Staraya Ladoga

Staraya Ladoga (Russian: Ста́рая Ла́дога, lit. 'Old Ladoga'), known as Ladoga until 1704, is a rural locality (a selo) in Volkhovsky District of Leningrad Oblast, Russia, located on the Volkhov River near Lake Ladoga, 8 kilometers (5.0 mi) north of the town of Volkhov, the administrative center of the district.

Staraya Ladoga
Старая Ладога
Selo[1]
Flag of Staraya Ladoga
Flag
Coat of arms of Staraya Ladoga
Coat of arms
Location of Staraya Ladoga
Staraya Ladoga is located in Leningrad Oblast
Staraya Ladoga
Staraya Ladoga
Location of Staraya Ladoga
Staraya Ladoga is located in European Russia
Staraya Ladoga
Staraya Ladoga
Staraya Ladoga (European Russia)
Staraya Ladoga is located in Europe
Staraya Ladoga
Staraya Ladoga
Staraya Ladoga (Europe)
Coordinates: 59°59′50″N 32°17′53″E
CountryRussia
Federal subjectLeningrad Oblast[1]
Administrative districtVolkhovsky District[1]
Rural settlementStaroladozhskoye Rural Settlement[1]
Founded753[2]
Population
 (2010 Census)[3]
 • Total2,012
 • Capital ofStaroladozhskoye Rural Settlement[1]
 • Municipal districtVolkhovsky Municipal District[4]
 • Rural settlementStaroladozhskoye Rural Settlement[4]
 • Capital ofStaroladozhskoye Rural Settlement[4]
Time zoneUTC+3 (MSK Edit this on Wikidata[5])
Postal code(s)[6]
187412
Dialing code(s)+7 81363
OKTMO ID41609462101

It used to be a prosperous trading outpost in the 8th and 9th centuries.[7][8] It was dominated by Varangians who became known as the Rus'. For that reason, Staraya Ladoga is sometimes called the first capital of Russia,[9] and is regarded as one of the original centers from which the name Rus' spread to other territories inhabited by the East Slavs.[10][11]

History

Origin
The fortress of Ladoga was built in the 12th century and rebuilt 400 years later. It is now mostly reconstructed since being heavily damaged during World War II.

Dendrochronology suggests that Ladoga was founded in 753.[2] Until 950, it was one of the most important trading ports of Eastern Europe. Merchant vessels sailed from the Baltic Sea through Ladoga to Novgorod and then to Constantinople or the Caspian Sea. This route is known as the trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks. An alternative way led down the Volga River along the Volga trade route to the Khazar capital of Atil, and then to the southern shores of the Caspian Sea, all the way to Baghdad. Tellingly, the oldest Arabian Middle Age coin in Europe was unearthed in Ladoga.[12]

Ladoga under Rurik and the Rurikids
See also: Rurikovo Gorodische
8th- to 10th-century Viking burial mounds along the Volkhov River near Staraya Ladoga

According to the Hypatian Codex that was created at the end of the 13th century, the legendary Varangian leader Rurik arrived at Ladoga in 862 and made it his capital. Rurik later moved to Novgorod and subsequently his successors moved from there to Kiev where foundations for the powerful state of Kievan Rus' were laid. There are several huge tumulus, or royal funerary barrows, at the outskirts of Ladoga. One of them is said to be Rurik's grave, and another one—that of his successor Oleg. The Heimskringla and other Norse sources mention that in the late 990s Eric Haakonsson of Norway raided the coast and set the town ablaze. Ladoga was the most important trading center in Eastern Europe from about 800 to 900 CE, and it is estimated that between 90% and 95% of all Arab dirhams found in Sweden passed through Ladoga.

Ladoga's next mention in chronicles is dated 1019, when Ingigerd of Sweden married Yaroslav of Novgorod. Under the terms of their marriage settlement, Yaroslav ceded Ladoga to his wife, who appointed her father's cousin, the Swedish earl Ragnvald Ulfsson, to rule the town. This information is confirmed by sagas and archaeological evidence, which suggests that Ladoga gradually evolved into a primarily Varangian settlement. At least two Swedish kings spent their youths in Ladoga, Stenkil and Inge I, and possibly also King Anund Gårdske.

