Golitsyn estate Volkhonka house 14 building 5. History of the mansion

Since its founding, the Institute has been located in the former estate of the Golitsyn princes - a building built in the 18th century and survived the fire of 1812. This mansion, under state protection as an architectural monument, is a witness to many events in the history and culture of our country; the most important philosophical and scientific discussions of the last century; Its history includes the names of outstanding Russian thinkers, scientists and public figures, writers and poets, composers and artists. Since the end of the 19th century, the Moscow Conservatory and the Moscow City People's University named after A.L. Shanyavsky, higher and secondary educational institutions, a number of academic institutes, and public associations have operated within its walls. The house on Volkhonka, 14 has become an integral part of the scientific and humanitarian culture of Moscow, a kind of symbol of Russian philosophy.

Volkhonka 14

A. V. Sazanov, Doctor of Historical Sciences

The museum quarter on Volkhonka, which is occupied by the famous Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, includes several buildings known as the Golitsyn estate: the main house (1759), the service building (1778) and two wings of the 19th century, residential and service.

The history of the estate can be traced back to the 17th century. In 1638, another census of Moscow households was carried out. Its original, “Martynov’s manuscript,” is kept in the Moscow Armory Chamber. Among the persons who owned lands on Volkhonka, Pimen Yushkov was mentioned, who had a yard near the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in Turygin. Almost 80 years later, a new census names the owner of the plot as “the deceased boyar Boris Gavrilovich Yushkov.” He is also mentioned in the “Books on the collection of bridge money from the Belago city of 1718–1723.”

Boris Gavrilovich's heir, Lieutenant Sovet Ivanovich Yushkov, in 1724 sold Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich Golitsyn an estate that included two courtyards: “porozhiy” (empty) and “with all kinds of stone chamber and wooden buildings.” A record of the transaction was preserved in the following lines of the Moscow register books: “May 15th day.” Kopor[sky] Inf[ort] Regiment Lieutenant. Council Ivanov son [son] Yushkov sold the navy to lieutenant [prince] Mikhail Mikhailovich Golitsyn a courtyard in the Near [city], in the parish [of] St. Nicholas the Miracle [creator], which is in Turygin , on the white land... and these yards went to him after his grandfather - boyar Boris Gavrilovich, and uncle - okolnichy Timofey Borisovich Yushkov, and aunt Praskovya Borisovna st[ol]n[ika] Dmitivskaya wife] Nikitich Golovin and his sister Marya Dmitrievna, Prince. Mikhailovskaya wife of Mikhailovich Golitsyn, for 1000 rubles.” (4, p. 346).

Moscow census books of 1738–1742 record the transfer of ownership from father to son - Mikhail Mikhailovich Golitsyn Jr. and talk about his neighbors: “... adjoining on one side is the courtyard of Ober-Ster-Kriegs-Commissar Fedor Abramov, son of Lopukhin, and on the other side of General Agrafena Vasilyeva’s daughter Panina.”

In June 1759, the owners petitioned for permission for new construction: “The court of His Imperial Highness the Blessed Sovereign Grand Duke Peter Fedorovich, the chamber cadet Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich and his wife Princess Anna Alexandrovna Golitsyn, is being beaten by minister Andrei Kozhevnikov.

1. The said Mr. My parent was granted his Excellency Admiral General, Actual Privy Councilor, Senator and Knight of the Admiralty Collegium, President Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich Golitsyn, his Moscow yard with a stone built-up house standing on Prechistoya Street in the 3rd command in the parish of the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, which in Turygin.

2. And this built-up house, and two small newly added wings to it, my Mr. ordered to be rebuilt this summer, for the sake of which the courtyard with the former stone structure and the newly assigned outbuildings received a proper plan, which is located at the Moscow Police Chief's office for the architect by Mr. Mergasov, by which I apply his hand to this request of mine” (5).

The resolution read: “Decision to commit.”

The plan of the estate, signed “for the architect” by Ivan Mergasov, has been preserved (2, l. 199).

“No. 1 – the courtyard and garden of his Prince Golitsyn;

No. 2 – again wants to add two outbuildings to the old chambers;

No. 3 – well;

No. 4 – courtyard stone building of the general and cavalier Fyodor Avramovich Lopukhin;

No. 5 – his own Golitsyn stone living chambers;

No. 6 – Prechistenka street;

No. 7 – roadway lane.”

L.V. Tydman managed to clarify the history of the development. In 1758, M. M. Golitsyn Sr. transferred to his son a courtyard on Prechistenka with an unfinished one-story “built-up stone house.” According to the researcher, at this stage there were serious changes in the overall plan: “It was decided to build a second floor and add two symmetrical wings on the sides.” Naturally, changes were required in the layout, the facades and interiors were transformed. The house, built in 1760, took another six years to finish (6, p. 103, 281). In 1768–1770, stone outbuildings along the sides of the front yard, services and a fence were erected. The work was carried out by I. P. Zherebtsov according to the project of S. I. Chevakinsky (3, pp. 297–301).

In 1774, the war with Turkey ended triumphantly. The conclusion of the Kyuchuk-Kainardzhi peace was going to be celebrated in St. Petersburg and Moscow. Catherine II intended to arrive at the Mother See at the beginning of next year. In advance, on August 6, 1774, she asked M. M. Golitsyn, “whether there is a stone or wooden house in the city in which I could fit and the yard accessories could be located near the house... or... not Is it possible to quickly build a wooden structure anywhere?” The answer was obvious - of course, her own Golitsyn estate (perhaps the empress’s choice was influenced to some extent by the fact that the mother of her favorite G. A. Potemkin lived next door).

However, in its existing form, the property was absolutely unsuitable for the empress and her luxurious court to stay there. A solution was found quickly. In August 1774, the head of the Kremlin expedition, M. M. Izmailov, issued a lease for three nearby houses and instructed the architect M. F. Kazakov to measure them. Soon two plans landed on the Empress’s table. She didn’t like the first one - it’s just a huge house, it’s not for her. The second, brought by Kazakov himself, was approved.

Thus began the construction of the famous Prechistensky Palace. It was necessary to be in time for the arrival of the Empress, and Matvey Kazakov brought in the work of architects A. Baranov, M. Medvedev, M. Matveev and R. Kazakov. Construction went on all autumn, and just before the New Year, the head of the Kremlin expedition, M. M. Izmailov, reported on its completion.

The Prechistensky Palace has not survived; only archival documents and brief descriptions allow us to imagine its appearance. One of them belongs to the Frenchman C. Carberon: “The external entrance is decorated with columns; behind the hallway is a very large hall, behind which is another, also large, in which the empress receives foreign ministers. Next comes an even more spacious hall, it stretches the length of the entire building and consists of two rooms separated in the middle by columns; in the first the empress plays, and the second is used for dancing.” He also mentions a throne room with tall windows and a throne in the canopy. At the palace, according to the design of M. F. Kazakov, a separate house wooden church of Saints Anthony and Theodosius of the Pechersk, consecrated on December 16, 1774, was built.

