow streets, closely connected with the development of Russian culture and education; In the history of Russia, it is famous, in particular, for the fact that "the first Printing House in the country was located here in the 16th century, and then the Slavic-Greek-Lativ Academy, where M.V. Lomonosov studied.

No less interesting from a historical point of view is another street leading from the noisy Dzerzhinsky Square. It keeps the connection with the history of Moscow and Russia directly in its name - Cannon. Cannon yard in Moscow XV-r-XVII centuries. was, one might say, one of the most important structures - the first artillery factory in Russia. The court arose on the high left bank of the Neglinnaya under Ivan III, when it became obvious that it was necessary to organize a large state-owned enterprise for casting cannons, which was beyond the power of individual artisans. In particular, the giant Tsar Cannon was cast here, at the Moscow Cannon Daor, by master Andrey Chokhov.

Despite numerous fires, the buildings of the Cannon Yard survived until the beginning of the 19th century, they were dismantled with cotton wool, and the stone was used in the construction of the Yauza bridge. By the way, the name of Pushechnaya Street on the map of Moscow has existed only since 1922. It was then that the old name of the street was restored, more precisely, Mr. Pushechny Lane; at one time it was replaced by the name Sofiyka due to the fact that the church of St. Sofia.

On the one hand, the building of the Polytechnic Museum and Serov Proezd overlook Dzerzhinsky Square. Until 1939 it was called Lubyansky. A Soviet fighter pilot, Hero of the Soviet Union, participant in the civil war in Isparin A. K. Serov lived in the former Lubyansky passage. After his death, the passage was given a new name in honor of the hero - Serov's passage. Here, in Lubyansky Proyezd, the outstanding Soviet poet VV Mayakovsky lived and worked for the last few years.

New Square is located near Dzerzhinsky Square. In the XVIII century. this name was opposed to the old trading rows overlooking Red Square. One of the most interesting Moscow museums, the Museum of History and Reconstruction of Moscow, is located on New Square. It is located in the building of the former church of St. John the Evangelist, under the Elm.

The modern territory of the Lubyanka has been known since the founding of Moscow. According to one version, in the 12th century it was called the Kuchkov field - after the name of the owner of these lands, the boyar Kuchka. Presumably, he owned Moscow lands before Yuri Dolgoruky.

There is no consensus on how the toponym Lubyanka appeared. One of the popular versions - the name comes from the region of Novgorod, Lyubyanitsa. Other options are associated with bast - a flexible tree bark, from which bast shoes, baskets, dishes, roofing and coarse fabric, matting were made.

A settlement history is connected with Novgorod near Lubyanka. After the weakening of Novgorod and its annexation to the Moscow principality, Ivan III moved the Novgorod nobility here in the last quarter of the 15th century. The first mention of Lubyanka in chronicles belongs to the same period.

In the 30s of the 16th century, the fortifications of Kitay-gorod were erected on the side of the Kremlin. So there was a gate overlooking the square. Their names changed over time: Vladimir, Nikolsky, Sretensky. From them, through Cannon Square (on the site of which Novaya Square is now located), it was possible to drive to another gate - Varvarsky (current Slavyanskaya Square).

The Neglinka River flowed in front of Kitay-Gorod, which was later removed into the sewer

Reconstruction of buildings in Kitay-gorod. Vladimir gates - those from below

At the beginning of the troubled 17th century, in the Lubyanka area, the troops of Minin and Pozharsky stormed Kitai-Gorod to drive the Poles out of there. Fifty years later, in 1662, during the Russian-Polish war, a crowd gathered here to protest against the increase in taxes and the issuance of rapidly depreciating copper coins. The protest became known as the "Copper Riot". Bypassing the ditches that then lay along the Kitaigorod wall, people headed towards the Kremlin.

Assuming the invasion of the Swedish troops, during the time of Peter the Great, earthen bastions were erected on part of the square. They were dug up after the fire of 1812. The fire destroyed the old buildings in the area. The modern arrangement of streets and squares appeared just after him.

Under Catherine the Second, from Myasnitskaya Street, there was a branch of the Secret Expedition - the special services of the 18th century. During the demolition of buildings at the beginning of the 20th century, the remains of prisoners and torture in the basements were found here.

