According to ehuacom, Nizhneudinsk is located 506 km northwest of Irkutsk at the foot of the spurs of the Eastern Sayan on the banks of the Uda River. The first settlement on the site of the modern city was founded by the Cossacks in 1648. Nizhneudinsk received city status in 1783.
The history of the city and its environs can be found in the Nizhneudinsky Museum of Local Lore, whose funds include more than 9 thousand exhibits. It tells not only about the history of the region, but also about its nature and art. The main attraction of the museum is a collection of cultural objects of the ancient people living in the center of the Eastern Sayan – tofs.
Tourists are attracted to Nizhneudinsk by its surrounding nature. Located 18 km from the city Ukovsky waterfall. The Uk River carved a picturesque gorge in the mountains, where the waters of the waterfall fall from a 20-meter height. 75 km from Nizhneudinsk up the river Uda are Nizhneudinskiye caves. They consist of the Big and Small caves, the entrance to which is located at an altitude of 460 m from the riverbed of the Uda. Inside the caves you can see numerous halls and tunnels.
Nizhneudinsk is the starting point for traveling through the natural region of the central part of the Eastern Sayan – Tofalaria. It is located 200 km from the city. You can get to Tofalaria by plane, motor transport, rafting down the river, or by going along one of the many routes. This is the land of untouched taiga forests and alpine tundra. The name Tofalaria was given by the people living here since ancient times – tofs. Tofs are engaged in reindeer herding, hunting and gathering. Most of the tofs are adherents of shamanism. Tofalaria occupies an area of over 21 thousand square meters. km. The main routes along Tofalaria pass through the mountain peaks of the Eastern Sayan with a height of 2000 to 3000 m, the largest lakes in the region – Agulsky and Bear, as well as through the caves “Winter’s Tale”, Svetlaya and Spirinskaya with stalagmites and stalactites.
Novocherkassk, Rostov region (Russia)
Novocherkassk is located 40 km northeast of Rostov-on-Don. It was here that in 1805 the capital of the Don Cossacks was moved.
Today there are about 200 monuments of history and architecture in the city. At the entrance to Novocherkassk there are two triumphal arches erected in honor of the participation of the Don Cossacks in the Patriotic War of 1812. The arches are decorated with a poetic inscription in honor of Emperor Alexander I. The center of the city is Cathedral Square and Azov Square. The Military Ascension Cathedral rises on Cathedral Square. It can be seen from any corner of Novocherkassk, because the height of the cathedral reaches 75 m. This is the third largest Russian cathedral after the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow and St. Isaac’s Cathedral in St. Petersburg and the main temple of the Don Cossacks. The military Ascension Cathedral was built in the period from 1805 to 1905 in the neo-Byzantine style, it was destroyed twice, its current version is the third. At the base of the cathedral there is a temple-tomb – the Lower Intercession Church, which was built from the remains of the former Ascension Cathedral, half gone underground. Here are the burial places of prominent military and church leaders of the Don – the Reverend Archbishop of the Don and Novocherkassk John, Ataman Matvey Ivanovich Platov, heroes of the Patriotic War of 1812 Vasily Vasilyevich Orlov-Denisov and Pyotr Yakovlevich Baklanov. The Ascension Cathedral is decorated with sacred inscriptions and wall paintings depicting episodes of Don history.
Next to the cathedral stands a bronze monument to Yermak, the Don ataman, the conqueror of Siberia, and a monument to General Ya.P. Baklanov, hero of the Caucasian War. In the center of Azovskaya Square stands Michael the Archangel Church, which was built in 1870, and from where the Cossack army went to war with Napoleon. In the Platovsky Square of Novocherkassk, a monument was erected to the founder of the city, Ataman M.I. Platov. Behind it is the Ataman’s Palace, which was the official residence of the Don atamans, as well as the place of stay for members of the imperial family during their trips to the Don.
Now the palace building has been transferred to the Museum of the History of the Don Cossacks. On the second floor there is a memorial exposition that tells about the system of ataman power and the role of the personalities of the Don chieftains in the history of the Don army. The Museum of the History of the Don Cossacks was opened in 1899. He tells about the history and nature of the Don region. The museum fund has 120,000 items. The main building of the museum exhibits collections of military Cossack Kleinods, military and regimental banners of the 18th-19th centuries, Cossack military and household costumes of the 19th-20th centuries, premium, granted weapons, as well as edged and firearms, letters of commendation, documents of the military office and village administrations., an extensive collection of paintings of the 18th-20th centuries, a collection of books and newspapers. The pride of the museum is the world’s only collection of Cossack banners, bunchuks, regimental standards of the Don Cossacks of the 18th-20th centuries. In addition to Cossack rarities, the museum exhibits petrified remains of animals and plants, tools of primitive man, items of Scythian-Sarmatian culture, the Greek colony of Tanais and the Tatar city of Azaka. The Museum of the History of the Don Cossacks, in addition to the Ataman Palace, has several more branches – house-museum of M.B. Grekov, where the famous battle painter lived and worked, the memorial house-museum of I.I. Krylov, a landscape painter who bequeathed about 1000 of his paintings to the city, and the museum of the Novocherkassk poet V.V. Kalmykov. From the museums of Novocherkassk, one can also single out the Museum of the History of the Don Viticulture with collections on the history of winemaking from ancient times to the present day.