It is clear that Kazakov preserved Golitsyn’s house, expanding it towards Volkhonka. What happened as a result caused mixed reactions. The same S. Carberon noted “a very skillful connection of external walls and internal chambers.” The Englishman William Cox, who was in Moscow at that time, appreciated the beauty and convenience of the building, “constructed with lightning speed.” The empress herself, however, did not like the Prechistensky Palace. She complained to Baron Grimm: “... identifying oneself in this labyrinth is a difficult task: two hours passed before I found out the way to my office, constantly ending up at the wrong door. There are many exit doors, I have never seen so many of them in my life. Half a dozen were sealed according to my instructions, and yet there are twice as many of them as needed.”

Apparently, the empress's displeasure led to the dismantling of the wooden part of the palace, which lasted from 1776 to 1779. The disassembled structures were loaded onto barges and floated down the Moscow River from Prechistensky Descent to Vorobyovy Gory. There they were placed on the preserved foundation of the Old Vorobyov Palace, built in the 16th century by Vasily III. The building was named the New Vorobyov Palace and was first noted in the general plan of Moscow in 1789. The iconostasis of the palace church ended up in the Kremlin.

Construction of a classicist estate began on Prechistenka, completed in 1802. The façade of the main house is illustrated by illustrations from the fourth album of Particular Buildings by M. Kazakov.

In the fall of 1812, the Great Army entered Moscow. The mansion was looked after by Golitsyn’s old acquaintance, General Armand de Caulaincourt. He described the Moscow fire in the following lines: “It can be said without exaggeration that we stood there under a fiery arch... I also managed to save the beautiful Golitsyn palace and two adjacent houses, one of which had already caught fire. The emperor’s people were zealously helped by the servants of Prince Golitsyn, who showed great affection for their master.”

However, Caulaincourt’s participation did not save the estate from ruin. The manager of the house office, Alexei Bolshakov, reported to the owner on October 19, 1812: “Our storerooms were all broken and looted in one day, what was left was tidied up. The stone storerooms under the church, with the permission of General Caulaincourt, who lodged in our house, were again filled and plastered. This storeroom contains books, paintings, bronze items, watches, porcelain, dishes and other things, which I do not remember, because the soldiers who robbed the house did not take many things, but broke them or moved them around, looking for silver, dresses and linen. After the Kremlin was blown up by five mines from the 10th to the 11th of October at two o'clock in the morning, the rooms were strewn with glass that had flown out of the ends, many doors and end frames with logs were torn out of place, which was all tidied up and cleaned by us. Pyotr Ivanovich Zagretsky and retired Major General Karl Karlovich Torkel now live in our house... Ermakov, whom I sent to Her Excellency’s house, said that the main building did not burn, the outbuildings and carriages were all burned, and what was in the whole building was looted, as well as storage rooms. Our house church was also plundered” (1, l. 18–19). After the French left, the estate took a long time to be repaired, about which numerous records from the house office have been preserved.

Two mentions connect the Golitsyn estate with the stay of A.S. Pushkin. The first is V. A. Annenkova’s notes about the ball at Prince Sergei Golitsyn, where she “danced with the poet Pushkin... He told me lovely things... about myself... since, having seen me, it will never be possible to forget me.” The second was left in a letter from Moscow postal director A. Ya. Bulgakov to his brother dated February 18, 1831. It contains the only evidence so far of A. S. Pushkin’s intention to get married in the house church of Prince S. M. Golitsyn: “Today is Pushkin’s wedding at last. On his part, Vyazemsky and gr. Potemkin, and from the bride’s side Iv. Al. Naryshkin and A.P. Malinovskaya. They wanted to marry them in the prince’s house church. Serg. Mich. Golitsyn, but Filaret doesn’t allow it. They were going to beg him; apparently it’s not allowed in brownies, but I remember that Saburov got married at Obolyaninov’s, and that he recently married Vikentyeva.” But they didn’t persuade me. The place of A.S. Pushkin’s wedding was the Church of the Great Ascension at the Nikitsky Gate.

This ends one era in the life of the Golitsyn estate. Ahead were: the Golitsyn Museum, the private school of I. M. Khainovsky, classes of the Moscow Conservatory, Golitsyn Agricultural Courses, the Forestry Institute and Technical School, the Brain Institute, the editorial offices of several magazines, the Communist Academy, the Institute of Philosophy of the USSR Academy of Sciences (RAN) and, finally, the Art Gallery countries of Europe and Asia of the 19th–20th centuries The Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. A. S. Pushkin.

Literature and sources

1. GIM OPI. F. 14. Book. 1. D. 54.

2. GIM OPI. F. 440. Op. 1. D. 944.

3. Kazhdan T. P. Materials for the biography of the architect I.P. Zherebtsov / Russian art of the 18th - first half of the 19th centuries. M, 1971.

4. Moscow. Act books of the 18th century. T. 3. M., 1892. 1724

5. RGADA. F. 931. Op. 2. Unit hr. 2358.

6. Tydman L. V. Hut, house, palace: Residential interior of Russia from 1700 to 1840. M.: Progress - Tradition, 2000.

April
2012

Estate of the Lopukhins - Potemkins - Protasovs

The knee of Maly Znamensky Lane is a miracle of Moscow estate. The section of the alley coming from Volkhonka abuts the gates of the Vyazemsky estate, the section from Znamenka ends at the gates of the Lopukhins’ estate, and both segments are visually closed to the manor’s houses. Coming out of the Vyazemsky Gate, we immediately enter the Lopukhin Gate - the modern Roerich Museum (Maly Znamensky, 3).

The gate itself is remarkable for its 19th-century latticework with a floral motif, which contrasts with the classic portico of the manor house.

The architecture of the main facade illustrates the later pages of the history of the estate, so the reverse sequence of the story is justified here.

The magnificent coat of arms in the pediment, built according to all the laws of heraldry, is striking. This is the second of three promised coats of arms of Volkhonka. The shield is topped with a jagged crown - a sign of the count's dignity of Alexander Yakovlevich Protasov. The count's crown was granted to him by Alexander I in the year when Alexander himself was crowned with the royal cap. Granted “to express Our gratitude for his zealous labors incurred in educating Us.”

On the classic surface of the wall, voluminous 17th-century platbands protrude in two places. One of them does not match the later window. The platbands, of course, were exhibited by restorers.

The courtyard facade was completely restored to the 17th century. The outer porch, recreated from the foundations using analogies, is striking. To the right you can see the blocked passage arch - a fashionable device of those years, strangely combined with the free placement of the house in the center of the courtyard.

According to the memoirist Berchholtz, Peter settled Poltava prisoners in the house - Field Marshal Karl Gustav Renschild, Chief Marshal Karl Pieper and others. Pieper was kept in Moscow until 1715 and died in Shlisselburg in 1716; Renschild was exchanged for Stockholm prisoners - Prince Ivan Trubetskoy and General Automon Golovin - in 1718. In the same year, Abraham Lopukhin was arrested and executed. It turns out that the Swedes were kept in the Lopukhins' house until it was confiscated.