In the 12th and 13th centuries, Ladoga functioned as a trade outpost of the powerful Novgorod Republic. Later its trade significance declined and most of the population engaged in fishing in the 15th century.[13] After new fortresses such as Oreshek and Korela were constructed in the 14th century further to the west of Ladoga, the town's military significance also decreased. Ladoga belonged to Vodskaya Pyatina of the Republic and contained eighty-four homesteads in the 15th century; most of the land belonged to the church.[13] The Novgorodians built there a citadel with five towers and several churches.

Later history

After the town of Novaya Ladoga (New Ladoga) was founded in 1704 by Peter the Great, Ladoga became known as Staraya Ladoga and its importance decreased.[14]

Sights and landmarks

The heart of Staraya Ladoga is an old fortress where the Ladozhka flows into the Volkhov. In earlier times, it was a strategic site because it was the only possible harbor for sea-vessels that could not navigate through the Volkhov River. The fortress was rebuilt at the turn of the 15th and 16th centuries. In 1703, Peter the Great founded the town of Novaya Ladoga (New Ladoga) closer to the bank of Lake Ladoga. The ancient fortress thenceforth declined and came to be known as Staraya Ladoga (Old Ladoga), in order to distinguish it from the new town. The reconstruction of one of the towers of Staraya Ladoga's fortress was scheduled to be completed in 2010.[15]

  • Ladoga Fortress
  • Ladoga Fortress 1909 by Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky
    Ladoga Fortress 1909 by Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky
  • Ladoga Fortress 2013
    Ladoga Fortress 2013
  • Ladoga Fortress 2013
    Ladoga Fortress 2013
  • Ladoga Fortress 2017
    Ladoga Fortress 2017
  • Ladoga Fortress 2017
    Ladoga Fortress 2017
  • Ladoga Fortress main gate
    Ladoga Fortress main gate
  • Ladoga Fortress wooden chapel
    Ladoga Fortress wooden chapel
  • Panorama of the Ladoga Fortress from the eastern bank of the Volkhov River
    Panorama of the Ladoga Fortress from the eastern bank of the Volkhov River

The mid-12th-century churches of St. George and of Mary's Assumption stand in all their original glory. Inside St. George's, some magnificent 12th-century frescoes are still visible. In addition, there is a mid-12th-century church of St. Climent, which stands in ruins.

There is also the Assumption Nunnery/Monastery, and a monastery, dedicated to St. Nicholas which was constructed mainly in the 17th century.

  • Monasteries in Staraya Ladoga
  • The Assumption Monastery/Nunnery
    The Assumption Monastery/Nunnery
  • The Assumption Monastery/Nunnery
    The Assumption Monastery/Nunnery
  • The Assumption Monastery/Nunnery
    The Assumption Monastery/Nunnery
  • The Assumption Monastery/Nunnery
    The Assumption Monastery/Nunnery
  • The St Nicholas Monastery 1909 by Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky
    The St Nicholas Monastery 1909 by Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky
  • The St Nicholas Monastery 2011
    The St Nicholas Monastery 2011

Culture and art

Staraya Ladoga's barrows, architectural monuments, and romantic views of the Volkhov River have always been drawing attention of Russian painters. There were the artists Ivan Aivazovsky, Orest Kiprensky, Aleksander Orłowski, Ivan Ivanov, Alexey Venetsianov and many others in the 19th century.[16] A future member of the Imperial Academy of Arts and the Peredvizhniki group Vassily Maximov was born and laid to rest there. He portrayed scenes from an everyday life of peasants.