THE SQUARE ACQUIRES THE PRESENT FEATURES

The construction of the 19th century formed the modern configuration of the Lubyanka - up to the circle in the center of the square. Since 1835, there has been a fountain on the site of the current flower bed. It received water from the Mytishchi water supply system, which was used for domestic needs. The fountain was designed by the sculptor Ivan (Giovanni) Vitali, was called Nikolsky and consisted of four figures of boys holding a large bowl and personifying the Volga, Dnieper, Don and Neva rivers. The small bowl was supported by a group of three bronze eagles, which were lost. The fountain itself stood on the square for almost a hundred years, and during the reconstruction of the square in 1934 it was moved to the Alexandrinsky (Neskuchny) Palace, where it still stands.

Lubyanka Square, 1910–1917. In the foreground is the fountain of Giovanni Vitali, behind it is the Kitaygorod wall and the Vladimir Gates, behind which passes Nikolskaya Street. On the site of the Lubyansky passage (on the right) is now the "Children's World" Photo: K.Fischer / pastvu.com/p/283413

Menageries were located on the site of the current Polytechnic Museum in the 18th-19th centuries - the townspeople could not only marvel at exotic animals such as the anaconda or puma in the Kreisberg menagerie, but also watch a show with trained animals. There is a story about an elephant that almost escaped. He escaped from the enclosure and moved into the crowd, only a company of soldiers could cope with him. After the closing of the menageries, the animals were traded on the square.

A huge whale 14 sazhens long and a panorama located in a large booth on Lubyanka Square can be seen at Shrovetide every day from 1 am to 7 pm; between the ribs of the whale is placed a choir of musicians playing different plays

"Russian word"

Yesterday, at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, a wolf appeared from somewhere on Myasnitskaya Street. The wolf ran down the middle of the street from the Butcher's Gate to Lubyanka Square. The appearance of a wolf in the street caused confusion among the public and frightened many horses, who shied away. The policeman, together with the janitors, drove the wolf into the yard of Davydov's house, and then into a large box. After some time, the huntsman of the owner of the wolf, student N.P., came here. Pakhomov. According to the huntsman, the wolf is tame. He is only 6 months old. He fled from his kennel from the yard of Kabanov's house, on Chistye Prudy. The wolf was returned to the owner on receipt.

Vladimir Gilyarovsky

"MOSCOW AND MUSCOVITES"

Somehow, back in serf times, a wooden booth with a menagerie and a huge elephant appeared on Lubyanka Square, which attracted mainly the public. Suddenly, in the spring, the elephant went berserk, tore out the logs to which he was chained from the wall, and began to sweep the booth, victoriously trumpeting and catching fear in the crowds of people surrounding the square. The elephant, annoyed by the cries of the crowd, tried to escape, but he was held back by the logs to which he was chained and which were stuck in the wreckage of the booth. The elephant had already managed to knock down one log and rushed into the crowd, but by this time the police had brought a company of soldiers, who killed the giant with several volleys. Now the Polytechnic Museum stands on this site.

The modern large building of the Polytechnic Museum was built in several stages over 30 years, and was completed in 1907. At the same time, the Big Auditorium appears - the city platform that has become famous for speeches by scientists and representatives of culture. The building was not always used for its intended purpose - during the First World War there was an infirmary there.

Between the Polytechnic University and the square was the so-called "Shipovskaya fortress", built in the first half of the 19th century on the site of the printing house of Nikolai Novikov. From the fortress there was only the name and essence. The fact is that the general established original rules: he did not take a fee for renting apartments, and he did not follow the number of tenants. The "fortress" settled rabble, hiding from the police. What and who only was not found in it. The stolen goods could be conveniently sold in the neighboring markets of the Old and New Squares.

At the turn of the 18th-19th centuries, Lubyanka was one of the aristocratic districts of the city: the Golitsyns, Volkonskys, Dolgorukies, and Khovanskys lived here. In the place where the main administrative building of the FSB now stands, there was a large courtyard of the Mingrelian princes Dadiani. In the middle of the 19th century, the square turned into an active business and trade space. The nobles sell their properties and business merchants take their place.

At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the Lubyansky passage of the merchants Alekseevs will appear between Teatralny Proyezd and Sofiyka (as Cannon Street was then called). The three-story buildings of the passage were rented out as shops and shops. He continued to work after the revolution.

The roadway of Lubyanka Square in the first half of the 20th century was very busy. There were cab stops, tram routes, and wandering pedestrians. In 1911, there was even a plan to create a tunnel under Kitay-gorod to unload the area. The tram junction was improved to increase the throughput, and an electrical substation was built nearby, near the Kitaigorod wall.

