Koporye: a fortress with history

2024 Author: Harold Hamphrey | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:06

Curious tourists can't miss Koporye - the fortress, which is a wonderful monument of Russian defensive architecture. It is located on the Izhora Upland in the Leningrad Region. Just twelve kilometers to the south of the Gulf of Finland in order to be in front of a small platform on a rocky cape.

Koporye is an ancient fortress, although unknown to many. However, this is an amazing architectural work of the masters of our country. During its history, the fortress was repeatedly rebuilt, changed owners, passed from hand to hand as a trophy. Today it is practically not restored, which allowed the building to preserve its original architecture, the special atmosphere of the romantic distant Middle Ages.

History and present

Koporye (fortress) was founded in the thirteenth century. On the lands of the Vod tribe, who paid tribute to Veliky Novgorod, there was a small churchyard. It was burned in 1240 by the knights of the Livonian Order, who set out on a campaign to capture new territories. At this place they erected a small wooden fortress, which was later recaptured by the army of Alexander Nevsky. Sonhis Dmitry, who inherited the throne, ordered the construction of a more reliable structure to protect the borders. Therefore, according to the Novgorod chronicle, Koporye - a fortress - appeared on the map in 1279. At first, the fortifications were made of wood, and a year later they were built of stone.

However, Dmitry's fortress was destroyed during the reign of his brother Andrei. Already by the end of the thirteenth century, it was rebuilt again, as the threat of foreign seizure escalated. This building stood until the fifteenth century. Koporye (fortress) lost its significance with the construction of a new stronghold - Yam on the Luga River. The population was constantly decreasing, and so it lasted until the territory became part of the Moscow principality. Koporye was thoroughly rebuilt: they took into account the features of the relief and the development of firearms. Even foreign masters were attracted to work.

In the sixteenth-eighteenth centuries, the fortress became a repeated battlefield between Russian and Swedish troops. The fortification was in the power of one or the other, the opponents did what they tried to return it to themselves. However, it remained at the disposal of the Russian Empire. Catherine II excluded Koporye from the fortresses, but forbade it to be dismantled. Only in the twentieth century battles broke out here again: between the Red Army and the White Guard, and then between the Soviet troops and the Nazis. In the eighties of the last century, historians drew the attention of the authorities to an architectural monument, so conservation and conservation work began here. And in 2001the fortress received the status of a museum, which is open daily.

How to get there?

The Koporye Fortress can be visited by everyone. The optimal route lies through St. Petersburg. An electric train departing from the B altic Station will take you to the Kalishche station, and then you should transfer to a fixed-route taxi. You can also travel by car along the Tallinn, Peterhof or Gostilitsky highways.