60 Fun Facts About Kremlin

In Russian, what does the word kreml' mean?

Many Russian cities have a kremlin of their own; Moscow's is simply the best known.

The Kremlin overlooks which river to its south?

Red Square lies to its east and the Alexander Garden to its west.

How many palaces and how many cathedrals does the Kremlin complex comprise?

The Grand Kremlin Palace, once a residence of the tsars, is now the official residence of Russia's president.

The Kremlin stands on which rise of ground, at the point where the Neglinnaya flowed into the main river?

Slavs occupied its south-western part as early as the 11th century.

Which prince greatly extended the original fort in 1156, the traditional founding era of Moscow?

The Mongols destroyed it in 1237 and Ivan I Kalita rebuilt it in oak in 1339.

Dmitri Donskoi replaced the oak palisade in 1366-68 with a citadel of which material, giving Moscow a lasting nickname?

The walls withstood a siege by Khan Tokhtamysh, and Muscovy rose to dominance behind them.

The present Kremlin walls and towers were built in 1485-95 by masters from which country?

Ivan III recruited Renaissance architects; Russians called them all Fryazin, a term for anyone Italian.

Which Italian architect designed the new Kremlin wall and its towers, and is praised in a Latin inscription on the Saviour Gate?

Marco Ruffo designed the prince's new palace, and Fioravanti the Dormition Cathedral.

How long is the Kremlin wall in total?

It encloses an irregular triangle of 275,000 square metres, with heights from 5 to 19 metres.

How many towers has the Kremlin wall had since the 17th century?

There were originally eighteen; the number rose in the 17th century. All but three are square in plan.

Which is the tallest of the Kremlin towers, at 80 m?

It reached its present height in 1495; the Spasskaya with its star stands 71 m.

The Spasskaya Tower's clock, whose chimes officially set Moscow Time, has a face of what diameter?

The clock is thought to date from between 1491 and 1585.

The Spasskaya Tower takes its modern name from an icon of the Saviour placed above its gate in 1658. What was the tower originally called?

It was named after the Church of Frol and Lavr, since demolished.

In 1935-37 Stalin replaced the gilded double-headed eagles on the towers with what?

The 1937 ruby stars, designed by Fyodor Fedorovsky, were timed for the 20th anniversary of the October Revolution.

How many Kremlin towers carry a ruby star?

Four replaced the imperial eagles; one more was added on the Vodovzvodnaya tower.

The Tsar Bell, the largest bell in the world, weighs roughly how much?

It stands 6.14 metres tall; the piece that broke off alone weighs 11.5 tonnes.

Why has the Tsar Bell never been rung?

A Kremlin fire broke out on 29 May 1737 while it was still in its casting pit.

Which empress commissioned the current Tsar Bell?

She was Peter the Great's niece; the bell bears near life-size images of her and Tsar Alexei.

Which French architect finally raised the Tsar Bell from its pit and set it on a pedestal in 1836?

He was busy at the time building St Isaac's Cathedral in the imperial capital.

The Tsar Cannon was cast in bronze in 1586 by which master founder?

Guinness lists it as the largest bombard by calibre in the world; it was never used in war.

Which tsar is depicted on horseback on the barrel of the Tsar Cannon?

The name Tsar more likely refers to its size; it was nicknamed the Russian Shotgun for its 800 kg stone grapeshot.

The Cathedral of the Dormition, where Russian monarchs were crowned from 1547 to 1896, was designed by which Bologna-born architect?

He travelled to Vladimir to study Russian church building before designing it in 1475-79.

Almost all Muscovite rulers from Ivan Kalita to Ivan V are buried in which Kremlin cathedral?

Boris Godunov was originally buried there too but was moved to the Trinity Monastery.

Which three painters decorated the Cathedral of the Annunciation in 1406?

The gilded cathedral was rebuilt in 1489 with three domes and enlarged to nine a century later.

Until 1917 no building in Moscow was allowed to be taller than which Kremlin structure?

Completed in 1600 at 81 metres, its 21 bells sounded the alarm when enemies approached.

The oldest surviving secular building in the Kremlin, completed in 1491, is which?

Its Red Staircase, flanked by stone lions, was where tsars bowed three times to the crowd after coronation.

What is the oldest surviving structure in the entire Kremlin and in all of Moscow?

Its lower storey, dating from 1393, is embedded within the Grand Kremlin Palace.

During the Time of Troubles, forces of which country held the Kremlin from 1610 to 1612?

The volunteer army of Pozharsky and Minin from Nizhny Novgorod liberated it, clearing the way for the Romanovs.

Peter the Great, who disliked the Kremlin after barely escaping the 1682 Moscow Uprising, abandoned it in 1703 for which new capital?

He had built a new arsenal in the Kremlin's northern corner just two years earlier.

What colour were the Kremlin walls traditionally painted from the early 18th to the late 19th century?

It was a matter of fashion during the Imperial period.

When Napoleon retreated from Moscow in 1812 he ordered the Kremlin blown up. Why was the damage less than intended?