And after the confiscation, a branch of the linen factory of Ivan (John) Tames was located in the estate.

Emperor Peter II - the son of Tsarevich Alexei and the grandson of Queen Evdokia - returned the confiscated chambers to the children of Abraham Lopukhin. Then both Queen Evdokia and the capital itself returned to Moscow.

According to the clergy records, the architectural student Prince Dmitry Vasilyevich Ukhomsky, the future luminary of the Baroque, the builder of the Red Gate and the bell tower of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, lived in the Lopukhins’ house for some time.

The chambers remained in the Lopukhin family until 1774 .

That year became significant for the inhabitants of all the ancient lordly nests near the Kolymazhny yard. Catherine appointed Moscow as the center of celebrations for peace with the Turks and was preparing to arrive in the capital to meet the winner - Rumyantsev. In the absence of the Kremlin Palace, which was never built by Bazhenov, the Empress occupied the so-called Prechistensky Palace.

The Prechistensky (by its then name Volkhonki) palace was a conglomerate of three houses acquired or hired by the crown and connected by temporary halls and passages. The former Lopukhins' house was intended for the gentlemen on duty.

Exactly the former: Catherine wrote to Baron Grimm from Moscow that this house now belongs to her and “is assigned to those who need to live at court. The rest of the retinue are housed in ten or twelve rented houses.”

It is possible that behind the plural number of gentlemen on duty is hidden the only gentleman on duty - Potemkin. Too significant, ceremonial place is occupied by “Potemkin’s chambers” in the chronicle of the Prechistensky Palace. So, on February 13, 1775, the favorite hosted a dinner in honor of the European envoys. On July 8, Field Marshal Rumyantsev, the main hero of the celebrations, arrived in Moscow and visited the Empress, then the heir, and then Potemkin in the Prechistensky Palace. It's like walking from house to house along passages. On September 30, Potemkin’s name day was celebrated in Potemkin’s chambers.

What is most eloquent is the fact that after the abolition of the palace, the former chambers of the Lopukhins turned out to be the property of Potemkin’s mother Daria Vasilievna and remained with her, and in fact with her son, for 12 years.

If we take into account that Potemkin gave the family yard at the Nikitsky Gate for the construction of the Church of the Great Ascension, and acquired land on Vorontsov Field, but did not build it up, then the Lopukhins’ chambers with the Protasovs’ coat of arms are the only house of His Serene Highness Prince Tauride preserved in Moscow.

Golitsyn Estate

The house of Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich Golitsyn (Maly Znamensky Lane, 1/14, corner of Volkhonka) became its own (imperial) half of the Prechistensky Palace. This is the main surviving address of Catherine the Great within the boundaries of old Moscow. (Indeed, the Petrovsky Castle is located behind the outpost; the hostess never moved into the Lefortovo Catherine Palace, and the existing living quarters of the Kremlin Palace belong to other eras.)

In the summer of 1774, the Empress asked Golitsyn in a letter “if there is a stone or wooden house in the city that would accommodate me.” The prince's answer was clear in advance. Probably, Golitsyn’s house was chosen because of its proximity to the Kolymazhny yard, which could accommodate a court “train.” The nearby Kremlin was visible across the courtyard.

In four months, by the New Year, “thousands of hands” under the leadership of Matvey Kazakov adapted and connected the houses that were part of the palace with passages, and behind the Golitsyn house they built a special wooden building with a throne room.

The Empress spoke about the palace in her Mozartian light epistolary style: “... Finding oneself in this labyrinth is a difficult task: two hours passed before I found out the way to my office, constantly ending up at the wrong door. There are many exit doors, I have never seen so many of them in my life. Half a dozen were repaired according to my instructions...” After which Kazakov... received the title of architect and orders for the Petrovsky Palace and the Kremlin Senate.

Among the unsealed doors, there was one special one. According to historian Pyotr Bartenev, “a door was made from the house of Prince Golitsyn into the house next door in the alley, which belonged to Potemkin’s mother... which all the old servants remember.”

The secret spouses spent the entire year 1775 in Moscow - the second year of their marriage. On July 12, in the Prechistensky Palace, forty-six-year-old Catherine gave birth for the last time. The girl was named Elizaveta Temkina and given to the family of Count Samoilov, Potemkin’s nephew.

On the eve of the ceremonial events, the Empress spent the night in the Kremlin. The difficult dislocation of 1775 corresponded to her ambivalent attitude towards Moscow. In the St. Petersburg way, not loving the mother throne, Catherine was still a people's, zemstvo empress, who accepted the title of Mother of the Fatherland in Moscow and from Moscow. And in Zaneglimenye, Catherine, like the oprichnina Tsar Ivan once, cultivated privateness. The Prechistensky Palace became an experience in the renewal of medieval impulses and meanings of Zaneglimenye, the oprichnina Chertolye.

In the backyard of the Golitsyn estate, with the main facade facing Prechistenka (Volkhonka), Kazakov erected a wooden building with a throne and ballroom, a living room and a church. At the end of the celebrations, Catherine ordered this building to be moved to the Sparrow Hills, to the foundations of the ancient palace of the kings. Francesco Camporesi left us a drawing of the Vorobyovsky Palace. There is no foundation in the old place, since the throne building stood on stilts. Only the plan, a section of the throne room and a drawing of the iconostasis have survived. In the cross-section we see the throne under the canopy, the transition to the Golitsyn house and part of the baroque facade of the neighboring house - the residence of the heir Paul (more about it below).

Prince Golitsyn did not cease to own the estate during the empress's stay. In general, the estate was not inclined to “change the surname”: the Golitsyns owned it until 1903. The family names of the Golitsyns from Volkhonka are Mikhail, Sergei, Alexander, their Moscow region is Kuzminki.

The property near Kolymazhny Dvor became Golitsyn's in 1738. Its acquirer, Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich Jr., made a naval career. As a young officer, having become famous in naval victories under Peter, he became president of the Admiralty Board under Elizaveta Petrovna. Outlived all the famous associates of Peter the Great. Petersburg for a long time did not let the prince go to the Moscow house, which remained one-story. Only at the turn of the 1760s did the old man undertake its reconstruction, ordering the project from his subordinate, the architect of the naval department, Savva Chevakinsky.

The famous author of the St. Nicholas Naval Cathedral and the Fountain House in St. Petersburg, Savva Ivanovich, executed the drawings, carried out on the spot with modifications. The appearance of the admiral's house can be judged by the end (whitewashed) part of the right wing and by the manor gate. The house was built at the turning point from Baroque to Classicism and on the threshold of the “golden age” of freedom of the nobility. The nobility, exempted from compulsory service, preferred Moscow to St. Petersburg.

Particularly impressive is the gate, crowned with the prince’s coat of arms - the third to survive on Volkhonka. Together, the local coats of arms form an encyclopedia of heraldry. After the untitled nobles Voeikovs and Counts Protasovs are the princes Golitsyns. The princely shield is crowned with a “perforated” crown.

The Latin monogram “PMG” - “Prince Mikhail Golitsyn” - is woven into the elegant gate grille.