"Moscow life"

Yesterday, one of the representatives of the French colony sent a clipping from French newspapers to the mayor with a message about a new bill regarding the fight against pornography. On this occasion, a French citizen writes that Moscow no less needs to protect the population from sellers of pornographic cards. Now this trade is carried out openly. The author of the letter has to walk every day from Lubyanskaya Square to Teatralnaya Square, and in this area he is accompanied by booksellers who offer to buy cards of known content. Taking advantage of the general interest in the personality of the recently deceased Leo Tolstoy, these merchants offer the public his pamphlets, and between the pages of the books they keep pornographic cards. The mayor sent this letter to the discretion of the mayor.

In 1905, a whole wave of demonstrations and armed uprisings swept through Moscow. During the October demonstration, which took place on Nemetskaya Street, the revolutionary Nikolai Bauman, who was then head of the Moscow Bolshevik Organization, was killed. Farewell to the body of Bauman was organized in the building of the Imperial Moscow Technical School. Many people came to it, and on October 20, a procession of two hundred thousand workers with a coffin passed through Lubyanka Square to the burial place at the Vagankovsky cemetery. After the Bolsheviks came to power, Nemetskaya Street was renamed Bauman Street. In the spring of 1912, the square will again be filled with protesters - a demonstration will pass through the Lubyanka after the Lena massacre, then the workers who went on strike were killed.

In the autumn of 1914, patriots who opposed the German and Austrian subjects marched through the area: “The crowd moved to the Lubyansko-Ilyinsky trading premises, where the Einem shop was located,” wrote the newspaper Russkoye Slovo. - In an instant, the partnership store was destroyed. Nothing inside the store survived. Everything is crumpled, beaten, broken, torn. Then the windows were broken in the Dresden store and some others on Myasnitskaya Street, Harrakh and Ferman on Kuznetsky Most.

In the 19th century, gradually all buildings began to be rented out, and the area turned into a concentration of insurance companies. There were 15 branches of various insurance companies on Bolshaya Lubyanka alone. That is why the large insurance company "Russia" in 1894 bought land from the Tambov landowner Mosolov to the north-east of the area for the demolition of all the buildings that existed there.

Vladimir Gilyarovsky

"MOSCOW AND MUSCOVITES"

Opposite Mosolov's house on Lubyanka Square was an exchange of hired carriages. When Mosolov sold his house to the Rossiya insurance company, he gave the carriage and horses to his coachman and Noodles went up on the stock exchange. An excellent harness gave him the opportunity to earn good money: driving with Noodles was considered chic. (…)

Near Mosolov's house, on the land that belonged to the consistory, there was a common tavern "Uglich", a cabbie's tavern, although it did not have a yard where horses usually feed while their owners drink tea. But at that time there was “simplicity” in Moscow, which was brought out in the mid-nineties by the chief police chief Vlasovsky.

And before him, Lubyanskaya Square also replaced the cab yard: between Mosolov’s house and the fountain there was an exchange of cabs, between the fountain and Shilov’s house there was an exchange of draymen, and along the entire sidewalk from Myasnitskaya to Bolshaya Lubyanka there was a continuous line of cab drivers hustling around horses.

The new owners decided to build a large apartment building. It was designed by architects Nikolai Proskurin and Alexander Vasilyevich Ivanov (author of the National building). The first floors were rented out for commercial premises. And the upper ones are for housing and offices. In this building there was a firm "Scherer, Nabgolts and Co", which was engaged in photography. Many photographs of Lubyanka Square were taken from the window of this firm.

Turrets are located on the roof of the building. On the central one is a clock. They were crowned with two figurines of women - symbols of Justice and Consolation. It is not immediately possible to recognize the current building of the FSB in the facade of this house and the symbols of the figurines, but it is he who is destined to become a symbol of the Lubyanka of the Soviet period.

HEADQUARTERS OF THE CHEKISTS

Only in the 20th century did Lubyanka become associated with the powerful department of the security forces. When the Bolshevik government moved from Petrograd to Moscow and nationalized several buildings on the Lubyanka in 1918, the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission got it.

A year and a half later, the department organizes the then-famous inner prison. One of her first prisoners were Olga and Sergei, surprisingly, the Lenins. According to one version, in 1900 they helped Vladimir Ulyanov with a foreign passport by borrowing a document from their father Nikolai. Two decades later, Vladimir Ilyich, who successfully returned from abroad, did not spare his assistants.

The prison was originally intended for special prisoners and detainees who were not allowed to communicate not only with the outside world, but also with each other. In the most difficult times, prisoners were “broken” here, in addition to torture during interrogations, by severely cramped conditions of detention or, conversely, by complete loneliness. For example, when escorting prisoners along the corridors and stairs, the guards had to hide them from each other's eyes, and there were gaps between the walls that prevented the prisoners from tapping.

