Dungeons of the Moscow Kremlin: the main riddles. underground kremlin

The dungeons of the Moscow Kremlin have attracted the attention of historians and archaeologists for many years. Research and excavations have been carried out here repeatedly, but the underground Kremlin still holds a lot of mysteries.

Sexton's excavations

From time immemorial, the Moscow Kremlin has been not only a symbol of sovereign power, but also a place about which legends were made. Not all of them appeared out of nowhere. Many are based on real documents, reports and notes of servicemen. And hundreds of years of archeology did not leave hope to penetrate the secrets of the dungeons. They tried to explore three times, and each time the excavation was stopped from above.

The first attempt in the fall of 1718 was made by the sexton of the Church of John the Baptist on Presnya Konon Osipov. Referring to the words of the deacon of the Great Treasury Vasily Makariev, who in 1682, on the orders of Princess Sophia, descended into a secret passage leading from the Tainitskaya tower to Sobakina (Angular Arsenalnaya) and allegedly saw the chambers full of chests, the sexton asked Prince Romodanovsky for permission to look for them. Unfortunately, the clerk himself was no longer alive. In the Tainitskaya tower, the sexton found the entrance to the gallery, which had to be excavated, and they even gave him soldiers, but there was a danger of collapse, the work was curtailed. Six years later, Osipov returned to the search by decree of Peter I. Ponomar was assigned prisoners to work, but the search was unsuccessful. In the Arsenal corner, Osipov found the entrance to the dungeon, which was flooded with water from a spring. After five meters, he stumbled upon the pillar of the Arsenal, and breaking it in the middle, rested against the rock. Ten years later, he excavated inside the Kremlin to "intercept" Makariev's move, but was again defeated.

Shcherbatov's attempt

The story was continued in 1894.

The case was picked up by an official for special assignments, Prince Nikolai Shcherbatov. In the Nabatnaya Tower, he found the entrance to a walled-up gallery leading to the Konstantin-Eleninskaya Tower. In the Konstantin-Eleninskaya tower, they found an oncoming vaulted corridor 62 meters long. At the end of the gallery, behind the brickwork, they found a cache - cannonballs. Later, Shcherbatov dismantled the floor in Nabatnaya and found a passage leading to this hiding place from the other side. Exploring the Corner Arsenal Tower, Shcherbatov, like Osipov, could not penetrate further. Then the prince decided to break through the underground gallery from the side of the Alexander Garden. The passage went under the Trinity Tower and led to a small chamber with stone vaults, on the floor of which there was a hatch leading to the same room below. The upper chamber was connected by a corridor with another room. A low tunnel began from the second chamber, which led out into the wall. Under the Borovitskaya tower, Shcherbatov found a chapel, a dungeon under a diversion archer, a passage that led to Imperial Square, a “foot battle” that made it possible to keep the space near the tower and the chamber under the congress under fire.

Spring

After the revolution, the Bolsheviks came to power and immediately took care of the safety of the citadel. They seized photographs of the passages from Shcherbatov, filled up the well in the Tainitskaya tower, walled up the lower chambers in Troitskaya. After a Red Army soldier fell into the ground in the fall of 1933 in the courtyard of the government building, archaeologist Ignatius Stelletsky was invited to explore the dungeons. At one time, he put forward a version that the well of the Tainitskaya tower was once dry, and passages came from it. His excavations of the "Osipovsky" passage under the Corner Arsenalnaya led to discoveries. Under the wall, they found an unloading arch, opened an exit to the Alexander Garden, which was immediately walled up. But then Stelletsky ran into a stone block. He believed that the further passage was free from earth, but the scientist was forbidden to excavate and was ordered to clear the dungeon of the Corner Arsenal to the bottom. It turned out that the spring, which now and then flooded the dungeons, was enclosed in a stone well with a diameter of five meters and a depth of seven.

Unexpected finds

It was cleared to the bottom in 1975. Archaeologists found in it two military helmets, stirrups and fragments of chain mail of the late 15th century, stone cores. At the bottom of the well, a spillway was arranged, which was supposed to protect the container from overflow. After it was cleared, the problems with flooding stopped.

In addition to archaeologists, builders also made discoveries. In 1930, they found an underground passage in Red Square, in which several skeletons in armor were found. At a depth of five meters, it went from the Spasskaya Tower towards the Execution Ground and had brick walls and a wrought iron vault. The passage was immediately covered with earth. In 1960, having noticed a microscopic crack in Lenin's mausoleum, the architects began to find out the reason and found an underground passage under the mausoleum as high as a man at a depth of 15 meters. In June 1974, archaeologists discovered an intra-wall passage near the Middle Arsenal Tower. Behind the wall, a 15th-century staircase covered with earth was opened, which could lead to the treasured tunnels. A year earlier, a gallery was found near the Nabatnaya Tower, which went from the Nabatnaya to the Spasskaya Tower, but the beginning and end of the gallery could not be found.

underground roads

However, moves are not everything! After all, the territory of the Kremlin is large.

On April 15, 1882, a dungeon opened in the middle of the road between the Tsar Cannon and the wall of the Chudov Monastery. Three policemen could pass on it in a row. One end of the tunnel rested against the wall of the Chudov Monastery, and the other was littered with stones. When digging the foundation of the Annunciation Monastery in 1840, cellars and underground passages with piles of human remains were found. They talk about a whole road passing under the Cathedral of the Annunciation. Here in the cathedral, Prince Shcherbatov opened a cache that could lead further down. The prince cleared the space under the floor from debris and reached the mosaic floor, which could easily be the vault of an underground tunnel or structure. The mysterious iron door, allegedly located in the dungeons between the Cathedral of the Annunciation and the Archangel, remains a mystery.

Kremlin - underground

Some particularly zealous researchers of underground Moscow assure us that the Kremlin was originally conceived as a huge underground structure, for which a foundation pit was dug on the site of Borovitsky Hill, in which a whole system of tunnels, rooms and galleries was laid. And only after that the builders began to create the ground part of the Kremlin. Then, they say, the plans for the dungeons were lost or burned on purpose. If we take into account the depth of the cultural layer, which in some places reaches seven or eight meters inside the Kremlin, it can be said with certainty that many finds were previously located on the surface of Borovitsky Hill.

True, the mysteries from this do not become less.

Maya Novik

When a thin crack appeared on the building in the early 1960s, in order to find out the reasons for its occurrence, it was decided to explore the bowels next to it. What was the surprise of the researchers when, at a depth of 16 meters, they stumbled upon an arch of a secret passage lined with oak. He led from the Mausoleum in and out. It is possible that the information was not made available to the public, the passage was quickly concreted. But rumors about the dungeons under the Mausoleum still swept the city ...
It should be noted that underground Moscow is of great interest, and at the same time gives rise to many rumors and legends. No one knows for sure about dungeons and secret passages. But they are constantly talked about. Underground Moscow is a huge mystery. They say that this is a whole city, and diggers count 12 of its levels.
And researchers argue that the bowels of the capital resemble a termite mound or a head of Dutch cheese: by the beginning of the 19th century, the center of Moscow had already been dug up in all directions. And the 20th century added new ones to the paved passages, along which metro trains passed, and communications stretched.

Why does Moscow need dungeons?

Although the secret passages known to us date back to the XV-XVII centuries, the underground space of the city was used in ancient times. In some dungeons they arranged hiding places and kept valuables, church relics, and weapons. Others became necropolises. Third, they kept prisoners. Often arranged and underground cellars. Moscow often burned, and such caches made it possible to save valuables and food supplies from the fire. Moscow alchemists and counterfeiters set up their laboratories and workshops underground.
But underground passages were of particular importance in wartime! In the towers, for example, there were rumor dungeons and passages for secret sorties. And the underground galleries of the Novodevichy and Simonov monasteries led to ponds for hidden water intake in case of a siege.
Some caches were sheathed with boards or massive logs, the walls of others were lined with white stone or red brick. It was possible to go down to some passages only through the cellars, and to others - to get on the stairs arranged in the walls of the chambers and towers. Some dungeons were filled with water and suffocating gas, and some were almost entirely filled with sand and silt.

Exploration of the underground passages of Moscow.