Entering the gate, you imagine how and how many times these openwork metal doors opened in front of Catherine the Great.

It was not the admiral, long deceased, who gave shelter to the empress, but his son, who bore the same name, the lieutenant general. At the end of the century, the prince will rebuild the house, and Kazakov will include it in his Albums of the best buildings in the city. The drawing of the facade shows that the entrance was located on the right side of the house. The cylindrical vault with paintings above the main staircase has been preserved, but the staircase itself is now divided by an interfloor ceiling. The main house is distorted by the addition of two floors in 1930. The right wing, expanded by an extension to the west, retains a deep columned loggia.

With a new appearance, the house entered a new century - and soon found itself in big history again. In 1812, the headquarters of Napoleon's master of the horse, the noble Armand Louis de Caulaincourt, was located here. Caulaincourt himself wrote about it this way:

“I went to the palace stables (Kolymazhny Yard), where some of the emperor’s horses stood and where the kings’ coronation carriages were located. It took all the energy and all the courage of the grooms and grooms to save them; Some of the grooms climbed onto the roofs and threw down burning brands, others worked with two pumps, which, by my order, were repaired during the day, since they were also damaged. It can be said without exaggeration that we stood there under a fiery vault. With the help of the same people, I also managed to save the beautiful Golitsyn palace and two adjacent houses, one of which had already caught fire,” judging by the Moscow plan of 1813, Caulaincourt saved the houses of the Protasovs (formerly Lopukhins, Potemkins) and Tutolmin (formerly Vyazemskys). “The emperor’s people were zealously helped by the servants of Prince Golitsyn, who showed great affection for their master.”

Caulaincourt housed 80 fire victims in the saved house. Among them was “the master of horse of Emperor Alexander Zagryazhsky, who remained in Moscow, hoping to save his home, the care of which was the meaning of his whole life.”

The owner of the Golitsyn house in 1812 was Prince Sergei Mikhailovich. Trustee of the Moscow educational district in 1830-1835, the prince doomed himself to literary immortality. Here are just two famous reviews:

“Our nobles think that learning should not be allowed into the drawing room. Golitsyn, as a horse master, is in charge of the stables, but does not let the horses in” (Vyazemsky).

“For a long time he could not get used to the disorder that when the professor was sick, there was no lecture, he thought that the next in line had to replace him, so that Father Ternovsky would sometimes have to read in the clinic about women’s diseases, and the obstetrician Richter interpret seedless conception” (Herzen).

Herzen is biased: Golitsyn led the investigation into his case. To announce the verdict, twenty members of the student circle were taken to the prince’s house. To someone’s remark: “My wife is pregnant,” the owner of the house cynically replied: “It’s not my fault.”

The wife of Sergei Mikhailovich himself left him shortly after the wedding. In St. Petersburg, Evdokia Ivanovna, née Izmailova, became famous for staying awake and receiving guests at night in order to deceive fate: a fortune teller predicted her death during a night's sleep. Hence the nickname "Princesse Nocturne". Pushkin, of course, visited the Princess of the Night and dedicated two poems to her, including the famous:

Alien lands inexperienced amateur
And his constant accuser,
I said: in my fatherland
Where is the right mind, where will we find genius?
Where is the citizen with a noble soul,
Sublime and fiery free?
Where is the woman - not with cold beauty,
But fiery, captivating, lively?
Where can I find a casual conversation?
Brilliant, cheerful, enlightened?
With whom can you be not cold, not empty?
I almost hated the Fatherland -
But yesterday I saw Golitsyna
And reconciled with my fatherland.

The Moscow house of the Golitsyns was also known to the poet. So much so that Alexander Sergeevich wanted to get married in his home church, but Metropolitan Filaret pointed to the bride’s parish church - the Great Ascension. The church was located on the second floor in the northern wing of the house.

Generations of Golitsyns collected Western paintings. The once famous museum of the Golitsyn Hospital was partly included in the home collection of Prince Sergei Mikhailovich, replenished, in turn, by his nephew, the ambassador to Spain, Prince Mikhail Alexandrovich. In memory of this Golitsyn, five state rooms of the house on Volkhonka became a free museum.

For twenty years, since 1865, Bruegel, Van Dyck, Veronese, Canaletto, Caravaggio, Correggio, Perugino, Poussin, Rembrandt, eleven Roberts, Rubens, Titian... were exhibited here - a total of 182 paintings, as well as books and rarities.

Alas, the new owner of this treasure, the collector’s son Sergei Mikhailovich Golitsyn (the second) was “a friend of horses, not books.” In the end, the prince decided to improve his affairs at the expense of the “Moscow Hermitage”, and the entire artistic part of the collection was bought by the St. Petersburg Hermitage.

The Golitsyn Museum is a predecessor of Pushkin's only in location, not in collection.

The “friend of horses” did not live in the family home. Even when the museum was operating on the main floor, the residential first floor was rented out to tenants.

“I won’t move anywhere,” swore Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky, a long-time resident of Vorontsov Polya. “Will they offer me to live in the office of Prince Sergei Mikhailovich Golitsyn?” This is what happened in 1877.

From Ostrovsky’s letter to a confidant: “Since the caretaker of the house said seriously wife, that before concluding a condition, they will collect certificates about the moral qualities of the person to whom they are renting the apartment, then you can tell him some of my merits, not major ones (so as not to amaze).”

The apartment consisted of a front room, a reception room, a people's room, three children's rooms (for the writer's six children), a governess' room, a bedroom, a dining room, a buffet, a pantry, a kitchen and an office. Here the play “The Last Victim” was completed, “Dowry”, “Heart is not a Stone”, “Talents and Admirers” were written. These were the last nine years of the playwright's life.

In 1885, Ivan Sergeevich Aksakov occupied the neighboring apartment. Six months later, on January 27, 1886, the leader of the Slavophiles, one of the creators of public opinion in the Balkan campaign, died at the table, editing his newspaper “Rus”, in a room with windows overlooking the Cathedral of Christ the Savior.

In May, preparing to take over the state apartment of the theater department, Alexander Nikolaevich moved to the Dresden Hotel, and then to the Shchelykovo estate, where he died on June 2.

That same summer, the leader of Moscow Westernizers, former mayor Boris Nikolaevich Chicherin, moved out of his third apartment on Volkhonka.

And in the fall, Bruegel, Rembrandt, Titian, eleven Roberts and all the other inhabitants of the second floor left the house.

At the end of the century, the “friend of horses” Sergei Mikhailovich rebuilt the left wing of the Golitsyn estate according to the design of the architect Vasily Zagorsky (future author of the Conservatory). The resulting building became the Prince's Court furnished rooms.

A memorial plaque on the eclectic façade is dedicated to Surikov. According to his biographer Maximilian Voloshin, author of the brilliant book “Surikov,” the artist spent “the entire second half of his life as a real nomad - in furnished rooms, although expensive and comfortable, but where not a single thing spoke of his inner world. But he always and everywhere carried with him a large old wrought-iron chest, in which drawings, sketches, papers, and favorite things were stored. When the chest opened, his soul was revealed.”

