File:The (Saviour) Spassky Tower of the Kremlin, Moscow , c. 1913.jpg

Identifier: russia00dobsrich (find matches)
Title: Russia;
Year: 1913 (1910s)
Authors: Dobson, George Grove, Henry M Stewart, Hugh, 1884-1934 Haenen, F. de
Subjects: Soviet Union -- Description and travel
Publisher: London, A. and C. Black
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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ls the little triangle of highground contained on one side—the south—by theMoscow River, and on the west and north by asmall river, with marshy banks — the Neglinia.This w^as the Kremlin, the fortress. Moscowbecame so important that the Metropolitan for-sook Vladimir, the old Church capital, and movedto Moscow, where the first stone building in thetown, the Cathedral of the Assumption of the HolyVirgin, was built in 1339, under the superinten-dence of foreign architects, as the Russians onlyunderstood wooden buildings. In 1367 the wholeof Moscow, including the wooden walls of theKremlin, was burnt down. Prince Dmitry Donskoithen had a stone wall built round the Kremlin.This was badly constructed, and was replaced, earlyin the fifteenth century, by the walls now standing,which were constructed under the direction ofItalian architects. Owing to its central, and consequently protected,position, Moscow suffered less than any of the otherprincedoms in Russia from the invasions of the
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THE SAVIOUR SPASSKV; TOWER OF THE KREMITX, MOSCOW HISTORICAL 161 Tartars, Swedes, Poles, etc. ; consequently peopleflocked to it for shelter, the population rapidlyincreased, and the coffers of the Moscow Princesbecame well filled. AVhen the Tartars put up the post of GrandPrince (or Grand Duke, as we say now) for auction,the Moscow Princes easily outbid the others, andthereby still more increased their wealth and in-fluence. Ultimately the Princes of Moscow becamelooked on as hereditary Grand Dukes of Russia.This brings us to the end of the fifteenth century,when the Tartar yoke was nearly broken. Moscowis now vastly improved; Byzantine architects arebuilding stone palaces for the wealthy nobles, andthe Grand Dukes of Moscow now style themselves Monarchs of all Russ. Ivan III. (1462-1505) married Sophia Palceo- logus, niece of the last Emperor of Byzantium, and on the fall of Constantinople considered himself the heir of the Byzantine Emperors, and adopted the double - headed eagle a

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