Caches near Moscow have long attracted attention, but only a few attempts are known to explore their. And yes, something got in the way all the time.
For example, in the 17th century, on the orders of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, master Azancheev repeatedly tried to build an underground passage under the Moscow River. Everything was unsuccessful, although soon the nobility was suddenly granted to the master-man. And about the tunnel under the river was no longer mentioned.
And during the time of Peter I, sexton Konon Osipov asked to be allowed to scout "two chambers full of chests." It was assumed that the famous Liberia, the library of Ivan the Terrible, could be hidden there. The king allowed the study, but the sexton "did not find any luggage." And soon he died altogether.
At the end of the 19th century, Prince N.S. Shcherbatov, but the First World War prevented him.

"Underground Moscow" by Stelletsky.

In Soviet times, Ignatius Stelletsky tried to explore the dungeons- an enthusiastic archaeologist who devoted his whole life to searching for the book treasures of Ivan the Terrible. He repeatedly applied to various organizations, raising the question of the use of ancient underground structures and referring to the experience of Paris, Rome, London:

Everywhere and everywhere the dungeons are brought by time and people into a state of, if not complete, then very great destruction. The Kremlin did not escape the common fate, and therefore one cannot deceive oneself with the thought that it is enough to open one passage and it is already easy to pass along it under everything, if not under all of Moscow. In fact, a journey through underground Moscow is a jump with obstacles, and very significant ones, the elimination of which will require a lot of effort, time and money. But all this is nothing in comparison with the possible ideal result: the underground Moscow cleaned, restored and illuminated by arc lamps would be an underground museum of scientific and any interest...
Stelletsky's appeals remained unanswered, all his findings and discoveries were concreted or conserved according to the principle "whatever happens." And soon Stelletsky's research was completely banned: the increased interest in the dungeons was interpreted as a conspiracy against the Soviet regime.
The final chord of this story was the 1949 law "On Subsoil" who declared the subsoil of the country the exclusive property of the state. It was then that Stelletsky's discoveries were classified.
And there were many discoveries. For example, the archaeologist warned that the building of the Lenin Library could collapse if the “historical voids” under it were not explored. And the cracks and faults were not long in coming. Similar deformations appeared in the buildings of the Bolshoi and Maly theatres. And the Historical Museum, according to Stelletsky, was also threatened by quicksand. Perhaps that is why the monument to George is so deep into the ground with a pedestal: it serves as an additional support for the building, like forest plantations that strengthen the slopes of a ravine.
Stelletsky's research was remembered during the years of Khrushchev's "thaw" and even a commission was created to search for the library. But with the coming to power of Brezhnev, the Kremlin was closed to scientists, and diaries containing a documentary history of the royal library were stolen from Stelletsky's widow.

Where are underground passages found in Moscow?

The authorities of the capital acknowledge that there is no map of the underground passages of Moscow. There are diagrams drawn based on the results of research by diggers, according to the memoirs of Stelletsky, according to archival materials ... but even their authenticity cannot be vouched for.
Perhaps this was done so that data on caches would not become available to the enemy side in wartime. Therefore, when listing known hiding places and underground passages, one always has to say the word “possibly”.
It is possible that underground passages connect the Tainitskaya, Nikolskaya and Spasskaya towers of the Kremlin. Perhaps the passage leads to Kitay-Gorod, to the Old Pharmacy. Perhaps there is a hiding place under the chambers of Averky Kirillov. Perhaps in a secret passage you can go down to and on. Perhaps from there you can quietly walk to the infamous House on the Embankment. Perhaps there are underground galleries under the Sukharev Tower, under Bruce's house on Prospekt Mira, under the building of the English Club on and in the courtyard of the Yusupov house. Perhaps in Tsaritsyno there is a many-kilometer chain of dungeons. Possibly underground. the Church of the Resurrection of the Word in Barashy is connected with the Apraksinsky Palace. Perhaps it will be possible to get out of the Kremlin underground directly into the house.
Or maybe it's all fiction. So, for example, a certain A. Ivanov, who published an article in 1989 about the dungeons of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, assured that this particular underground passage leads to Liberia. But in fact, he led into the river and turned out to be a drainage system ...

Underground bunkers in Moscow.

There is no doubt that the 20th century added several mysterious dungeons to Moscow. This government bunkers, which were created in case of a nuclear strike. Three government bunkers are precisely known in Moscow: on Taganka, in Izmailovo (two car tunnels go from it to and in the area of \u200b\u200bthe Sokolniki metro station, and you can get into the bunker itself from the Partizanskaya station) and to Kuntsevo (it also goes there automobile tunnel from the public reception of the Ministry of Defense on Myasnitskaya).
A lot of interesting things are told about the underground bunkers of Moscow:
Under our feet - under the asphalt, under the thickness of the earth - there is a whole giant dead city, created for survival. In its multi-storey buildings - air-conditioned, expensive carpets on the floors, electronic clocks that measure time with second accuracy, untouched sheets of paper on the tables, special compartments with beds lined with clean linen. "The bomb shelter is in conservation mode," the military says. It is unlikely that anyone other than them would dare to call these underground mansions bomb shelters. Bomb shelters for mere mortals are completely different ... Elite houses built in Stalin's time, state institutions, factories, some shops are connected by a system of so-called potterns - long underground corridors at a five-meter depth, leading to the actual bomb shelters ... Poterns are connected by small channels with water supply, sewer wells , which in case of blockages, destruction will serve as emergency exits. Theoretically, it is possible to get into the front of an administrative building from an ordinary hatch ...
Digging of the first posterns began before the war and continued actively until 1953, the year of Stalin's death. They built, as it was then supposed, reliably: not a single transition has yet collapsed. The scheme of their location is secret, only the Ministry of Emergency Situations has complete maps. There are especially many underground corridors inside the hills on which Moscow stands: near Taganka, Kitay-Gorod, under Sparrow Hills. An all-encompassing, branched system of posterns is the first, upper level of the underground defensive structures of our city.
Their second level began to be made after 1953. The buildings of the Central Committee, the KGB, the Ministry of Defense grew deeper and deeper into the ground - sometimes up to five floors. No money was spared... These comfortable buildings, like in a real city, are connected by "streets" and "lanes". So, from Lubyanka there is a direct underground passage to the Kremlin, and the tunnel leading to it from the building of the Central Committee on Staraya Square is so wide that you can drive through it by car ...
At the end of Khrushchev's rule, the danger of nuclear war seemed much more real than it is now. Then there were projects of the third level of underground structures. They began to implement them in the early 70s. ... the so-called underground monorail. His first route was from the Central Committee to the Kremlin. Now it is more than 600-800 meters and passes mainly under the Kremlin and in close proximity to it ... And modern shelters, going underground for 8-10 floors, could easily qualify for five stars in terms of comfort, with rooms of the “presidential” level » .

Riddles and secrets of Metro-2.

But if underground bunkers are known for sure, then it is still impossible to say with certainty whether there is a special. metro or "Metro-2". Some say it exists, and there are even witnesses who have seen these mysterious government lines. Others claim that this is just a bike. Yes, and the name "Metro-2" was given with the light hand of the magazine "Spark".
Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that the first information about these metro tunnels appeared in 1992 in one of the AiF issues, where they talked about a certain cleaning lady in the KGB, who was taken to special facilities by special metro lines. The editors responded by stating that this metro system was described in the US Department of Defense's 1991 annual edition of the Soviet Armed Forces and even published a simplified diagram. It showed that, for example, from the Kremlin it was possible to get to the Domodedovo airport and the Bor forest boarding house with a bunker for the government and the General Staff.
And here is what Vadim Mikhailov, head of the Digger-Spas service, says about the government metro:
Of course, the secret "Metro-2" exists, we diggers have not only seen it hundreds of times, but also explored many sections of it. We got on it to Ramenok. However, today a part of Metro-2, in the area of Arbatskaya Square, has received an additional status of secrecy, now there is no way to penetrate there. And today Metro-2 is being built, but at a snail's pace - as always, there is no money. However, the secret metro is only part of underground Moscow. In total, there are 12 levels of communications in it (these are pipes, collectors, mines, etc.). The maximum inhabited depth is 840 meters, there are military bunkers there. They would have dug deeper, but granite rocks go further.
Underground rivers do not have muslin banks, and secret passages are dangerous and difficult to pass. But underground Moscow has its own special romance. Of course, the dungeons of the capital are not fully explored. But what is explored is not open to all eyes. Scientists admit that even the secret passages of the Kremlin have not yet been studied. And now, when the Kremlin towers are being restored, underground Moscow can reveal one of its secrets, which will either excite the public, or hide under the heading "Top Secret" for a long time.
But they say that once in the metropolitan underground labyrinths, it is easy to get lost among the many galleries, passages, wells, halls, walled doors and flooded passages.
And perhaps somewhere here, very close, the famous library of Ivan IV the Terrible is hidden and, perhaps, someday it will be given into the hands of a successful dungeon explorer.