Artists generally loved to stay at the Prince's Court. Moreover, in 1903, Golitsyn’s estate was bought by the Moscow Art Society. At the hotel, Bunin consoled Repin on behalf of the public, who had learned about the maniac’s attack on the painting “Ivan the Terrible and His Son Ivan.”

Nowadays in the “Princely Court” there is the Gallery of Western Art of the Pushkin Museum with a new facade along Volkhonka. The facade needed to be decorated after the demolition of the outbuilding adjacent to the end of the former hotel from the Volkhonka side.

There were actually two wings. They flanked the side, service courtyard of the estate, which paradoxically overlooked the main street. During the Soviet years, the demolition of the outbuildings was undertaken to expand Volkhonka. (The old red line is kept by the fence of the Pushkin Museum.)

The Moscow Art Society adapted outbuildings for the apartments of its members. In the right one, adjacent to the Princely Dvor Hotel, the family of Leonid Pasternak lived since 1911. The windows of the apartment faced the courtyard and Volkhonka. Boris Leonidovich Pasternak lived here for 25 years with interruptions. “In winter they will expand our living space, / I’ll rent my brother’s room,” he dreamed. Only in the mid-1930s did the poet receive an apartment in a writer’s building opposite the Tretyakov Gallery.

In Pasternak's memory, the main house of the estate became the Communist Academy and was built on. Now it is the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The left wing retained its early classical appearance. It appeared after the dismantling of the throne building of the Prechistensky Palace, that is, in the last quarter of the 18th century.

In a photo from the early 1930s, the area behind the left wing has been cleared. In a few years, a gas station in the Art Deco style will appear here - the only completed fragment of the grandiose project of the Palace of the Soviets. Today it is a “Kremlin”, high-security gas station – by the way, the last vestige of the ancient function of the Sovereign’s stables.

The Pushkin Museum, according to the concept of its development, occupies the entire Golitsyn estate. The Institute of Philosophy was surprised to learn that, according to government orders, he must leave his home. In the backyard of the estate, on the site of a gas station, and in the front yard of the neighboring Rumyantsev estate (see below), the Pushkin Museum Exhibition Building is being designed - the notorious “five-leafed building”. The gas station, the identified monument, is either being demolished or moved. The former red line of Volkhonka is being recreated, but a boulevard is being planted in place of the once demolished outbuildings.

Rumyantsev-Zadunaisky Estate - First Men's Gymnasium

This manor house is turned towards Volkhonka, retreating deeper into the courtyard (No. 16/2). You can get to it from the street, from Bolshoi Znamensky Lane, and through the Golitsyns’ backyard, as Catherine probably did.

Unlike the Golitsyn house, the house of the Dolgorukov princes was bought by the empress. As part of the Prechistensky Palace, this particular house was intended for the heir.

Tsarevich Pavel Petrovich found himself in two-story stone chambers built before 1754, when Prince Vladimir Sergeevich Dolgorukov received them as a dowry for his wife, née Ladyzhenskaya. The Baroque chambers of the Ladyzhenskys and Dolgorukovs remain the core of the building, which was rebuilt many times, and were recently discovered in the volume of the left wing. And on the cross-section of the Prechistensky Palace, part of the right wing is visible.

Now that we know the principle of the Prechistensky Palace, it is worth making an unexpected geographical digression.

In the Moscow summer of 1775, Catherine and Potemkin looked for a dacha - the Black Mud estate, which was soon acquired from Prince Kantemir and renamed Tsaritsyno. The lovers lived there too; Adjutant General Potemkin, always on duty, was with the Empress, in her temporary chambers, which have not survived to this day.

The capital Tsaritsyn Palace, ordered by Bazhenov, was a close arrangement of three independent and equal buildings. Two buildings were intended for Catherine and Paul, and the third was called the Great Cavalier. In such a decision one cannot help but see the principle of the Prechistensky Palace with its three houses. The Large Cavalry Corps in Tsaritsyn corresponded with the Lopukhins’ chambers in the Prechistensky Palace and, by analogy, was intended for Potemkin. (Researcher Lydia Andreeva is inclined to the same idea.)

What is not the reason for demolition ten years later, when the Empress arrived to take over the work? The Tsaritsyn composition became a painful reminder of the long past. Not a tombstone yet, but a melancholic monument to happiness with Potemkin. The gentleman on duty in 1785, selected by His Serene Highness himself, hardly corresponded to Bazhenov’s scale.

The objection that the layout of the Great Cavalry Corps was designed for several residents does not change what has been said. The secret purpose of the corps lost its relevance very soon, but the obvious, official purpose remained - to be a haven for several senior courtiers. Finally, with the birth of Alexander and Konstantin Pavlovich, the entire structure of the Tsaritsyn palace, tested on Volkhonka, became obsolete.

In general, it is interesting to compare the complete diagram of the Prechistensky Palace, which included “ten or twelve more rented houses,” with the complete diagram of Bazhenov’s Tsaritsyn. For example, find an analogue to Kolymazhny Dvor there.

After Paul's departure, his Prechistensky house became the property of the main hero of the 1775 celebrations - Field Marshal Count Pyotr Aleksandrovich Rumyantsev.

Here is a name that makes you remember what was actually being celebrated. Battles of Larga, Kagul, Chesma - and peace at Kuchuk-Kainardzhi. The capture of Kerch as Russia's first port on the Black Sea, with the right of free navigation. Transfer of the Turkish border from the Dnieper to the Southern Bug and access to the sea between these rivers. Annexation of Kuban and Terek. The transition of the Crimean Khanate to dependence on Russia. Diplomatic assertion of Russia's right to intercede for Moldova and Romania.

Volkhonka, 16 - the main address of Rumyantsev-Zadunaisky in Moscow. Yes, the main one again - like the neighboring addresses of Ekaterina, Potemkin, Karamzin. The “Axial Age” of Volkhonka is the “golden age” of the Empire. Rumyantsev owned the house for eighteen years. Only in 1793, shortly before his death, did he sell the estate and buy another (now Maroseyka, 17). However, the field marshal was not often a Moscow resident. Both before and after the Turkish War, he served in the difficult position of Governor-General of Little Russia.

According to legend, Rumyantsev died from the news of the accession of Paul, who once lived in his Moscow house.

After Rumyantsev, the house quickly changed owners, was built on, burned in 1812, and restored, became the home of the 1st Moscow men's gymnasium. First a university, then a provincial, gymnasium was located here until 1917. The list of students shines with names: Pogodin, Kropotkin, Ostrovsky (whose life circle almost closed next door, with the Golitsyns), Vladimir Solovyov...

The front yard into which these children walked eventually became a garden. The direction of the central alley has been preserved - towards the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. During the expansion of Volkhonka, the fence with eagles on the gate was demolished, and the structure of the estate lost its former clarity.

This does not mean that the estate does not exist. That in place of her yard and garden it is possible to design some kind of “five-leafed” buildings.