Nicholas Roerich painted his studies there during the summer of 1899. He named this landscape the best of the Russian one.[17] Valentin Serov, Konstantin Korovin, Boris Kustodiev also worked there. Alexander Samokhvalov was in Staraya Ladoga many times in 1924-1926. He took part in the restoration of the St. George's Church.[18] That experience gave a great deal to the artist, he wrote. It helped him to understand the effect of joining a monumental painting with the architectural forms.[19] In result of this dwelling in that place painter made his "Staraya Ladoga" (1924) and "Family of Fisherman"(1926, Russian Museum)[20]

In February 1945 the ex-estate of the prince Shakhovskoy was given to Leningrad artists as a base zone for rest and creative work.[21] The restoring works continued 15 years from 1946.[22] But Leningrad artists began to arrive to Staraya Ladoga from 1940s. It became a source of inspiration for Sergei Osipov, Gleb Savinov, Nikolai Timkov, Arseny Semionov and many others for many years.[23]

The House of Creativity «Staraya Ladoga began to operate permanently in the beginning of the 1960s after the finish of the restoration. It was an important center of the art life of Russia for 30 years.[24] Such artists as Evsey Moiseenko, Alexander Samokhvalov, Vecheslav Zagonek, Dmitry Belyaev, Vladimir Ovchinnikov, Boris Ugarov, Boris Shamanov, Vsevolod Bazhenov, Piotr Buchkin, Zlata Bizova, Taisia Afonina, Marina Kozlovskaya, Dmitry Maevsky, Alexander Semionov, Arseny Semionov, Irina Dobrekova, Vladimir Sakson, Gleb Savinov, Elena Zhukova, Sergei Zakharov, Ivan Varichev, Veniamin Borisov, Valery Vatenin, Ivan Godlevsky, Vladimir Krantz, Lazar Yazgur, Irina Dobrekova, Piotr Fomin and many other Leningrad and other regions painters and graphic artists worked there.

In 1970-1980 as the House of Creativity was widening, new buildings were built. They used it a whole-year. A dwelling there for 1–2 months was without any payment for the artists. All commitments on housing, food and travel were taken on by the Art Foundation of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.[17] The paintings created there were exposed in first-rate art exhibitions.[25][26][27] It completed the collections of the main museums of Soviet Union and numerous private collections of Russia and abroad. Also it became a base of an extensive collection of painting, graphics and sculpture of the museum “Staraya Ladoga”.[28]

Financing of the House of Creativity stopped at the beginning of the 1990s on the breakup of the USSR and after the liquidation of the Art Foundation. It stopped welcoming artists and was closed.