The end of the thirties ... Four friends Leva Fedotov (aka Levikus, or Fedotik), Oleg Salkovsky (Salik, or the Big Man), Mikhail Korshunov (Mihikus, Mistihus, Stichius, or also Khimius) and Yura Trifonov (Juriskaus) lived in in the same house, studied in the same school and in the same class. Decades will pass, and the already famous writer Yuri Trifonov will write the story "The House on the Embankment". The house on Bersenevskaya embankment, or Government House (popularly abbreviated Dopr) was dressed in a gray overcoat of concrete, 25 entrances, 505 apartments. Some people's commissars and deputy commissars lived up to 140 people, and most of them would die during the years of repressions, and many of those who directly carried out repressions and occupied the apartments of their victims in the house would also be destroyed later. Yagoda, Yezhov, Vyshinsky, Beria regularly visited here, and Stalin came occasionally. There lived Fotieva, Dimitrov, Poskrebyshev, Zemlyachka, Alliluevs, who were arrested incessantly; Milyptein, Kobulov, Chubar, Stasova, Kosarev, Lysenko, Stakhanov, Khrushchev, Mikoyans, Marshal Tukhachevsky, Marshal Zhukov, Stalin's children, adopted son of Voroshilov, prince and princess from Laos. Various foreign spies who worked for the USSR were hiding in safe houses, "cuckoos", one of the last were "Felix" and "Lina" from South Africa. Some apartments, on the highest floors, had access to the attic from the kitchens. There was a shooting range in the basement. Here, in the house, Kalinin's son shot himself; There was a telephone connection "with the automatic telephone exchange of the Moscow Kremlin." The rules for using the station said: “About all changes in the sense of personal use of one or another number, please notify the Commandant of the Kremlin on machine number 113 and the Kremlin, ext.22.”

The house was designed and built by the architect B.M. Iofan. He himself settled in it in an apartment that served him and a workshop where he would begin to develop a project for the next grandiose construction of the Palace of Soviets. The palace was going to be built on the site of the blown up Cathedral of Christ the Savior. Boris Mikhailovich was educated in Italy.

Until the last days of his life, Iofan tried to save the concrete brainchild he created from all kinds of alterations, additions, and if he noticed that somewhere in the gray overcoat walls they tried to cut through additional windows or doors, he ran out of his 21st entrance and rushed in anger to violators of the integrity of the Bersenevsky complex, which received another name - the residential building of the Soviets of the CEC-SNK.

Every spring, blocks of ice were thrown from the roof, which exploded on the pavement with bomb strikes. In 1941, real bombs will fly at the house and explode on the same asphalt: the Nazis will mark the house on their flight maps, just as the Kremlin will be marked.

Sometimes, from the side of the Red October confectionery factory, the wind blew the smell of fresh chocolate, the smell of deceptive sweetness that surrounded us, we will understand this pretty soon when the arrests begin, when Yagoda, Yezhov, Beria unleash their active work. And then our house will begin to be enveloped in the smell of executions... In the meantime... My mom and dad, still very young, run after work to the Udarnik cinema, which was an integral part of the Government House, run to dances. A component of the house and the Big Stone Bridge: the same gray, with cold winter winds. In the past, across the Stone Bridge, or Vsekhsvyatsky, criminals were taken to execution, to Bolotnaya Square, with burning candles in their hands. Paid "tongues" crowded on the bridge from the Detective Order. The thief, robber and former Moscow detective Vanka Cain hunted. Blind people traded locks and keys, "Lazarus singers" lived here. The church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, and the chambers of the Duma deacon Averky, which were stubbornly called Skuratov's, and all together church, were the same part of our life. Here, according to rumors, there was an ancient courtyard of Malyuta, the head of the torture department of Tsar Ivan the Terrible, from where there was an underground passage to the Kremlin under the Moscow River for immediate meetings between Malyuta and the tsar. In the hiding places of the Malyutinsk compound, ancient traces of the torture of people were found - chains, shackles, rings for the rear. And also skulls, bones, cut female braids. One day, we, the guys from Bersenev, decided to directly enter the Kremlin using an ancient underground passage. These guys were Leva, Oleg and me. Yura Trifonov had left our house by that time (my father and mother were arrested), so the three of us remained at Bersenevka. Leva kept detailed diaries of our expeditions.

Thus began our first joint and secret search for the dungeon.

More than half a century passed, and one fine day in 1992, I learned that a recently created organization for underground work in Moscow and the Moscow Region was showing interest in the underground passage to the Kremlin, and it was called FROM (from the English, “from”, that is, it is supposed to be “from - under the ground).

The desire to contact the FROM employees, or rather, the appearance of such an institution, brought Oleg Salkovsky and me back to those pre-war days, when we and three other guys from the same house tried to find the ancient tunnel to the Kremlin. And now, decades later (more precisely, more than fifty years), I am Khimius, it was under this school nickname that I was bred by Trifonov in the famous story, and Oleg Salkovsky (Leva died in the war near Tula, Yura Trifonov died), the two of us plus photographer Artem Zadikyan and decided to continue our search for a tunnel to the Kremlin. But in order to tell you about these new searches, about everything that we experienced, I consider it necessary to recall our initial penetration into the “underground lair of Malyuta”, and for this we cite the pages of Levin’s diary.

But first, a little more about Lev Fedotov.

Yura Trifonov many years later will write about Lev: “In my childhood, one boy struck me. He was an amazingly versatile personality. Several times I commemorated him either in a newspaper article, or in a story or story, for Leva captivated the imagination forever. He was so different from everyone! From his boyhood years, he rapidly and passionately developed his personality in all directions, he hastily absorbed all the sciences, all the arts, all books, all music, the whole world, as if he were afraid of being late somewhere. At the age of twelve, he lived with the feeling that he had very little time, and there was an incredible amount to be done. Time was short, but he did not know about it. He was especially fond of mineralogy, paleontology, oceanography, he drew beautifully, his watercolors were at the exhibition, he was in love with symphonic music, he wrote novels in thick common notebooks in calico bindings. I got addicted to this tedious business of writing novels thanks to Leva. In addition, he tempered himself physically in winter he went without a coat, in short pants, mastered the techniques of jiu-jitsu and, despite congenital shortcomings myopia, some deafness and flat feet, prepared himself for distant travels and geographical discoveries. The girls were afraid of him. The boys looked at him as if he were a miracle and called him affectionately: Fedotik.

Diary of Leva Fedotov. December 7, 1939

... “Today, at history in a cramped small classroom, Salo leaned over to me and whispered with a mysterious look:

Levka, do you want to join us... with Mishka? Just don't tell anyone... anyone... tell.
Well, well! And what?
Do you know that there is a church near our house in the garden? This is the church, it seems, of Malyuta Skuratov.
Well?
Mishka and I know the basement there, from which underground passages go ... Narrow, horror! We were already there. You are writing Underground Treasure, so it will be very interesting for you. We want to go to these dungeons again one of these days. Just don't tell anyone.
You can rely on me, I said seriously. If necessary, I can keep my mouth shut. So know.