Volkonsky House - First Men's Gymnasium

The next house on the street, the last one, on the corner of the boulevard (No. 18), also belonged to the gymnasium. Unlike its neighbors, the house stepped onto the street line. There are six known families that owned the estate before it was acquired by the treasury. We will highlight the owners of the 18th century, the Volkonsky princes, Semyon Fedorovich and his descendants. Volkhonka ends as it began - with her favorite surname.

Golitsyn Estate

The ancient estate on Volkhonka, which belonged to the princes Golitsyn since the 18th century, is a witness to many cultural and historical events of the Mother See. Its ensemble consists of a main house, a courtyard wing and an entrance gate. The house, built at the turning point from Baroque to Classicism, was built according to the design of a Russian architect who worked mostly in St. Petersburg, Savva Chevakinsky, the author of the Naval Cathedral in St. Petersburg. Subsequently, the building was rebuilt several times. The impressive gate, crowned with the princely coat of arms of the Golitsyns, is the only thing that has survived to this day in its original form.

The property was bought by M. M. Golitsyn (junior), president of the Admiralty College. (This is probably the reason for the connection between the customer of the estate and Savva Chevachinsky, who actively collaborated with the Admiralty Department.) At the time of the purchase of the plot, there was a large hay hut on it, built on the site of the stone chambers shown in the so-called “Peter’s drawing” of the late 16th century century. This hut was demolished, and during the construction of Golitsyn’s house, part of the walls of the ancient chambers may have been used. The gate has survived intact to this day. Their two pylons, connected by a smooth arch, are processed with rusticated blades and completed with a multi-stage attic, where the stone coat of arms of the Golitsyn princes was placed. They are flanked on both sides by stone gates with the same stepped finish as the gate. The gate, like the façade of the main house, faces the alley.

The estate was turned into an alley, where a massive gate still opens. The layout of the estate was typical for the first half of the 18th century: in the depths of it there was a house, separated from the red line by a front courtyard - a cour d'honneur with a flower garden in the middle; there were outbuildings on both sides of the house. The entire estate was surrounded by a fence. At first the fence was solid, made of stone, only at the end of the 19th century its remaining part was replaced with a forged lattice between rusticated pillars. The first floor of the right wing retained, on the end façade facing the alley, decorative baroque processing in the form of panels in which the windows were placed. The facade facing the main house was completely redone in the 70s of the 18th century. All that remains of the left wing is a small two-story part, which was heavily rebuilt in the second half of the 19th century.

The main house in the middle of the 18th century was a two-story massive volume with risalits, identical on both the main and courtyard facades, apparently with equally decorated complex-shaped window frames and, possibly, panels. But the house did not last long in this form - about 13 years. After the death of the owner, the estate passed to his son, also Mikhail Golitsyn. This owner is associated with a stay in the house of Empress Catherine II
Having concluded the Kuchuk-Kainardzhi Peace with Turkey, Catherine II was going to Moscow for solemn festivities. Remembering the everyday inconveniences of the Kremlin and not wanting to stay in it, on August 6, 1774, she turned in a letter to M. M. Golitsyn with the question: “... is there a stone or wooden house in the city in which I could fit in and belong to the courtyard? it could be located near the house... or... isn’t it possible to quickly build a wooden (structure) anywhere.” Naturally, M. M. Golitsyn offered his house. At the same time, under the leadership of Matvey Kazakov, a project was made for the Prechistensky Palace, which included the Golitsyn house, the Dolgorukov house (No. 16) and a large wooden part on the site of the current gas station. The houses included in the palace were connected by passages, and behind the main house there was a wooden building with a throne and ballroom, a living room and a church. Catherine II stayed in the estate for almost a year.

As for house 14, Kazakov preserved the entire volume of Golitsyn’s house, expanding only the left courtyard projection towards Volkhonka, and built mezzanines on the upper floors of both projections (their windows are still visible). A representative of the era of classicism, M. F. Kazakov endowed the facade of the house with its indispensable features: in the center there was a six-pilaster portico of the solemn Corinthian order, completed with a flat, smooth pediment. In the middle part of the portico, the rhythm of the pilasters is interrupted: three high windows with a semicircular arch above the middle window of the second, front, floor and elegant panels above the windows of the first floor are united by a wide balcony. Its graceful parapets with flowers inscribed in circles still decorate the main, eastern facade of the house. A more modest balcony is symmetrically located on the courtyard, western facade. In this way, special expressiveness was achieved in the architecture of the mansion. And the risalits remaining from the Baroque building enlivened the volume of the house and created a rich play of light and shadow on the facade.

In 1812, the estate witnessed the war with Napoleon. At that time, the headquarters of Napoleonic General Armand Louis de Caulaincourt, who served as the French ambassador to Russia before the start of the war, was located here. He was personally acquainted with Golitsyn, and during the fire it was thanks to his efforts and the efforts of Golitsyn’s servants who remained in the house that the estate and neighboring buildings were saved from the fire.

The walls of the house have seen many famous people. At one time, A.S. Pushkin also appeared at the luxurious balls held at the Golitsyn estate. At first, he was even going to get married to Natalya Goncharova in the house church of Prince Golitsyn, but in the end the wedding ceremony was arranged in the bride’s parish church at the Nikitsky Gate.

At the end of the 19th century, the left wing was converted into furnished rooms and was rented out to tenants, receiving the name “Princely Court”. Here lived A. N. Ostrovsky, prominent representatives of the leading socio-philosophical movements of that time - Westernism and Slavophilism - B. N. Chicherin and. S. Aksakov, V.I. Surikov, A.N. Scriabin and others also stayed for a long time at the “Princely Court”. E. Repin, and in the 20s of the 20th century B. L. Pasternak settled in one of the apartments.

The Golitsyns collected Western paintings from generation to generation, and part of the once famous Golitsyn Hospital Museum became part of the home collection of Prince Sergei Mikhailovich, which was then replenished by his nephew, diplomat Mikhail Alexandrovich. At that time, a free museum was located in the five main halls of the house, where rare paintings and books were exhibited. However, soon Sergei Mikhailovich (the second) became the new owner of the palace, who sold the entire artistic part of the collection to the St. Petersburg Hermitage.

Having come under the jurisdiction of the Pushkin Museum. Pushkin in the late 20th century, the building was reconstructed, today it houses the exhibition building of the Gallery of Arts of Europe and Asia of the 19th - 20th centuries.

It is easy and difficult for me to write about this ancient building at the same time. I worked within its walls for almost 15 years, where it was located until 2015. This house impressed both with its luxurious interiors in the old part and with the repulsive impersonality and dilapidation of the Soviet-era superstructure. Now, after the institute has moved, estate of the princes Golitsyn on Volkhonka became part Museum town. Restoration work will begin in 2017, after which a museum will open within these walls.

The first owner of the estate was a naval commander, President of the Admiralty Collegium, Admiral General Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich Golitsyn Jr.(1684-1764), associate of Peter the Great. For a long time he lived mainly in St. Petersburg, and was able to return to Moscow only during the reign of Anna Ioannovna.

In 1738, he purchased an estate near the Kolymazhny (Konyushenny) yard. In their place, the Museum of Fine Arts was built in 1912, now the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts.