Orientation in space for the prisoners was difficult not only because of the walls surrounding them. The elevator in the building rose so slowly that, after riding in it, the prisoners might think that they had risen from a deep basement, and not from the first floor of the prison to the upper sixth. Regarding the number of storeys of the KGB building in the city, an anecdote arose: “Which building is the tallest in Moscow? Answer: Lubyanskaya Square, building two. From its roof you can see Kolyma. Kolyma was not the worst option for prisoners.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago

Ivanov-Razumnik, in the Lubyanka foster "dog lover", calculated that for whole weeks there were THREE people per 1 square meter of the floor (estimate, accommodate!), There was no window or ventilation in the dog ward, from the bodies and breathing the temperature was 40-50 degrees (!), everyone was sitting in the same underpants (putting winter clothes under themselves), their naked bodies were compressed, and from someone else's sweat, the skin fell ill with eczema. So they sat for WEEKS, they were not given any air or water (except for the gruel and tea in the morning).

The prisoners were walking in the courtyard-well. There were two places for a walk - on the lower floor and on the upper one, from where only the sky was visible. Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who was imprisoned during the investigation, described how soot fell from a stove chimney on walkers. The writer suggested that documents and investigation materials were burned in the oven. He also recalled that in the prison library it was possible to get forbidden literature - it was not seized from there. But the order was strict: for the slightest offense or at the whim of the guards, the conditions of detention could be worsened.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago:

We walked under the stove chimney - in a concrete box, on the roof of Bolshaya Lubyanka, at the level of the sixth floor. The walls also towered over the sixth floor by three human heights. With our ears we heard Moscow - the roll call of car sirens. And they saw - only this pipe, the sentry on the tower on the seventh floor, and that unfortunate piece of God's sky, which happened to stretch over the Lubyanka.

During the “big purge”, those who, in fact, previously led the prison, also ended up in prison. According to some reports, in 1937 alone, almost 30 thousand people passed through the internal prisons of the main complex of the NKVD. Only a few were released from it, the rest were sent to other Moscow prisons or to be shot. The inner prison of the main building is quite famous. But besides it, there are underground dungeons under the quarter behind the main building at a shallow depth, disguised as the basements of houses. In late Soviet times, under the complex of buildings of the special services, underground structures were dug at a great depth below the metro level in order to protect against a nuclear strike, spread over the entire block. The buildings are still in operation. There is also talk of a tunnel allegedly connecting the KGB headquarters with the Kremlin. In addition to other scary places, Lubyanka is known for its poison laboratory. In it, special services tested poisonous substances on prisoners. There is no single version of when the prisons were closed in the KGB buildings on Lubyanka. According to one version, this happened in the 1960s, when, by order of KGB chairman Vladimir Semichastny, the last persons under investigation under economic charges were transferred to Lefortovo. The main part of the prisoners from the “nutryanka” was transferred back in 1953. According to another, the last inhabitant was Viktor Ilyin, who made an attempt on Brezhnev's life, who shot at a car with astronauts near the Borovitsky Gates of the Kremlin in 1969 (he confused it with the General Secretary's car). He was released from here in 1988, but he allegedly sat there only for a few hours. In 1989, a museum with limited access was made out of the six chambers of the “interior”, and in the rest of the building there is a dining room, warehouses and offices.

It is curious that in the first two decades after the creation of the Cheka, the office of human rights activists - the Political Red Cross and Pompolit - was located very close to their building. They quite legally helped convicts until 1937. One of the key persons of the organizations was Ekaterina Peshkova, informally Gorky's ex-wife and Sergo Beria's relative by granddaughter.

In 1926, the Chekists appropriated the name of the square as well - Lubyanskaya became Dzerzhinsky Square, who died of cardiac arrest in the same year. This name will also be inherited by the metro station built under the square 9 years later. The former name of the square and the station will be returned in 1990.

In memory of Comrade Dzerzhinsky, the Presidium of the Moscow Soviet decided to rename Lubyanskaya Square and Bolshaya Lubyanka Street into the square and street named after. Comrade Dzerzhinsky.

"Latest news"

In Moscow, the question of the demolition of the Kitaygorod wall, erected in the 16th century, was raised. under Elena Glinskaya. After the restoration work, it was recognized that the Kitai-Gorod wall does not represent a museum value. They are demolishing it because it clutters up traffic, especially on Lubyanka Square and Varvarka

During the reconstruction from Dzerzhinskaya Square, as well as from other squares in Moscow, tram traffic was removed in 1934, and a metro was built under it.