Throughout the lesson, Salik told me about their past adventures in the dungeon. I lit up with curiosity. During the break, Mishka asked me if Salo had told me about the dungeons of Malyuta Skuratov? I said yes.
We might go tomorrow, Mihikus said. Since we don't have many lessons for the day after tomorrow. And let's go for three hours. You just put on something old. And then there, you know, everything is in some kind of dust. We fools went first in what we usually wear, and I even put on a clean coat, so we came out of there all smeared, dirty, sprinkled, as if from the next world ... "

It all started with the fact that at the end of the 30s, as a schoolboy, I came to the church located next to our government house of the CEC-SNK, where cabinetmakers worked in the former refectory. I came to them for a frame ordered by my father (he was fond of painting). The cabinetmakers were having a quiet conversation among themselves, from which I understood that from the basement of this ancient church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker their workshop there seems to be an ancient underground passage; and not just anywhere, but directly to the Kremlin, and it is associated with the name of Malyuta Skuratov himself, with the fact that he went to secret reports along this passage to Tsar Ivan the Terrible himself.

And so ... late in the evening, I alone tried to find this passage. Then, under the strictest confidence, I first told Oleg Salkovsky about this, and then Oleg and I decided to invite Lev Fedotov to our expedition.

So, I am again in the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker on Bersenevka, where I first learned about our underground passage. Signboards have now been erected on the church and on the adjoining ancient chambers of the Duma clerk Averky Kirillov, informing that this historical complex belongs to the Research Institute of Culture.

He opened the door... and immediately the church hall. In the hall: a long table under a green cloth, around green chairs, near the window a pulpit, next to the pulpit a slate board. Piano. On the whitewashed walls and on the dome, there are squares and rectangles of ancient painting, as if they were postage stamps from the Ancient Rus' series: the result of trial clearings.

He knocked on the door "Sector of garden and park architecture." Three young women were sitting at the desks, drinking tea: lunchtime. I apologized.
What is your issue?
About this building, or rather basement.
Are you an architect?
No. And, in order not to waste time explaining who I am, what and why, I put in front of them the plan of the Malyutin dungeon drawn from the Left. One of the women later I find out that her name is Olga Vladlenovna Mazun, exclaims:
As a child, my grandmother told me that three guys planned to get into the Kremlin, they were looking for an underground passage! But they were overwhelmed, or something ...
No. It didn't fail. See, I'm sitting in front of you.
“... On geometry, in a physics office. Salo drew me a rough plan of the moves that they had already found with Mishka, and I tried to remember it. But at home I was suddenly overcome with doubt. For some reason, it suddenly seemed that Mishka and Salo were simply playing tricks on me, making fun of my gullibility. I decided to be careful and more reserved. A little trick came to my mind. Remembering perfectly the plan of the dungeon and the church drawn by Oleg, I decided to check it with the plan that Mihikus should have drawn at my request. After all, there is no doubt that they did not agree on this in advance ... To my proposal to draw a rough plan of moves, Mishka replied:
Yes, I don't remember him.
Well, at least somehow.
Yes, it is so difficult. OK. Look here. And he began to sketch out an independent plan of halls and passages on a notebook sheet. The plan was exactly the same as Salkovsky's. After that, Mishka began to tell me about the adventures in the dungeon ... "

And we really had adventures. Oleg, due to his heaviness, kept getting stuck in narrow passages, so we did not examine them in detail. Something crunched and crackled underfoot, and when Oleg and I reached a small “hall” where one could stand almost at full height, we saw that the brick floor was littered with small skeletons of mice: they were crackling. But this is only the beginning. We got to the next "hall" in the corner appeared what was supposed to be, according to our beliefs, in places marked with the name of Malyuta, skulls and bones. We got to the "hall" by dismantling the modern brickwork. Obviously, she should have served as a barrier to such stubborn tunnelers like us. And there were wells. And there was mold. And silence. And Oleg painted a skull and two crossbones on the ceiling with soot from a candle. If we really fell asleep, filled up, then since no one knew where Oleg and I went, we would hardly have figured out where to look. Recently, Oleg reminded me that we then put on gauze masks, because we heard that the basements of the church were once whitewashed and disinfected: the result of the fight against plague and cholera, which once raged in Russia.

I remember that, at Levkin's insistence, we started compiling a list of things necessary for the expedition - an electric lantern, candles, matches. Watch. Scrap. Levka also suggested a rope with a weight to measure the depth of the wells, a notebook, a pencil, and for some reason a compass. And the pink stearin candle that Oleg and I had from the last time: it burns brightly, but, really, smokes ...

The women from the “landscape architecture sector” whom I had already met, Muza Belova, Olga Mazun, and almost a girl Irina continued to insist that we drink tea with them and tell them in more detail about what happened to us in adolescence.
Details will be.

Suddenly, Irina remembers that Alexander Ivanovich Frolov works in the museum department. He collected interesting material on the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, standing almost close to the chambers of the deacon Averky Kirillov.

As a child, we called Averky's house a church house for its appearance, I said. Watchmen, janitors, roofers, carpenters and some of the cabinetmakers lived in it.

Olga Mazun volunteered to run after Alexander Ivanovich.
Soon she appeared with him.

Alexander Ivanovich, looking around me and briefly getting to know me, said that until 1917, in guidebooks around Moscow, the boyar house on Bersenevka was designated precisely as Malyuta Skuratov’s chambers with a house church, and even in the twenties Lunacharsky came here to look at Skuratov’s estate, where Malyuta “dishonored his victims," he raged along with the royal jester and executioner Vasyutka Gryazny. When, on the other side of the Moskva River, the Palace of the Soviets (now Kropotkinskaya) metro station was being built, they found Malyuta's gravestone and decided that Malyuta obviously lived here. There was also a small church nearby.

If before moving to the opposite bank of the river, did Malyuta still live on Bersenevka?
Perhaps it?
Possibly.
Did the hypothesis have a right to exist?
Had and has.
I learned from some employees of the institute, and they even showed me the place where a girl was found immured in the church.
When did you open a niche?
Yes. Braid, ribbon in braid. The girl instantly crumbled, turned to dust.
She was seen only by those who stood nearby then.
What is your opinion on the underground passage to the Kremlin? I finally asked Frolov the most important question. And at the same time, he told Alexander Ivanovich that the department for the protection of monuments claims that there could not be an underground passage, because even today the metro builders can hardly pass under the river.

Alexander Ivanovich replied:
How did they dig under fortresses in the old days? Smuggled barrels of gunpowder? The digging technique was very high. How was the Solovetsky Monastery erected? The underground passage could have suffered from floods. There was a severe flood, for example, in 1908.

Alexander Ivanovich also reminded us that the house we lived in stands partly in a swamp, partly on the site of a wine and salt yard, and partly in a cemetery.

So, they visited the old places? Alexander Ivanovich asked me as if the same boy from 1939 was sitting in front of him.
Yes. I entered the basement first. Wandered. Looked around. I will not hide, and was frightened to some extent.
Then they called friends? he said, waiting for my story.
Oleg... um... sorry, if taking into account your research institute, then now a professor, doctor of sciences, who taught in Germany and even in their native language Oleg Vladimirovich Salkovsky, well, and Lev, of course.

The scientific staff of the research institute made it clear with smiles that they fully appreciated Oleg's “titledness”.
So you were still looking for an underground passage? as if insistently Frolov demanded the continuation of the story.
Searched. And I think with enough persistence. Can confirm Leva Fedotov's diary.

December 8, 1939

“... As soon as we entered the site, the figure of a man who was standing not far from the warehouse caught our eye.
Oh, hell! gnashed Mishka. Watchman. He's always hanging around here.
Let's pretend that we just want to walk through the garden to the gate and go out to the embankment, suggested Salo.

Whistling carelessly, we went down to the garden and moved towards the gate to the embankment between the watchman and the warehouse adjacent to the church ...
Hurry, Mishka hurried us in a whisper.

We quickly rounded the corner of the church and came to the top of the stone stairs. The distant steps blurred in terrible darkness, and it seemed to us that before us was a bottomless abyss. There weren't even steps, or rather, they had completely worn out from time to time.

Let's go, whispered Mihikus, stooping down, and began to carefully and quickly slide down. Salik and I followed him.

My heart was pounding, I was holding my breath.

Finally, we appeared in front of a semicircular wooden door, consisting of two wings. The boards were dry and gray with age. The first words belonged to Mishka. He told us in a whisper:
Follow me. I know everything here.

He carefully opened the door. A faint shrill creak was heard. We froze, but the next moment we were already squeezing through the door leaves. Now no one could notice us we plunged into the hopeless darkness of the first basement, which is part of the vast dungeons of Skuratov's church. My pupils opened wide, but all I could see before me was a charcoal darkness.