Explosions still ran for three days and destroyed several towers and buildings; Osip Bove led the restoration.

Which architect built the Grand Kremlin Palace in 1839-49 for Nicholas I, to rival the Winter Palace?

He also designed the Kremlin Armoury and the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour.

The Grand Kremlin Palace's five reception halls are named after what?

The Georgievsky, Vladimirsky, Aleksandrovsky, Andreyevsky and Ekaterininsky halls honour the orders of St George, St Vladimir, St Alexander, St Andrew and St Catherine.

Renovating the Grand Kremlin Palace in the 1990s reportedly cost more than how much?

The original 1840s construction cost 11 million rubles.

Which Neoclassical building by Matvey Kazakov, finished in 1787, is now the principal workplace of Russia's president?

Its green dome, flying the state flag over Red Square, became a Soviet propaganda icon.

The Soviet government moved from Petrograd to the Kremlin in which year?

Lenin took rooms in the Senate building.

Under Soviet rule, how many of the Kremlin's 54 historic buildings were destroyed?

Among them were 17 of its 31 churches, including the Chudov Monastery and Ascension Convent.

How was the Kremlin disguised from German bombers during the Second World War?

Cobbled grounds were covered with sand and even the building facades were repainted.

The Kremlin was closed to tourists until which year?

It reopened to foreign visitors during the Thaw.

The Kremlin was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in which year?

It was among the first Soviet sites listed.

The glass-and-marble State Kremlin Palace, opened in the early 1960s for party congresses, was commissioned by which leader?

Nearly half of it is underground; today it hosts concerts, and Mariah Carey, Tina Turner and Cher have all played there.

The State Kremlin Palace's auditorium seats roughly how many people?

The building has more than 800 rooms and about 17 metres of it are below ground.

The practice of burying dignitaries at the Kremlin Wall Necropolis ended with whose funeral in March 1985?

Burials there began in November 1917 with 240 pro-Bolshevik dead from the Moscow uprising.

Stalin's body was removed from Lenin's Mausoleum and reburied by the Kremlin Wall in October of which year?

The 22nd Party Congress sanctioned the removal; the Mausoleum was hastily covered in plywood for the job.

Which cosmonaut's ashes were interred in the Kremlin Wall after a 1968 jet crash?

He and instructor Vladimir Seryogin died in a MiG-15UTI; it was one of only three group burials there.

How many of the 44 surviving Fabergé imperial Easter eggs are displayed in the Kremlin Armoury?

Alexander I made the Armoury Moscow's first public museum in 1806, though it did not open for seven more years.

Which monarch contributed more pieces to the Diamond Fund than any other, and even named a stallion "Diamond"?

The collection traces back to the crown treasury Peter I set up in 1719; it was first shown to the public in 1967.

The largest raw diamond in the Diamond Fund, at 342.57 carats, is named after what?

"Alexander Pushkin" (320.65 carats) is second and "The Creator" (298.48) third.

The Kremlin Regiment, which guards the complex, is housed in which building, built for Peter the Great in 1701?

It also mounts the guard of honour, Post No. 1, at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

When the Soviet leaders first arrived in the Kremlin, their protection was entrusted to which unit?

They left for the Civil War fronts that September and were replaced by cadets of a military school.

The Cold War discipline of reading Soviet politics from tiny clues such as who stood where on the reviewing stand is called what?

It was pioneered by Boris Nicolaevsky and Franz Borkenau, and the term is now applied to North Korea too.

In 2013 what did Vladimir Putin have built inside the Kremlin grounds so his motorcades would stop snarling traffic?

He typically commutes by Mil Mi-8 helicopter.

Which daughter of the first man in space became director of the Kremlin Museums in 2001?

Elena Gagarina, appointed director in 2001, has advocated the full restoration of the monasteries destroyed under Stalin.

A bacterium first isolated from deteriorating marble in the Kremlin was named what?

It was first called Methylophaga murata.

During the Second World War, what was spread over the Kremlin's cobblestone grounds to fool German pilots?

Roofs were painted rusty brown and tents painted like rooftops were stretched over the gardens.

How many towers did the Kremlin wall have originally, before the number rose to twenty in the 17th century?

All but three of today's towers are square in plan, and their brick tent roofs date to the 1680s.

From 2013, which helicopter did Vladimir Putin begin using to commute to the Kremlin?

The helipad's location was chosen so as to pose no threat to the Kremlin's architecture.

Roughly what area does the irregular triangle of the Kremlin wall enclose?

The wall itself is 3.5 to 6.5 metres thick and between 5 and 19 metres high depending on the terrain.

How many bells hang in the 81-metre bell tower on Cathedral Square that once sounded the alarm for approaching enemies?

Its upper part was destroyed by the French in 1812 and rebuilt; it is said to mark the exact centre of Moscow.

Which architect did Catherine the Great engage in 1773 to build a vast new Kremlin residence, never completed?

His Neoclassical scheme required demolishing churches and part of the wall before money ran out.