Tarusa

Tarusa is a city in the Russian Federation, a district center in the Kaluga region, located on the Oka River 70 km from Kaluga. The population is 10,000 people (2001). For the first time Tarusa is mentioned as the center of specific ownership of Prince Yuri Tarussky in 1246. Since the end of the 14th century, the city is part of the Moscow principality, as a fortress on its western borders. During the Patriotic War of 1812, reserves and warehouses of the army of M. I. Kutuzov were located in Tarus. In the 19th century, the paper-weaving and leather industry developed in the city.

 

Since the late 19th century, Tarusa has been known as the “city of artists”. Not far from Tarusa, on a high hill above the Oka, in the village of Bekhovo there is a Borok estate (now Polenovo), built according to the project of its owner V. Polenov. Here he created his paintings “Christ and the Sinner”, “Golden Autumn”, “Overgrown Pond”, “Moscow Courtyard”. In Polenovo there is a museum-estate of V. Polenov.

 

In different years, V. Borisov-Musatov, K. G. Paustovsky, N. P. Krymov, N. A. Zabolotsky lived and worked in Tarus. M. I. Tsvetaeva. Located near Tarusa Bogimov estate was described by A. P. Chekhov in the story "House with mezzanine". In Sivtsevo, near Tarusa, spent the last years of his life writer A. P. Sumarokov. The art gallery of the city has an extensive collection of paintings and graphics, including works by artists who lived in Tarus.

 

2 km from Tarusa is the estate of Naryshkins and Buturlin-Pertsov Ignatievskoye-Znamenskoye with a residential house of the mid-19th century. The cultural traditions and rich architecture of the city (among the most outstanding monuments of which the Resurrection Church, founded in the middle of the 17th century, the Peter and Paul Cathedral and many civil buildings of various styles) contributed to assigning the city the status of a natural and architectural reserve.