References

Notes
  1. Oblast Law #32-oz
  2. Chernykh, N.B. (1985). "Дендрохронология древнейших горизонтов Старой Ладоги (по материалам раскопки Земляного городище) (Dendrochronology of the Oldest Layers of Staraya Ladoga (from the Excavation Materials))". Новые археологические открытия (New Archeological Discoveries). Leningrad. I: 79.
  3. Russian Federal State Statistics Service (2011). Всероссийская перепись населения 2010 года. Том 1 [2010 All-Russian Population Census, vol. 1]. Всероссийская перепись населения 2010 года [2010 All-Russia Population Census] (in Russian). Federal State Statistics Service.
  4. Oblast Law #56-oz
  5. "Об исчислении времени". Официальный интернет-портал правовой информации (in Russian). June 3, 2011. Retrieved January 19, 2019.
  6. Почта России. Информационно-вычислительный центр ОАСУ РПО. (Russian Post). Поиск объектов почтовой связи (Postal Objects Search) (in Russian)
  7. Pritsak, Omeljan (1981). The Origin of Rus': Old Scandinavian Sources Other than the Sagas. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-64465-4. p. 31: Archaeology confirms that Old Ladoga, the first town in eastern Europe, had been founded as early as the second half of the eighth century
  8. Thomsen, Vilhelm (1877). Bondarovski, Paul (ed.). The Relations between Ancient Russia and Scandinavia, and the Origin of the Russian State. Oxford, London: Paul Bondarovski (published 2017). p. 70: Thus mention is often made of the old commercial town Aldegjuborg, the Russian (Old-)Ladoga, standing on the little river Volkhov, at some distance from its fall into lake Ladoga, called by the Scandinavians Aldegja
  9. Oliver, Neil (2012). Vikings. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. ISBN 9780297867883.
  10. Duczko, Wladyslaw (2004). Viking Rus: Studies on the Presence of Scandinavians in Eastern Europe. The Northern World. North Europe and the Baltic c. 400-1700 AD. Peoples, Economies and Cultures. Leiden, Boston: Brill. ISBN 9789004138742. p. 60: These two original centres of Rus were Staraja Ladoga and Rurikovo Gorodishche, two points on the ends of an axis, the Volkhov, a river running for 200 km between two lakes, from the Ilmen in the south to the Ladoga in the north. This was the territory that most probably was originally called by the Norsemen Gardar, a name that long after Viking Age was given much wider content and become Gardariki, a denomination for whole Old Russian State. The area between the lakes was the original Rus, and it was from here its name was transferred to the Slav territories on the middle Dnieper, which eventually became "Ruskaja zemlja"—the land of Rus
  11. Price, Neil (2000), "Novgorod, Kiev and their Satellites: The City-State Model and the Viking Age Polities of European Russia", in Hansen, Mogens Herman (ed.), A Comparative Study of Thirty City-state Cultures: An Investigation, Copenhagen: Kgl. Danske Videnskabernes Selskab, pp. 263–275, p. 264: The first material stage in the establishment of what would become the Rus' state seems to have been the settlement which sprang up near the mouth of the Volkhov, some 12 kilometres upstream from Lake Ladoga. Staraja (that is, "Old") Ladoga seems to have been founded sometime around the middle of the eighth century and served as the primary "gateway community" for Russian contacts with the Baltic and the west
  12. Kuzmin, Sergey L. (2008). "Ladoga in the early middle ages (mid-VIII -early XII centuries)" (PDF). Nestor-History (2008(99):3). Retrieved October 14, 2015.
  13. Bernadsky, Viktor Nikolayevich (1961). Новгород и новгородская земля в XV веке [Novgorod and the Novgorod Land in the 15th Century]. Leningrad: USSR Academy of Sciences. pp. 130–131.
  14. Murray, Alan V. (2016). The clash of cultures on the medieval Baltic frontier. ISBN 9781351892605.
  15. В Старой Ладоге в 2010 году воссоздадут Стрелочную башню крепости [In 2010, Strelochnaya Fortress Tower Will Be Re-Created in Staraya Ladoga] (in Russian). Leningrad Oblast: karpovka.net. August 22, 2009. Retrieved July 27, 2015.
  16. Н. В. Мурашова, Л. П. Мыслина. Дворянские усадьбы Санкт-Петербургской губернии. Южное Приладожье. Кировский и Волховский районы. — СПб, Алаборг, 2009. C. 207—224.
  17. Д. П. Бучкин. О доме творчества «Старая Ладога» // Д. П. Бучкин. Гравюры и рассказы. — СПб, Бибилиотека «Невского альманаха», 2004. — С. 10.
  18. А. Н. Самохвалов. Ладога, и не только Ладога // А. Н. Самохвалов. Мой творческий путь. — Л: Художник РСФСР, 1977. — С. 102 —113.
  19. А. Н. Самохвалов. В поисках монументальной выразительности // А. Н. Самохвалов. В годы беспокойного солнца. — СПб: Всемирное слово, 1996. — С. 193 —194.
  20. Баршова И., Сазонова К. Александр Николаевич Самохвалов. — Л: Художник РСФСР, 1963. — С. 50.
  21. Стенографический отчёт заседания Правления ЛССХ совместно с Правлением Ленизо и Художественным фондом по обсуждению плана работ на 1945 год и о подготовке к выставке 1945 года // Центральный Государственный Архив литературы и искусства. СПб. Ф.78. Оп.1. Д.49, Л.8.
  22. Л. С. Конова. Санкт-Петербургский Союз художников. Краткая хроника 1932-2009 // Петербургские искусствоведческие тетради. Выпуск 20. — СПб, 2012. — С.176.
  23. А. Н. Семёнов, С. И. Осипов, К. А. Гущин. Выставка произведений. Каталог. Авт. вступ. статьи Г. Ф. Голенький. — Л: Художник РСФСР, 1977. — С. 4.
  24. Дом творчества художников «Старая Ладога» в галерее «Голубая гостиная» Санкт-Петербургского Союза художников
  25. Зональная выставка «Ленинград». — Л: Художник РСФСР, 1965. — С. 9, 13, 14, 15, 19, 21, 25, 31.
  26. Изобразительное искусство Ленинграда. — Л: Художник РСФСР, 1976. — С. 15, 16, 17, 19, 32.
  27. Выставка произведений петербургских художников «Старая Ладога». 14 марта – 6 апреля 2014 года
  28. Фонд живописи, графики и скульптуры музея - заповедника «Старая Ладога»