A little earlier, the Kitaygorod wall and the Panteleimon Chapel, the architectural dominant of the square, were demolished. The chapel, made by Alexander Kaminsky at the end of the 19th century, looked like a real temple and had a height similar to the tower of the wall.

At the same time, Lubyanka was deprived of the ancient Temple of the Grebnevskaya Icon of the Mother of God, built in the middle of the 16th century. The land on which he stood was handed over for the construction of the subway. In place of the demolished small church with a bell tower, a booth-mine for ventilation will be installed.

Architectural changes hung over the square according to the Stalinist general plan of Moscow, which would never be implemented due to the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War. This will be especially noticeable at Lubyanka: according to the project of architect Alexei Shchusev, the NKVD building was to be built on and combined with a common facade with the neighboring building, but only the right half was reconstructed. In this form, it stood until 1983.

In the 1960s, the quarter between the square and the Polytechnic Museum was demolished, leaving behind an unnamed public garden. Opposite the headquarters of the Chekists in 1958, a monument was erected to their parent, Felix Dzerzhinsky. The monumental sculptural composition of Yevgeny Vuchetich and architect Grigory Zakharov visually connected the heterogeneous development of the square.

It so happened that there were children next to the Chekists. This happened during the first years of Bolshevik power. The Lubyanka hosted a children's version of the May Day demonstration. Delegations from the districts marched, chanted slogans and sang songs.

"Truth"

Lubyanka Square was the site of a parade of proletarian children. By 2 o'clock, the first columned children of Krasnaya Presnya appear on the square. Banners unfurled wide. Children's faces glow with spring joy. Above the motley heads are inscriptions: “Walk, young hearts! You are the red army”, “Grow us up - we will support you”, etc.

In the 1950s, architect Alexei Dushkin designed a large complex of the Detsky Mir department store on the site of the block between Dzerzhinsky Square and Zhdanov Street (as Rozhdestvenka was then called). It is curious that Dushkin was chosen by the author of the project as a person admitted (since he worked on the construction of the metro) to state secrets due to the proximity of the department store building to secret objects. But at this time, a struggle began with architectural excesses, and the project underwent changes due to which the architect fell into a deep depression. Dushkin lived for another 20 years, but the Children's World building was his last completed project.

The department store opens on June 6, 1957. In times of scarcity, it seemed to be a realm of abundance of children's goods. The building with massive glazed arched windows became the main architectural dominant of the square until the 1980s. In the same year, the Knizhny Mir store was opened on Kirov Street in the former apartment building of Nikolai Stakheev, which later turned into Biblio-Globus.

The facades of this building will be preserved, although the inner structure will be destroyed in the 1980s and become part of the KGB Computing Center. The power department, by the way, will expand the bookstore to a huge size. It will become one of the largest in Europe. The KGB took up the work that the Moscow City Council refused and restored the trading floor on its own, doubling its area. The Mayakovsky Museum, which moved to the Lubyanka in 1968, remained in the same building.

At the same time, at the corner of the current Bolshaya Lubyanskaya and Pushechnaya streets, a new monumental building of the KGB with a gray facade was being built. It still houses the main offices of the reformed intelligence service, and not in the old building, as is commonly believed.

According to Boris Paluy, a representative of the then Glavmosarchitectura, Dzerzhinsky Square was the only one in Moscow that had a “finished look” at the time of the collapse of the Soviet Union.

MODERN RUSSIA

In modern times, politics changed the appearance of the square. In 1990, several people's deputies proposed to transfer part of the premises of the KGB buildings to the Memorial society. Seriously, this issue could hardly be discussed - the infrastructure of the buildings of the special services was too expensive. On the other hand, Memorial succeeded in installing a large stone, which was brought from the Solovetsky Islands, in an unnamed square adjacent to the Polytechnic Museum.

For more than six months, a monument to the founder of the department that imprisoned people stood a hundred meters from the stone to those who were imprisoned. In August 1991, after the defeat of the State Emergency Committee, the Iron Felix was demolished. It was perhaps the most famous dismantling of the monument in the history of modern Russia. On August 22, a crowd of Democratic supporters surrounded the pedestal and painted it with the inscriptions "Executioner", "Subject to demolition", a swastika and a red star. With the help of a crane, the figure was removed. Actions were supported by the decision of the Moscow Council. On the same days, another Dzerzhinsky in the form of a bust was taken away from Petrovka, 38 - from the building of the main department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.