The door creaked, and the narrow dark blue stripe of sky vanished completely. I felt a sharp smell of mold, dust, or old crumbling stone walls. Under our feet we felt a layer of soft dust, similar to torn rags or tow.

Mihikus took a box out of his pocket, struck at its rib, and the match flared up brightly, blazing with an even flame. Its orange rays cast ominous reflections on everything around, which made the picture that we saw seem wild and gloomy. I looked around we were in a small basement, the walls and ceiling of which consisted of gray nondescript bricks. On one side were broken chairs, gray with dust, on the other side were old bulky barrels. Directly in front of us blackened the passage to the next basement.

Well, let's go, said Mishka, holding a match in his right hand.
The shadows on the walls moved, came to life, and soon the room plunged into hopeless darkness we went into the next room. The bear lit a new match.

Let's see if we can go through this passage now, Salo turned to Mishka, pointing to a low passage leading to the left and having a cross section resembling a quarter of a circle. Mishka looked at him and said:
It is immured. See!

Indeed, the floor of the corridor gradually rose and merged with the ceiling. In the second basement, Mihikus took out his white candle and held the match to its wick.

The second cellar was almost the same size as the first. Its gloomy brick walls and ceiling somehow inexplicably pressed on us, and I had a strange feeling in my chest. The opposite wall was completely littered with broken furniture, and in the back of the basement were two stands on which lay an old, yellowed door leaf. It was something from a locksmith's workbench. The air here was also damp and had an unpleasant smell of rot and some other devilry. Near the floor we saw a low rectangular door half a meter high. It was covered with stacks of broken chair backs.

Shh!.. Salo suddenly whispered.
We froze. Somewhere close steps were heard. Having roared over our heads, they froze in the distance: someone passed over us.

After that, without uttering a word, we began to carefully expose the door of the broken chairs. The backs were dry, light and dusty. We arranged a conveyor belt and in a minute we already saw the foot of a rectangular door.

Do you see the old door? Mishka asked me. Here we will climb into it now.

It was tricky for us to climb into it: it was very small. With a pounding heart, I waited.

I'll go first, suggested Oleg. Otherwise, it's more difficult for me to climb through.
Come on, I agreed.
Such a heavy uncle, said Mishka ironically, it is rather difficult to climb through such a door.
But we climbed into it before, objected Salo. He bent down and suddenly froze in a daze: a rustle was heard somewhere in the darkness.
We shuddered.
Hush! Mishka whispered, covering the flame of the candle with his hand.

But the alarm turned out to be false: everything was calm. Oleg carefully took the door and pulled. There was a faint squeak and rattle. I clenched my teeth and clenched my fists. With grunts and sighs, the door opened, and behind it I saw total darkness. A suspicious dryness blew into his face.
I will light my candle, said Oleg, and climb with it.

Now, when we look at the photographs of these guys from the government House on the embankment, it is striking that their appearance is no different from the appearance of ordinary yard guys in pre-war Moscow. Particularly convincing is the photograph of Svetlana Alliluyeva with the autograph of her father, the leader of the peoples.

From left to right: Svetlana Alliluyeva, Lyova Fedotov, Yura Trifonov with sister Tanya; and a drawing of the House on the Embankment, made by Yura Trifonov during his school years.

The basement was lit up by the rays of two candles.
It will arrange illumination, said Salo loudly, forgetting caution. Put your carcasses on! We need to save!
We froze at his thunderous voice.
Hush yell! Mishka snarled. Eco yells. They'll hear it. Light your pink candle, he told me. Otherwise, Oleg will fit in now, and we will remain in the dark. I'll follow him, and you follow me.

My candle flared up just in time: Salo at that moment put his hand with a burning candle into the opening of the door and squeezed himself in with a groan. His bulky carcass occupied all the space in the open door, so that we saw only the lower part of the tightness and legs, helplessly sliding on the floor.

Hush, hush, Mishka whispered. Hurry!
Wait a minute, we heard Salik's muffled voice.

Finally, only his shoes remained. Then Mishka rubbed his hands and, bending down, climbed through the door. I was alone in the hall. I heard Mihikus's voice from behind the door:
Climb here for us.

I blew out the candle.

The basement was plunged into complete darkness, only a narrow beam of light fell on the floor from the open door. I spat carelessly, creaked the door and crawled forward on all fours. When I raised my head, I saw only the dry gray brick walls of the narrow corridor and Mishka's trousers - he was standing to his full height, and I was still almost in a lying position.

Close the door, Mishka whispered. Just as tightly as possible.

I bent over, dragged my legs into the corridor, and grasping the edge of the door, closed it. She wheezed and turned around with a squeak. Somehow led her to the wall and heard the question of Mihikus:
Closed tightly?
Tight, I answered softly. With these words, I tensed the muscles of my legs and straightened up to my full height. And do you know, my friends, where we were? We were in a terribly narrow, but very high passage. It was so narrow that you could only stand sideways in it, turning your head to the left or right, otherwise we would rub our heads and noses against the walls.

The bricks are ancient, faded, shabby and in places covered with an easily rebounding old light brown mass that has managed to dry out over hundreds of years. This mass, when touched, crumbled into small pieces and dust.

My heart was pounding furiously, it was pressing in my chest, and from this terrible tightness some inexplicable, unpleasant feeling developed.

You see, what a passage, Mishka turned to me, somehow turning his head towards me, which is why his cap, catching the visor on the walls, tore off a piece of gray-brown putty and slid to one side. This is the very narrow passage that we told you about. I silently nodded.
Well, let's go, or what? asked Oleg.

And we, rustling clothes against the walls, began to move forward. Suddenly in the wall, in front of my eyes, floated several high and narrow windows. I looked into one of them, but I didn't see anything. He stuck his hand in there and felt empty. These terrible dungeons seemed to put pressure on my consciousness, and I felt squeezed and squeezed not only physically, because of the narrow corridor, but also mentally. I squinted my eyes and saw that my clothes had turned grey. The teddy bear advancing in front of me, and Salik walking in front of everyone, also looked like underground devils, and not like people. In appearance, this church is small, nondescript, I thought, but underneath it has such vast dungeons! Very strange..."

Oleg had Leo Tolstoy's novel "Resurrection" in the house, published at the beginning of the century. Church censorship removed the chapter on worship. The owner of the book of those years copied it on ordinary "notebook" paper and pasted it. One leaf remained free. Oleg tore it out and wrote something like this on it: “Walking down the aisle and going down lower and lower, you will see how the water oozes, and on the right there will be an iron door. Do not open it, because the water will gush! Oleg hinted at the Moscow River. And the signature high school student such and such.

Having outlined the “old” text on old paper, Oleg packed the note in an old iron box of the Sioux confectionery factory. He will put the box to Levka in the dungeon. Levka will have a face when Levka finds the note!

But the amazing plan fell apart with a bang. Cause? Oleg caught on the text was created without yati and other ancient wisdom, which even the most failing high school student could not do, because these “wisdom” are elementary. Lyovka is a scientifically meticulous person and will immediately expose a fake. And when Doctor of Sciences Oleg Vladimirovich Salkovsky now remembered and told this tragicomic story in our apartment, we laughed for a long time. Oleg and I read Levin's diaries, again made a long, reckless journey. In many respects reckless, considering the ultimate goal the Kremlin... And the complete lack of consistency, rationality in actions adventurers!.. Underground corridors. Halls. Tall and narrow windows and terrible cells with hooks and rings on the ceiling. Creaks. Rustles. Mold. Coal darkness or a beam of light. Skulls hell bones heaps. Malyutin secret reports to Grozny how many people were killed by "manual truncation", how many more are "reliably tortured". Someone was roasted alive in a large frying pan: there was such a thing. I even memorized the name of the executed boyar in a similar way - Shchenyatev. In short, a real horror! Whatever you say. I have already made this extract from the book of Academician Veselovsky. We have in the lists of the synodika that have come down to us not a chronological and not a complete list of those executed, but a very incomplete list of people who died during the entire period of mass executions ... This list was compiled not in the order of events, but retroactively, hastily, according to various sources .

