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"If St. Petersburg is Russia's
head, then Moscow is its heart
Originally founded in 1221 as a military outpost by the Grand Prince Yuri, the city center sits surrounded by high walls atop steep cliffs overlooking the confluence of the Volga and the Oka Rivers. The city's main value, however, would not be military. During the first two centuries of its existence, the city was burned and sacked at least seven times by various tribes and invaders. The motive for this violence, of course, was the city's fabulous wealth. Its central position within the important Volga region and along the two rivers, along important trade routes (which indirectly connected Baghdad, Europe, and Asia), its status as a religious and political center, as well as, perhaps most importantly, the enterprising spirit of its populous meant that city was host to substantial wealth. With each destruction, the city was rebuilt and today stands as a compact city of centuries-old commercial buildings, river ports, churches, mosques, and a 16th century Kremlin. As a cosmopolitan city of wealth, it also became an important education and cultural center, which also continues to this day, evident in the many universities, institutes, theatres, museums, and oddly numerous bookstores within Nizhny Novgorod. In the 18th century, it was the most prosperous trade center in Europe. The Soviets renamed the city "Gorky" in 1932, in honor of the great author and official Communist favorite, Maxim Gorky, who was born there. Under Soviet rule, the city also became an important industrial center for military technology, with some plants growing purposely around churches and mosques which were then usurped by the enterprises to serve as storage sheds for materials and equipment. The city was soon "closed," meaning that the city was off-limits to foreigners and tightly restricted for communications and for Russians wishing to enter or leave. With this status, Nizhny Novgorod became also a city of exile for such high-profile dissidents as physicist and humanitarian Andrey Sakarhov. Today, having regained its original name and lost its closed status, Nizhny Novgorod is noted as a model city in the revitalization of Russia and the transformation back to a market economy. The Volga still hosts two-thirds of Russia's overland transport, and the city and region remain an important industrial, political and cultural center. The great number of historical, architectural and cultural monuments remaining in the city (most of which are now being restored) recently prompted UNESCO to include Nizhny Novgorod in the list of 100 cities consist world historical and cultural value.
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