♦ On the history and architecture of this area:

Museum of Fine Arts named after A.S. Pushkin

At that time, a one-story stone house already stood on the territory of the estate. Apparently, it was precisely this that was called the “Hay Hut.” In 1759-1766 (according to other sources, in 1756-1761) the house was rebuilt and built on according to the design of the St. Petersburg architect Savva Ivanovich Chevakinsky (1709 or 1713 - between 1772 and 1780) with the participation of I.S. Mergasov and I.P. Zherebtsov . The main house, as in many other Moscow estates of the first half of the 18th century, was located in the depths of the plot. At that time, it was a two-story massive building with risalits on the facade and courtyard.

The elegant entrance gate with wickets on both sides was built in 1768-1770. The gate is crowned with the Golitsyn coat of arms carved from stone with a “perforated” crown above the prince’s shield. A monogram is woven into the gate lattice P.M.G.- “Prince Mikhail Golitsyn.”

Gate of the Golitsyn estate in Maly Znamensky Lane

Outbuildings were built on both sides of the main house, which have survived in a reconstructed form to this day. On the side of Maly Znamensky Lane, the old part of the outbuilding in the transitional style from Baroque to Classicism has been preserved; during the restoration it was highlighted in white.

Outbuildings of the Golitsyn estate

Initially, the estate was surrounded by a blank fence, which was replaced by an elegant forged one at the end of the 19th century.

Prechistensky Palace and the secret marriage of Catherine the Great

The new stage of construction is associated with the stay of Empress Catherine the Great in Moscow in 1775 on the occasion of the conclusion of the Kuchuk-Kainardzhi Peace Treaty with Turkey. The Empress did not want to stop in the Kremlin, and therefore in 1774 she made a request to Mikhail Mikhailovich Golitsyn(1731-1804, son of M.M. Golitsyn) with a request to find her housing near the Kremlin:

... is there a stone or wooden house in the city in which I could fit in and the yard accessories could be placed near the house ... or ... is it possible to whip up a wooden one somewhere?

Naturally, Golitsyn offered her his own house, which was rebuilt especially for these purposes by the architect Matvey Fedorovich Kazakov. In general, Kazakov preserved the original volume of the house, expanding only one of the courtyard projections, which faced Volkhonka, and adding mezzanines.

The facades were decorated in a classical style. The center of the building was highlighted by a six-pilaster portico of the Corinthian order, with a smoothly plastered flat pediment. The three middle windows were large in size; on the second floor there was a balcony with graceful parapets. A similar one, but smaller, was located on the western, courtyard façade. Between the portico and the risalits there were entrances, the main one at that time being the right one.

The Golitsyn estate from the courtyard

From the entrance one could get into the main vestibule, which has survived to this day. Unfortunately, the magnificent oval main staircase has not survived. Only in the institute library could one see the elegant vault that was once located above the stairs.

Ceiling in the Library of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences

The courtyard in front of the main manor house was solemnly decorated, with a large flower bed arranged in the center of it.

Flowerbed in the center of the manor yard

Since Volkhonka Street was called Prechistenka at that time, the palace was named Prechistensky. In addition to the Golitsyn house, it included neighboring estates: the Lopukhins (Maly Znamensky lane, 3/5 building 4), the Golitsyns-Vyazemsky-Dolgorukys (Maly Znamensky lane, 3/5, building 1), the Dolgorukys (Volkhonka street, 16). All these houses were connected by wooden walkways.

The French envoy Marie Daniel Bourret de Corberon (1748-1810) left the following description of the Prechistensky Palace:

The present palace, recently built, is a collection of many separate, wooden and stone houses, very skillfully connected. The entrance is decorated with columns; the entrance hall is followed by a large hall, and after this another, where Her Majesty receives foreign ambassadors. Then follows an even larger hall, occupying the entire width of the building and divided by columns into two parts: in one they dance, in the other they play cards.

The Empress's state chambers were located in Golitsyn's house. From there, a warm staircase led to a large wooden building where the Throne Room, Ballroom, Living Room and Church were located. A covered entrance with ramps led here from the street.

Plan of the Prechistensky Palace. Drawing from 1774-1775, a copy of the 19th century. Source: Architectural Monuments of Moscow. White City

The construction of the Prechistensky Palace, where “thousands of hands” worked under the leadership of Kazakov, lasted 4 months. The Empress herself spoke about her new palace as follows:

... Finding oneself in this labyrinth is a difficult task: two hours passed before I found out the way to my office, constantly ending up at the wrong door. There are many exit doors, I have never seen so many of them in my life. Half a dozen were sealed according to my instructions...

Nevertheless, Catherine was satisfied with the work of the architect, entrusting Kazakov with the construction of the Petrovsky Palace and the Senate building in the Kremlin.

A very romantic story is connected with the Prechistensky Palace. The neighboring manor house originally belonged to the Lopukhins, relatives of Evdokia Lopukhina, the first wife of Peter I. It was then donated to the mother of Prince Grigory Potemkin. In fact, the prince himself lived there, the secret husband of Empress Catherine the Great. A separate door led from the Golitsyn house to the Lopukhins’ house.

On July 12, 1775, in the Golitsyn house, 46-year-old Ekaterina gave birth to a daughter, who was named Elizaveta Temkina and was given to be raised in the family of Count Samoilov, Potemkin’s nephew.

For Tsarevich Pavel Petrovich, premises were allocated in the Dolgoruky estate; from 1819 to 1918 - First men's gymnasium (First city/provincial gymnasium).

Former Dolgoruky estate - First men's gymnasium

Catherine did not like Moscow, and soon after the end of the celebrations she left the Mother See. In 1779, the wooden building was dismantled and moved to Vorobyovy Gory, where it was reassembled on the foundation of the old palace built by Vasily III. The Empress had never been there. In the Golitsyn estate, an outbuilding in the classical style was built in its place, which has survived to this day.

The Golitsyn house was remodeled again at the end of the 18th century according to the design of the architect Rodion Rodionovich Kazakov (the namesake of the famous architect). In this form it was included in the album of the best buildings of the city.

Fire of 1812: noble Caulaincourt

The next bright page of the Golitsyn estate on Volkhonka is connected with the Patriotic War of 1812. At that time, its owner was Prince Sergei Mikhailovich Golitsyn (1774-1859).

During the months of the French stay in Moscow, the headquarters was located in the estate Armand Louis de Caulaincourt(1773-1827), French diplomat, ambassador to Russia in 1807-1811, who did a lot in trying to prevent a military conflict between Russia and France. He accompanied Napoleon on his military campaign, and then fled with him from Moscow.

During the famous Moscow fire of 1812, Caulaincourt behaved in the most noble manner. When the Kolymazhny Yard broke out, Caulaincourt rushed to save it, and largely thanks to his actions we can now admire the beautiful carriages of the Russian tsars, which are stored in the Armory Chamber, and also see the estates of the Lopukhins and Golitsyns-Vyazemsky-Dolgoruky.