“... We had not even gone a few steps from the door, when the corridor turned to the right at a right angle and became narrower than before. Even then it became more difficult to advance sideways: the walls of the corridor even touched my ears. We are in a gigantic grip.
And why did they make such passages? Mishka was surprised. Who needs such narrow ones?
Is there a turn again? cried Salo.
Be quiet, Mishka whispered. Why are you always forgetting to be careful! We have already been here, and you know that there are two turns.

We have already passed the first one, but this one is the second one. And there is nothing to shout.

Suddenly, somewhere in the depths, we heard a whisper. We froze. After standing still for a few seconds, they continued on their way more carefully. In the right wall I again saw windows.

Here, look, said Mishka, turning his head towards me.
What? I asked in a choked voice.
He shoved a burning candle out the window. I looked in and saw a square cell, the walls of which were made of gray bricks.

See what kind of camera? Mishka asked me.
I see, I answered, with a gaze, looking around the gloomy chamber ... "

We then shuddered and froze from these whispers reaching us from the unknown depths of history. And now, as I rewrite Levin's pages, I surrender to past experiences.

“... And now we have reached the end of the passage. The wall blocking our path had a square opening a meter wide just under the ceiling: this was the beginning of an inclined passage leading somewhere to the left. Near the opening, also under the ceiling, a long, low niche darkened. In order to get into the inclined passage, it was first necessary to climb into the niche, and only from it to crawl into the inclined passage.

Well, what are you standing for? Mishka said to Oleg. Climb into the niche there, just don’t break loose. Then I will climb to you and inspect this move.

I stepped back a little to give Mishka the opportunity to get away from Oleg, who was climbing into the niche: he could hit Mishka in the face with his feet ... "

Everything that happened that day, Oleg and I are forced to tell: there is no continuation of Levin's notes. There is no next notebook. She is among the missing. We have no doubt that everything was accurately, even scrupulously, entered into this notebook under number VI: the number of mysterious windows, mysterious chambers with skulls and bones, hatches, steps, corridors, entrances and passages. And how in one place water oozed and flowed somewhere between the stones, forming a deep trough there for a long time. So what happened to us next? How did the journey end?

In a very narrow sloping hole, despite the fact that Oleg climbed into a niche, in the end went Levka - the smallest and most frail. I did not include the so-called Swedish rope in the list of equipment we took. Wherever possible, we cut off pieces of the cord from the transoms and connected them into a relatively long rope. They tied Levka with it, and only then did he set off. The underground passage narrowed and narrowed. And the stubborn Levicus, this evolutionist Precambrian or Decombrian (Levin's next nicknames in the class), this chronicler of the Earth, resting on the floor with galoshes, crawled and crawled, getting stuck and moving forward again, touching the bricks not only with his ears, but also with his nose. That's for sure. Oleg and I completely lost sight of Levka. Not even the light of his candle. And Levka got stuck completely, as it was supposed to be. And here Oleg and I began to pull our scientist by the rope, pull him out. The short coat was wrapped around his head and Levka managed to pull it out with difficulty. Even the imperturbable Oleg got nervous while we were dragging Levka. What if the rope breaks? Or untie? Neither I nor even Oleg will reach Levka.

He was suffocating! Oleg was worried even now.
“His candle went out,” I reminded my friend.
Of course, we pulled Leva out. Well, he had a video camera: all the dust of the Paleolithic, of the entire geological calendar, was on Levka on his face, hair, and clothes.

We must have moved in the wrong direction, said Leva, catching his breath.

When, after various other adventures with hatches, entrances and passages, they left the dungeon and returned to the "sublunar world", it was the eleventh hour.

They never got to the Kremlin, as you understand. The head of the detective department of the oprichnina, Malyuta Skuratov, saved from us his secret of communication through an underground passage with the king of the "oprichnina" state. But Levka, biting her lip, will stubbornly return to underground secrets. He needed an outcome.

In early 1989, Apollos Feodosevich Ivanov, a former employee of the Construction Department of the Palace of Soviets, published in the journal Science and Life an excerpt from a book in which he talked about the destruction of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and how he and his friend entered the ancient tunnel leading from the Cathedral of Christ towards the Kremlin and Vagankovsky hill, that is, the modern Pashkov house (Lenin library). In the tunnel were "human bones with the remains of rusty chains ... the remains of unknown prisoners thrown into the dungeon by someone's evil will, perhaps Malyuta Skuratov himself." I responded to this publication with fragments of Levin's diary and some reminiscences about our desire in 1939 to penetrate the ancient "Malyutinsky" underground passage into the Kremlin. Among the letters, in which our boyish expedition was later discussed, there was one noteworthy one from Kyiv from the engineer Rudyk. He wrote:
“I had an interesting and very simple thought (I wouldn’t be surprised if someone has already thought about it). So, a question arose with a professional bias: how was the long and very narrow underground passage built? In addition, it gradually narrowed to such an extent that the “smallest and most frail” of the guys got stuck in it, and after all, adults built the move, in all likelihood. This means that it can be assumed that a passage dug in the ground should be much more spacious than a brick hole. It begs the idea that a real underground passage is located very close to a narrow hole, since digging a wide passage and immediately strengthening it with brickwork is much more convenient, and a narrow hole can be built in the same passage ... But in any case, you need to look for an underground passage nearby with a narrow hole. And the narrowing hole is nothing more than a trap for the uninitiated or an escaped prisoner. It is ridiculous to assume that the powerful Malyuta Skuratov crawled on his stomach for such distances or even walked along narrow passages. After all, with its capabilities it was permissible to dig a real tunnel. ”

More than six months after our secret event, Lyova wrote: “On the very first suitable evening, I decided to climb into the dungeon alone in order to fulfill all the same what I had planned back in the summer.” Here is Levka and his character. I went to the church, but, going down the "crooked steps", I found a "huge forged lock" on the doors.

And again, a few months later, the entry: “In the morning I noticed with surprise that the entire upper part of the church, including the dome, was painted beige. This immediately told me that we couldn’t get into the church, since now it’s no longer an abandoned church, but a state museum.”

Why did Leva want to go alone? Maybe Oleg and I were depriving him of his ultimate concentration?

Before us, the church of St. Nicholas, its underground part, was examined by our high school students Tolya Ivanov (Shishka), Valya Kokovikhin, Igor Petere and Yura Zakurdaev. We also got into the underground passage, but which began on the opposite side of the church in relation to our passage and was laid in the other direction under the very temple, but also towards the Moscow River. These guys “had a meeting” with a crumbling human skeleton in a niche, once chained to the wall. Then they discovered ancient icons, then they “ran out, the torches with which they were walking went out,” and the guys returned. I learned the details of this expedition this year in our museum "The House on the Embankment", located in the House on the Embankment, from Anatoly Ivanov himself. He even sketched a plan of “their tunnel” for me on a piece of paper... As for the ancient icons, maybe they are still hidden somewhere. And the girl was walled up in the church itself in the place where now there is a thin ornament in the form of a frame made of gray Italian marble on the wall. This is a temple where the names of Malyuta Skuratov and Vasily Gryazny, “faithful and terrible dogs of the king of the oprichny state”, are still not forgotten.

I remembered how in the gloomy pre-war years a significant number of apartments were empty: the people who inhabited them were sent immediately to the world of eternal rest, some previously behind barbed wire, some, as a member of the family of a traitor to the motherland, into distant exile. The guys, as best they could, rescued personal belongings, the most necessary for life, from arrest. Valya Kokovikhin and Tolya Ivanov lowered a rope from Valya's balcony late in the evening onto the balcony of the sealed-off apartment of the Peters. Tolya is small and light, so Shishka reached the Peters' balcony by a rope, managed to open the door, get into the sealed apartment and take the clothes Peters' son, Igor, needed. Rope Tolya returned back. Things have been lifted.

These were dangerous games, but the guys from Bersenev accumulated experience. They didn't betray each other...

And now, on July 14, 1987, a trolleybus, which departs from a stop just opposite our house, fell through one wheel into a “well”, which suddenly opened under the asphalt. When the repair workers who arrived at the scene of the accident descended into the well, and with them the correspondent of the Good Evening, Moscow TV program, they saw a room lined with brickwork. By a happy coincidence, my wife Vika and I sat at the TV screen that evening and watched this evening program. And when they showed this, I, just like in the best years, shouted:
Underground passage!

