Mother Catherine II (the so-called Tsaritsa of Oryol Polesie) was created in 1778 by the decree of the Oryol province, the center of which was the fortress city of Oryol, founded in the 16th century.
A bit of history
The border of Russian lands passed through the current cities of the Oryol Oblast in the 11th – 15th centuries, and military defensive installations of the Bolshoi Zasechny line stood here. There lived people who raised bread, grazed cattle, but in good times they took up arms and covered Moscow from invaders who came from the south or west.
With the strengthening and expansion of the Russian state, this danger began to disappear, and the black soil fertile land tireless peasant labor quickly became the breadbasket. Local merchants also traded hemp, wax, hemp oil, honey and skin. Industrial production was also born.
The spiritual development of Oryol
In the Oryol region there were more than five thousand noble estates. They lived here for a long time and had a positive impact on the cultural life of the provinces of Apraksina, Golitsyna, Dashkov, Kurakin, Lopukhina, Romanov and many other noble families. They created schools, opened libraries and theaters, conducted educational and enlightening work.
About how much the Oryol land raised people of various creative professions who glorified both it and Russia, we can talk for a very long time.
Since 1937, the population of the Oryol province began to live in villages and cities of the Oryol region . Today, its land stretches 150 km from north to south and 200 km from west to east. But by Russian standards, this is one of the smallest areas. It has only 17 cities in the Oryol region . But each of them deserves to be known and remembered.
City of Livny
For the first time, Livni was mentioned in the XII century as the center of the Principality of Libya, which was destroyed by Batu Khan. Only after 3 centuries a fortified city will be revived here to protect the southern borders of Moscow lands.
Today, the city of Livny in the Oryol region is very significant in size and economic development. A little more than 25 thousand people live there. About ten large industrial enterprises work in the city.
The city was given the name of the river, on the arrow of which it was built many years ago: Livny Polevoy and Livna Lesnoy.
On the outskirts of the city there is a skeleton of a five-story building of red brick, which immediately suggests the bombing of the Great Patriotic War. But they will tell you that this is the old Adam mill - a miraculous structure of the 19th century, built using then new technologies: reinforced concrete elements and electric drives from the turbine to the millstones. There are many legends about this mill and its owners that you unwittingly start to believe in, looking at the ruins.
The museum of local lore, having lost its exhibits in 1941, is being revived, gradually replenishing its storerooms. It still produces the accordion accordion known for its sonorous voice, and ceramic children's toys are molded from local clay.
On the high bank of the Sosna River stands the Sergius Monastery, founded in the 16th century. The civil buildings of the century before last have been preserved in the city center. A calm green city with hospitable residents warmly welcomes visitors.
City of Oryol, Oryol Oblast
The city was founded at the turn of the XII - XIII centuries by migrants from Nizhny Novgorod, although there are sources that attribute this event to a later period. The city is located on the banks of the Vyatka River, and in its name it should be thankful to the elder brother - the city of Oryol.
In the 18th century, a lively trading life was going on in the city, 3 fairs were held annually, local merchants selling grain and leather. XIX century - the time of the development of handicraft production: harmonies, self-spinners, matches and other small items.
The revolutionaries were exiled to these places remote from the capital. Here lived Nikolai Bauman, Vaclav Vorovsky, Rosalia Zemlyachka. The role of these people in the life of a small town was significant, even for seventy years it bore the name of one of them, Stepan Khalturin, who was born in the Oryol province.
The population of the town has always been small, in the best of times - up to 10 thousand people, now it does not exceed 7 thousand. People work at local enterprises: a creamery and a bakery, a cultural goods factory. Near the city is a large poultry farm.
The museum “Peasant Life” exposition tells about a peasant estate of the XIX century, and the local history museum, located in an old merchant's mansion, presents furniture sets of the XVIII and XIX centuries.
City Mtsensk
All people react equally to the name of this city, thanks to the story of N. S. Leskov. Tourists are still wandering along Mira Street near house No. 10, where a certain Katerina Izmailova lived. It is believed that she was the prototype of Leskov's heroine "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk".
The city of Mtsensk, Oryol Oblast, stands on the Zusha River (a tributary of the Oka) and is considered very significant on the Oryol land. Known from the XII century as a fighter city, a fortified city that protected the land from invaders until the end of the XVIII century. Then, together with its neighbors, it began to develop as a craft and merchant city. In 1943, fierce battles were fought near Kursk.
Now in the city live about 40 thousand inhabitants. Work factories, plants and factories. Mtsensk - transport interchange of the region. Here pass the M2 federal highway and two railway lines to Moscow and Kursk. The city has its own print media and television channels.
The city has something to see. The Mtsensk Museum of Local Lore, destroyed, like the whole city, during the war, works in the historical center of the city. You can visit the art gallery, the Sheremetyevs estate. Tourists and pilgrims will be attracted by the temples of the city, built in the XVII - XIX centuries. At 12 kilometers from it is the estate of I. S. Turgenev - Spasskoye-Lutovinovo.
As a souvenir, you can buy Mtsensk lace, the weaving technique of which has been preserved since ancient times.
City of Bolkhov
The history of the city of Bolkhov, Oryol Oblast, differs little from the life path of its neighboring cities. Created at the beginning of the XII century, it was both the center of the specific princedom, and the obstacle to the Tatars, and the site of the battle of False Dmitry II with Vasily Shuisky in his campaign to Moscow.
Since the end of the XIX century it is a large shopping center specializing in the sale of leather. During the Battle of Kursk suffered heavy battles.
Today, about 11 thousand people live there. The city is small, its wooden buildings (temples and civil buildings) have been preserved since the century before last. Specialists claim that it resembles Suzdal.
Beautiful views open from the high bank of the Nugr River. Curling around the city, the river creates a unique landscape.
The cities of the Oryol Oblast are united not only by the territory on which they stand, they are connected by a similar story of creation, development, fighting and rebirth, as well as by the extraordinary beauty of the landscapes sung by many writers, artists and poets - immigrants from Oryol land.