I went to the palace stables (Kolymazhny Yard), where some of the emperor’s horses stood and where the kings’ coronation carriages were located. It took all the energy and all the courage of the grooms and grooms to save them; Some of the grooms climbed onto the roofs and threw down burning brands, others worked with two pumps, which, by my order, were repaired during the day, since they were also damaged. It can be said without exaggeration that we stood there under a fiery vault. With the help of the same people, I also managed to save the beautiful Golitsyn palace and two adjacent houses, one of which had already caught fire... The emperor’s people were zealously helped by the servants of Prince Golitsyn, who showed great affection for their master.

80 fire victims were housed in the Golitsyn house. Among them was “the master of horse of Emperor Alexander Zagryazhsky, who remained in Moscow, hoping to save his home, the care of which was the meaning of his whole life”.

XIX - early XX centuries: Pushkin, Moscow Hermitage and apartments

After the War of 1812, a new stage in the life of the estate began. Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin attended balls here several times. In the manor church, which was located in the northern wing of the second floor, he planned to marry Natalya Goncharova. Only because of a ban from church authorities, the wedding ceremony had to be moved to the bride’s parish church - the Church of the Ascension at the Nikitsky Gate (“Big Ascension”; Bolshaya Nikitskaya St., 36, building 1).

House church in the Golitsyn estate. Photo from the archive of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences

In 1834, A.I. Herzen visited the estate, whose business was led by Sergei Mikhailovich Golitsyn, who at that time held the position of trustee of the Moscow educational district.

After the death of the childless Sergei Mikhailovich Golitsyn in 1859, his fortune passed to his nephew Mikhail Alexandrovich (1804-1960), who, as a diplomat, lived mostly abroad and, according to rumors, converted to Catholicism. After his death, ownership of the estate passed to his son, “a friend of horses, not books,” Sergei Mikhailovich Golitsyn (1843-1915).

In 1865, the Golitsyn House turned into the “Moscow Hermitage” for 20 years, where everyone could visit once a week. About 200 paintings by Western European artists were exhibited here, as well as books and rarities collected mainly by Mikhail Aleksandrovich Golitsyn: Bruegel, Van Dyck, Veronese, Canaletto, Caravaggio, Correggio, Perugino, Poussin, Rembrandt, Robert, Rubens, Titian...

Courtyard of the Golitsyn estate and the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts

In 1885, due to financial difficulties, Sergei Mikhailovich Golitsyn was forced to sell the art part of the collection to the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. The first floor of the main house has been rented out to tenants since the 1770s. Many famous personalities lived here: the writer Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky, the Slavophile philosopher Ivan Sergeevich Aksakov, the Westernizer Boris Nikolaevich Chicherin...

There is an unusual story connected with Ostrovsky’s move here. Having lived all his life on Vorontsovo Field in Moscow, he said: “I won’t move anywhere. Will they offer me to live in the office of Prince Sergei Mikhailovich Golitsyn?. And so it happened...

At the end of the 19th century, the left wing of the estate was rebuilt according to the design of the architect Vasily Zagorsky (who later built the Conservatory). It housed the “Prince’s Court” - furnished rooms. Nowadays, it houses the Gallery of European and American Art of the 19th-20th centuries at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. Pushkin.

Golitsyn Estate and Gallery of European and American Art of the 19th-20th Centuries

In 1903, Sergei Mikhailovich sold the estate to the Moscow Art Society. The estate wings overlooking Volkhonka were rebuilt into apartments. Among the famous guests of the “Princely Court” were the artist Vasily Ivanovich Surikov, the composer Alexander Nikolaevich Scriabin, the artist Ilya Efimovich Repin and many other celebrities. In 1911, Boris Leonidovich Pasternak and his family settled in an apartment in one of the outbuildings and lived here for a quarter of a century.

20th century: Communist Academy and Institute of Philosophy

In 1918, within the walls of the former estate was located Socialist Academy of Social Sciences, which in 1924 was renamed Communist Academy. It was conceived as a world center of socialist thought. In 1936, the institutions of the Communist Academy were transferred to the USSR Academy of Sciences, since the parallel existence of the Academy of Sciences and the Communist Academy was considered inappropriate.

In 1919–1921, the Golitsyn estate on Volkhonka also housed a group headed by Kandinsky. Museum of Pictorial Culture.

Golitsyn estate after the revolution

In 1925, next to the former Golitsyn estate, the former First Men's Gymnasium (Volkhonka St., building 16) was located Communist Workers' University of China, which existed in Moscow until 1930 and trained personnel for the Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China.

The main building of the former Golitsyn estate was built on two floors in 1928-1930, as a result of which the pediment crowning the portico was destroyed. Located here Institute of Philosophy of the USSR Academy of Sciences, part of the Communist Academy. Many rooms inside have lost their original decoration.

The already built-on building of the former Golitsyn estate and the estate wings along Volkhonka that have not yet been demolished. Photo from the archives of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences

The not yet demolished outbuildings along Volkhonka, the Communist Academy and the Museum of Fine Arts. Photo from the Cathedral of Christ the Savior

The building of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences shortly after reconstruction. Photo from the archives of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences

The building of the Institute of Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences on Volkhonka at the time of moving

Corner in the former Golitsyn estate

Nearby on Volkhonka Street, behind the left wing, a gas station was built in the early 1930s, which was to become part of the grand complex of the Palace of the Soviets on the site of the destroyed Cathedral of Christ the Savior. The outbuildings overlooking Volkhonka were demolished, but the red line of the street is still clearly visible.

21st century: museum or institute?

In 1990-2000, the mansion on Volkhonka was still owned by the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Some rooms on the second floor were restored and housed the Library, the Red Hall, and premises of the scientific sectors. The fourth and fifth floors were occupied by scientific sectors and other departments of the institute. The first and fifth floors also housed classrooms for the State Academic University of Humanities (GAUGN).

These walls remember heated philosophical debates, speeches by famous scientists, religious and political figures. “Our philosophical house,” this is what this mansion on Volkhonka was called for more than 80 years.

However, at the end of the 2000s, the question arose about transferring the former Golitsyn estate to the ownership of the Pushkin Museum, which was sorely lacking in premises to house its collections.

Hall of the Academic Council of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences on the 5th floor

Bas-reliefs in the Red Hall

Ceiling in the Red Hall

Ceiling in the Red Hall

Lamp in the Red Hall

Ceiling in one of the halls on the second floor

The original "Museum City" project, designed by British architect Sir Norman Foster, caused many scandals. Urban defenders feared that many historical estates here would be rebuilt, and parts of them that interfered with the new look of the quarter would be completely demolished. Due to a misunderstanding or someone’s malicious intent, the interests of the museum and the employees of the Institute of Philosophy were opposed; this conflict continued for several years.

Our sector of Eastern philosophies on moving day

However, in 2015, the Institute of Philosophy moved to a huge mansion on Taganka (Goncharnaya Street, 12с1), and the main house of the Golitsyn estate housed the exhibition “House of Impressions. A walk with a troubadour. Improvisation. Sound".

City estate of the Golitsyns. First floor plan.