Well, not an underground passage, but quite possibly, some part of the wine and salt yard, for example.

The next day, it became known from the same program (Vika and I were already specifically waiting for her): the archaeologists did not show any curiosity; workers flooded the dungeon with water, covered it with sand and asphalted it. Firmly. But, of course, this is not the last point in the former Sodovniki, where the former Government House now stands.

Mikhail Korshunov, Victoria Terekhova
To be continued

There are legends about the treasures and treasures of the Kremlin and not only. In the dungeons of the ancient fortress, treasures were indeed found and are being found - sometimes in the form of silver or copper coins and plates, sometimes in the form of ancient and even ancient silver jewelry, sometimes in the form of weapons or crosses.

The Tainitskaya tower of the Kremlin, under which, according to rumors, special hiding places were arranged

In the 19th century, a treasure was unearthed in the Kremlin, in which there was a bowl filled with antique coins, minted back in the time of the Roman emperor Tiberius. According to the official version, these coins came to Moscow along with the retinue of Sophia Paleolog, who arrived from Rome and became the wife of Grand Duke Ivan III. This, however, does not explain why someone from the retinue of the Byzantine princess brought coins of one and a half thousand years ago to Moscow.

But there are many more secrets that have not yet been revealed in the Kremlin, treasures and sacred artifacts that have not been found yet. The Kremlin has a huge number of underground passages, chambers, wells, but most of them are either covered with earth, or immured with stone, or even concreted. In addition, the Kremlin is the seat of government, and any work on its territory is strictly regulated. Therefore, archaeologists face great difficulties here, and ordinary treasure hunters, diggers and other adventurers have no entrance to the Kremlin at all. Therefore, most of the secrets of the underground Kremlin have not yet been disclosed.

Scheme of historical underground passages of the Kremlin

But not only for this reason, because most of the treasures and caches were most likely spellbound when they were laid, which means they were protected from being found, at least for a certain time. And, perhaps, we will have to wait a long time until the secrets and artifacts of the Kremlin reveal themselves.

Holy Grail of the Knights Templar

The symbol of the Templars - two knights on one horse

In 1307, repressions against the Knights Templar began in Paris. King Philip IV the Beautiful began to get rid of the "state within the state", which was an authoritative, rich and militant order of the Temple of the Virgin, which extended its political and financial influence throughout Europe. Naturally, Philip, who was constantly short of money, was very interested in appropriating the wealth of the order. In addition to earthly treasures, the order also possessed sacred treasures, the most famous and legendary of which was the Holy Chalice, also called the Holy Grail, in which the blood of Jesus Christ was collected. However, a few days before the start of the arrests, the knights of the order removed from his Parisian residence a huge convoy loaded with just the treasures that the French king dreamed of. Then these treasures were loaded onto 18 sea galleys, which sailed from the port of La Rochelle in an easterly direction.

Templars on ships

In the same 1307, in Novgorod, the Moscow prince Yuri Danilovich, the grandson of Alexander Nevsky, met overseas guests who had sailed there, most of them Gauls, who had sailed on 18 "lashings" (i.e. galleys). According to the chronicle, the strangers brought "a myriad of gold treasuries, pearls and precious stones", which bowed to Prince Yury, the lord and all people; then the seafaring wanderers complained to those who met them about "all the untruth of the prince of the Gauls and the pope." It turns out too many coincidences - and the year, and the number of galleys, and the untruth of the "prince of the Gauls", i.e. the French king and the Pope, and, finally, a myriad of gold treasuries.

It was from 1307 that the rapid rise of Moscow began: an ordinary Russian principality suddenly acquires the status of a grand duke with the residence of the head of the Russian Orthodox Church in it. According to many sources, Ivan Kalita, who inherited the Moscow throne after the death of his brother Yuri Danilovich, simply bought other principalities and estates that became vassals of the Moscow overlord. Where did the provincial (at the beginning of the 14th century) Moscow get the funds to become a grand principality by 1340 - in just 33 years? And in the next century, Moscow proclaims itself the Third Rome.

What gave Moscow such spiritual strength? In the light of the events that took place in Novgorod in 1307, this question disappears by itself. Another question: why did the foreigners who arrived hand over the treasury to the Moscow prince, and not to the prince of Kyiv or the Grand Duke of Vladimir.

Prince Yuri Danilovich of Moscow

The answer to this question is this: long before the notorious 1147, Moscow was already a fairly developed city both financially and militarily, since it was the Templars who chose it as their outpost and their commandership in the east of Europe. Therefore, it is not surprising that the knights templars who arrived in Novgorod gave the treasures of the order to the commander of the same order, Prince Yuri Danilovich of Moscow, who arrived there at the same time.

But did the Templars bring with them and hand over to Yuri Danilovich the Holy Grail? Logically, why not. After the defeat of the order, not only in Paris, but throughout Europe, whoever and wherever searched for this sacred artifact, but to no avail. The cup was sought in Spain, England, Portugal, in the castles of the German and Italian principalities, even in France itself - among the Albigensians. However, they never found her. Therefore, today Moscow has at least no less chances that this great artifact is hidden in it. In addition to the fact that by 1307 Moscow had been functioning as a commandant of the Knights Templar in Rus' for about a hundred years, it was an Orthodox city surrounded by other Orthodox cities that did not care about the decrees of the Pope - unlike other European countries, which either completely , or were partially compelled to submit. Secondly, if the Templars transferred the order treasures to the Moscow prince, then they could transfer the Holy Chalice to him for preservation.

Why did Yuri Danilovich and the Moscow princes who followed him never mention the Chalice? The answer is simple: in 1307 Moscow was free from the Pope, but was not free from the Horde, which in turn maintained serious diplomatic ties with Rome. If Moscow had just hinted at the possession of such a powerful artifact, either the Horde or Rome would have immediately captured it.
But if the Holy Grail was nevertheless transferred to Yuri Danilovich for safekeeping, then where could the Moscow princes and then the tsars store it? Of course, first of all, eyes are drawn to the Moscow Kremlin, or rather, to its underground part, which has existed since the foundation of the city itself and over time only expanded and deepened, turning into a second - underground - Kremlin.

Legendary Holy Grail

Recently, many publications have appeared claiming that Peter I, traveling around Europe, joined the Knights Templar (Masons), and they gave him the Grail, the keeper of which he became and the secret of which he took with him to the grave. Even the place of the alleged location of the artifact is called - the sarcophagus of Peter in the Peter and Paul Fortress. It can be assumed that this legend manifested the factor of rivalry between the two capitals - Moscow and St. Petersburg, which indirectly confirms the possibility that the Chalice was indeed transferred to the Moscow prince in 1307 by the fleeing Templars and has since been kept in Moscow in its main place of power - the Kremlin. That is, in the dungeons of the Kremlin. And there is no doubt that such a sacred and mystical artifact was hidden using all the magical means of protection available at that time, and therefore finding it is a very difficult (and unsafe) task.

The Secret of Liberia or the Library of Ivan the Terrible

Ivan III Vasilyevich the Terrible

Another legendary artifact may be hidden in the dungeons of the Kremlin - Liberia, or the Library of Ivan the Terrible. It is not very clear in honor of which Ivan this library got its name. She was brought by Sophia (Zoya) Paleolog to Moscow as a dowry for her marriage to Ivan III Vasilyevich, who was the first to receive the nickname Terrible. However, most people associate Liberia with the grandson of Ivan III - Ivan IV Vasilyevich the Terrible, who not only loved to read books from this library, but was very concerned about its safety. Ivan the Terrible kept this library in the underground chambers of the Kremlin, access to it was limited to a narrow circle of people who received a personal right of access from the tsar himself. Three clerks acted as librarians of Liberia - Andrei Shchelkalov, Nikita Viskovaty and Nikita Funika, two of whom were subsequently executed, and the third died of illness. Thus, after the death of Ivan the Terrible himself and as a result of the Troubles, the trace of Liberia was lost.

In addition to Ivan IV, who, as they said about him, “dug up all of Rus'” with underground passages and chambers, Ivan III and Sophia Paleologus could also hide the famous library before him, which, according to some historians, was associated with the restructuring of the Kremlin in the 15th century when the Kremlin from white stone became brick.