Sources
  • Законодательное собрание Ленинградской области. Областной закон №32-оз от 15 июня 2010 г. «Об административно-территориальном устройстве Ленинградской области и порядке его изменения», в ред. Областного закона №23-оз от 8 мая 2014 г. «Об объединении муниципальных образований "Приморское городское поселение" Выборгского района Ленинградской области и "Глебычевское сельское поселение" Выборгского района Ленинградской области и о внесении изменений в отдельные Областные законы». Вступил в силу со дня официального опубликования. Опубликован: "Вести", №112, 23 июня 2010 г. (Legislative Assembly of Leningrad Oblast. Oblast Law #32-oz of June 15, 2010 On the Administrative-Territorial Structure of Leningrad Oblast and on the Procedures for Its Change, as amended by the Oblast Law #23-oz of May 8, 2014 On Merging the Municipal Formations of "Primorskoye Urban Settlement" in Vyborgsky District of Leningrad Oblast and "Glebychevskoye Rural Settlement" in Vyborgsky District of Leningrad Oblast and on Amending Various Oblast Laws. Effective as of the day of the official publication.).
  • Законодательное собрание Ленинградской области. Областной закон №56-оз от 6 сентября 2004 г. «Об установлении границ и наделении соответствующим статусом муниципального образования Волховский муниципальный район и муниципальных образований в его составе», в ред. Областного закона №17-оз от 6 мая 2010 г «О внесении изменений в некоторые областные законы в связи с принятием федерального закона "О внесении изменений в отдельные законодательные акты Российской Федерации в связи с совершенствованием организации местного самоуправления"». Вступил в силу через 10 дней со дня официального опубликования (24  сентября 2004 г.). Опубликован: "Вестник Правительства Ленинградской области", №27, 14 сентября 2004 г. (Legislative Assembly of Leningrad Oblast. Oblast Law #56-oz of September 6, 2004 On Establishing the Borders of and Granting an Appropriate Status to the Municipal Formation of Volkhovsky Municipal District and to the Municipal Formations Comprised By It, as amended by the Oblast Law #17-oz of May 6, 2010 On Amending Various Oblast Laws Due to the Adoption of the Federal Law "On Amending Various Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation Due to the Improvement of the Organization of the Local Self-Government". Effective as of after 10 days from the day of the official publication (September 24 2004).).
  • А.Н. Самохвалов. Ладога, и не только Ладога // А. Н. Самохвалов. Мой творческий путь. — Л: Художник РСФСР, 1977.
  • А.Н. Самохвалов. В поисках монументальной выразительности // А. Н. Самохвалов. В годы беспокойного солнца. — СПб: Всемирное слово, 1996.
  • Д.П. Бучкин. О доме творчества «Старая Ладога» // Д. П. Бучкин. Гравюры и рассказы. — СПб, Бибилиотека «Невского альманаха», 2004.
  • Н. В. Мурашова, Л. П. Мыслина. Дворянские усадьбы Санкт-Петербургской губернии. Южное Приладожье. Кировский и Волховский районы. — СПб, Алаборг, 2009.
  • Л. С. Конова. Санкт-Петербургский Союз художников. Краткая хроника 1932-2009 // Петербургские искусствоведческие тетради. Выпуск 20. — СПб, 2012.
Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Staraya Ladoga.

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