Brick Kremlin after the restructuring of Ivan III

The search for the famous Library, which, according to legend, kept books, scrolls and manuscripts of works and creations almost from the time of the creation of the Roman Empire, began almost immediately after the death of Ivan the Terrible.

The fact is that initially this library belonged to the Byzantine emperors, and only after the fall of Byzantium through Sophia Paleolog came to Moscow. In addition, Ivan the Terrible, apparently, himself significantly replenished this library by sending his agents to Europe with the task of buying up the most valuable ancient books and manuscripts.

Saint Maxim the Greek

In the legend of St. Maximus the Greek, a learned Greek monk, whom, according to legend, Vasily III invited to Moscow precisely in order to translate Greek books from Liberia into Russian, it is said: “open the royal treasures of the ancient great princes of your forefathers and find in some chambers there are countless Greek books, while Slovenian people are by no means unreasonable ... ".

Johann Wittermann

Another testimony about Liberia was received from the Protestant pastor Johann Vettermann from Dorpat, whom Ivan IV the Terrible invited in 1570 to translate books. Franz Nienstedt (XVI century) cites his words in his "Livonian Chronicle": "books, like a precious treasure, were kept immured in two vaulted cellars." From Johann Wittermann, we know approximately which books were included in the Library of Ivan the Terrible: “How many manuscripts the tsar has from the East. There were only up to 800 of them, some of which he bought, some received as a gift. Most of them are Greek, but there are also many Latin ones. From the Latin ones I see: The Livy stories, which I had to translate. Cicero book de republica and 8 books of Historiarum. Suetonian stories about kings, also translated by me. Tacitus stories. Book of Roman Laws. Justin stories. Code of Constitutions of Emperor Theodosius. Virgil's Aeneid and Icht. Justian's code of constitutions and the code of short stories. These manuscripts are written on thin parchment and are bound in gold. The tsar also told me that he got them from the emperor himself and that he wanted to have a translation of them, which, however, I was unable to do. Sallust Jugurthine war and satires of Cyrus. Caesar's commentary and Codrus. The Greek manuscripts I saw were: Polybius stories, Aristophanes comedies. Pindar's Poems. Heliotropes Gynothaet.. Gefestionova Geographika. Justinian's agrarian laws ... ".

Interest in this incredible collection of knowledge and information has been enormous. Already at the beginning of the 17th century, Jesuit agents were looking for the library, in the middle of the 17th century, the Metropolitan of Gazsky Paisiy Ligarid, the Croatian scientist Yuri Krizhanich, who was eventually exiled to Tobolsk by the Russian authorities, was looking for it.

In the 18th century, the Russian authorities themselves began to look for Liberia. In their search, they relied on a note by the sexton of the Moscow church of John the Baptist Konon Osipov, who, referring to the story of the deceased deacon, described the alleged place of storage of Liberia: “There is a cache in Moscow near the Kremlin-city, and in that cache there are two chambers, full of chests to the sling. And those chambers behind the great fortifications; those chambers have iron doors, there are aperture rings across the chains, large dangling locks, lead seals on the wire, and those chambers have one window each, and they have gratings without shutters. And now that hiding place is littered with earth, out of ignorance, as the ditch under the Tsekhauznaya yard is visible, and with that ditch they found vaults on that hiding place, and those vaults were broken and, having broken through, poured the earth firmly. However, the search was not successful.

In the 19th century, there were many scientific disputes about Liberia, and in the end, the director of the Historical Museum, Prince Shcherbatov, decided to conduct excavations in the Kremlin. Several underground passages and premises were discovered, but most of them were either walled up or did not lead anywhere. Libraries could not be found, although several treasures consisting of coins and jewelry were found.

In the 20th century, the search for the Library of Ivan the Terrible was undertaken by the archaeologist I.Ya. conducted repeated excavations in the Kremlin and also found several treasures, except for Liberia. Unfortunately, his work was suddenly stopped and curtailed. He was no longer allowed into the Kremlin.

Pashkov House in Moscow

At the end of the 20th century, German Sterligov announced his intention to search for Liberia in the Kremlin. He was supported by the Moscow mayor's office, but then the preparations for the excavations were curtailed. In addition, the library of Ivan the Terrible was also searched for in the Pashkov House and in the royal estate in Kolomenskoye. She was also searched for in other cities of Russia - Alexandrov and Vologda. But so far to no avail.

It should be noted that artifacts of this magnitude are self-preserving treasures, that is, they themselves determine when, by whom and why they should be found. Sometimes they can show themselves to treasure hunters, but in such a way that they still remain inaccessible, and if they return for them another time, they don’t find anything in this place. So, in the case of the Holy Grail and in the case of Liberia, most likely, it is necessary to wait for the answer of fate.

Andrey Tsukanov

Sexton's excavations

They tried to explore three times, and each time the excavation was stopped from above.

In the Tainitskaya tower, the sexton found the entrance to the gallery, which had to be excavated, and they even gave him soldiers, but there was a danger of collapse, the work was curtailed. Six years later, Osipov returned to the search by decree of Peter I. Ponomar was assigned prisoners to work, but the search was unsuccessful. In the Arsenal corner, Osipov found the entrance to the dungeon, which was flooded with water from a spring. After five meters, he stumbled upon the pillar of the Arsenal, and breaking it in the middle, rested against the rock.
Ten years later, he excavated inside the Kremlin to "intercept" Makariev's move, but was again defeated.

Shcherbatov's attempt

The story was continued in 1894. The case was picked up by an official for special assignments, Prince Nikolai Shcherbatov. In the Nabatnaya Tower, he found the entrance to a walled-up gallery leading to the Konstantin-Eleninskaya Tower. In the Konstantin-Eleninskaya tower, they found an oncoming vaulted corridor 62 meters long. At the end of the gallery, behind the brickwork, they found a cache - cannonballs. Later, Shcherbatov dismantled the floor in Nabatnaya and found a passage leading to this hiding place from the other side.
Exploring the Corner Arsenal Tower, Shcherbatov, like Osipov, could not penetrate further.

Then the prince decided to break through the underground gallery from the side of the Alexander Garden. The passage went under the Trinity Tower and led to a small chamber with stone vaults, on the floor of which there was a hatch leading to the same room below. The upper chamber was connected by a corridor with another room. A low tunnel began from the second chamber, which led out into the wall.

Under the Borovitskaya tower, Shcherbatov found a chapel, a dungeon under a diversion archer, a passage that led to Imperial Square, a “foot battle” that made it possible to keep the space near the tower and the chamber under the congress under fire.

His excavations of the "Osipovsky" passage under the Corner Arsenalnaya led to discoveries. Under the wall, they found an unloading arch, opened an exit to the Alexander Garden, which was immediately walled up. But then Stelletsky ran into a stone block. He believed that the further passage was free from earth, but the scientist was forbidden to excavate and was ordered to clear the dungeon of the Corner Arsenal to the bottom. It turned out that the spring, which now and then flooded the dungeons, was enclosed in a stone well with a diameter of five meters and a depth of seven.

Unexpected finds

In June 1974, archaeologists discovered an intra-wall passage near the Middle Arsenal Tower. Behind the wall, a 15th-century staircase covered with earth was opened, which could lead to the treasured tunnels. A year earlier, a gallery was found near the Nabatnaya Tower, which went from the Nabatnaya to the Spasskaya Tower, but the beginning and end of the gallery could not be found.

underground roads

However, moves are not everything! After all, the territory of the Kremlin is large. On April 15, 1882, a dungeon opened in the middle of the road between the Tsar Cannon and the wall of the Chudov Monastery. Three policemen could pass on it in a row. One end of the tunnel rested against the wall of the Chudov Monastery, and the other was littered with stones.

When digging the foundation of the Annunciation Monastery in 1840, cellars and underground passages with piles of human remains were found. They talk about a whole road passing under the Cathedral of the Annunciation. Here in the cathedral, Prince Shcherbatov opened a cache that could lead further down. The prince cleared the space under the floor from debris and reached the mosaic floor, which could easily be the vault of an underground tunnel or structure. The mysterious iron door, allegedly located in the dungeons between the Cathedral of the Annunciation and the Archangel, remains a mystery.

Kremlin - underground