Belyov is one of the most ancient cities of the Russian state. Due to the circumstances, he always played a prominent role in the struggle of the Russian people for their freedom and independence. More than once he had to meet numerous enemies under his walls and give them a worthy rebuff.

For many centuries this one has stood faithfully ancient city on guard of the southwestern outskirts of the Russian land.

Having arisen in a remote corner of the possessions of the East Slavic tribe of the Vyatichi, Belev belonged first to the Kiev and Chernigov princes, and then was included in the Moscow principality.

In the 17th century, Belev bore the heavy burden of the Polish-Lithuanian intervention. Under the walls of the city, the rebellious peasants fought with the tsarist troops under the leadership of Ivan Bolotnikov.

Ancient monuments, documentary sources, former names of individual places and settlements, rivers and rivulets, natural boundaries and ravines remind us of these bygone times, of the heroic events of the distant past that have become the property of history.

The time of Belyov's founding is not exactly known. The first mention of him is found in the Ipatiev Chronicle under 1147. In 1437, we again meet Belev on the pages of Russian chronicles in connection with the attack on the city by one of the khans of the Golden Horde, Ulu Muhammad.

The lands located along the upper reaches of the Oka River, and in particular the territory of the modern Belevsky district, began to be settled in ancient times. Archaeological excavations in Belev, Doltsy, Fedyashevo, Voronets, Zhabyn, Snykhov, Kazarka have shown that Neolithic people lived in these places. Already in the third - the beginning of the second millennium BC. e. on the territory between the modern cities of Belev and Serpukhov there were camps of tribes of a tribal society engaged in hunting and fishing. A peculiar archaeological culture, known as Belyovskaya, has developed here. It is characterized by ceramics with rhombic and pit ornamentation, flint tools with massive knife-like plates, stone ax-shaped tools and long narrow "daggers". The traces of the most ancient settlements were parking lots and settlements on the territory of the Belevsky district.

The emergence of the city of Belev is associated with the general course of the socio-economic development of the Eastern Slavic tribes. In the first millennium of our era, the territory of the modern Belevsky district was part of the lands of the East Slavic tribe of the Vyatichi. Their main occupation was agriculture. Along with this, they were engaged in cattle breeding, fishing, airborne fishing, hunting and animal, in particular squirrel, fishing.

In the XI-XII centuries, cities appeared in the land of the Vyatichi - fortified centers of handicraft production and trade. One of them was Belev.

There are several hypotheses about the origin of the names of the city of Belev. One of them claims that the word "belev" is of Finnish origin. However, the Vyatichi, who lived on the territory of modern Belev, were never conquered by the Finns, and their culture did not have any influence on the Vyatichi. So this hypothesis is unlikely.

Other researchers noted that the root in the word "belyov" is "bel", from which the derivative in modern Russian is "white". The ancient Slavs enjoyed special respect and reverence for the heavenly bodies, which were personified with the concepts of clarity, purity, whiteness. One of the most important gods among the Slavs was Belbog, symbolizing light and life. The white color personified youth and light among the Slavs. The word "bel" was also used to determine the signs of various objects, the names of cities, towns, rivers, lakes (Belgorod, Beloozero, Beloberezhe, etc.); white place - land free from taxes; the white man is free and not subject to anyone.

According to the largest local historian of the 19th century Belyov, Archpriest of the Church of the Resurrection M.F. Burtsev, Belev got its name from the word squirrel, since the forests surrounding the city abounded with this animal, and the squirrel skins themselves “served for the local population as an object of exchange and sale. It is possible that the city was originally called Belovekshesk (veksha-squirrel), and as a result of further reductions it acquired modern name Belev.

The place where Belev arose was located on a high and steep bank of the river. Okie. Having strengthened this place with an artificial settlement, the Vyatichi received a rather powerful fortress and, if necessary, could successfully defend themselves from the enemy.

In the tenth century the lands of the Vyatichi, located along the upper reaches of the Oka and its tributaries, became part of. ancient Russian state.

Svyatoslav and other princes of Kyiv more than once had to "pacify" the Vyatichi, with great difficulty keeping them in obedience. The upper reaches of the Oka, including the territory of the modern Belevsky district, repeatedly turned into an arena of fierce skirmishes between the prince's combatants and the Vyatichi. It is possible that the names of the Serebryanka, Velya-Grivenka and Rezanka rivers, about which there is information in cadastral books and which are indicated on the maps of the Belevsky district, have their name from the time when the Kyiv princes imposed tribute on the Vyatichi.

When the Old Russian state collapsed, Belev became part of the Chernigov principality. In 1246, after the death of the last Chernigov prince Mikhail Vsevolodovich, the Chernigov principality, in turn, broke up into smaller destinies. One of these destinies was the Novosilsk principality, which included the cities of Odoev and Belev.

Novosilsk principality in the XIV century.

In 1368, one of the princes of Novosilsk, Roman Semenovich, swears allegiance to the Moscow Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy, participates with his squad in the Battle of Kulikovo in 1380 and a number of other battles on the side of Moscow. For this, the Novosilsky principality was subjected to a devastating attack by the Grand Duke of Lithuania Vitovt, who captured Belev and annexed it to his possessions. Fleeing from the Lithuanians. Roman Semenovich left Novosil and moved to the safer, surrounded on all sides by forests, Odoev. However, in 1407 Odoev was also captured by Lithuania and annexed to its possessions.

After the death of Roman Semenovich, Lithuania seeks to strengthen its influence in the territories it captured. Russian lands, located along the upper reaches of the Oka, to secure Odoev and Belev, to drive a wedge in relations between the Odoevsky principality and the Muscovite state. To this end, counting. to enlist the sympathy of the Odoevsky princes and make them their faithful vassals, the Lithuanian princes in 1468 presented the city of Belev with volosts to the brother of the Odoevsky prince Lev Romanovich Vasily Romanovich as a specific reign, subject to "faithful service" and acceptance of the union. This is how the Belevsky specific principality arose, one of the three (Odoevsky, Novosilsky) that existed in antiquity on the territory of the modern Tula region. Lithuania was interested in the existence of small, fragmented Russian principalities, as this weakened the Muscovite state and made it easier to fight against it.

Belevsky specific principality in the XIV century.

The Belevsky specific principality, small in size, occupied an insignificant part of the territory of the modern Tula and Kaluga regions. The eastern neighbor of the principality was Odoev, in the north its border passed near Kozelsk, in the south - near Bolkhov, in the west - not far from Zhizdra.

Already the first Belevsky prince Vasily Romanovich did not comply with the conditions put forward by Lithuania. However, between subsequent generations of the Belev princes, civil strife arose more than once about their political orientation. Ivan Vasilyevich, one of the representatives of the younger generation of the Belev princes, put an end to this. In 1490, he went over to the side of Moscow, and in 1493, taking advantage of the fact that his brother Andrei Vasilyevich was absent from Belev, he attacked his other brother Vasily with a retinue, seized him and his boyars and forcibly forced him to "kiss the cross" in loyalty to Moscow. After that, Ivan Vasilyevich attacked Andrei's patrimony and declared it his property. To the claims made by Lithuania, the Grand Duke of Moscow Ivan III replied that Belev and Odoev were from Moscow from time immemorial.

The broad masses of the people saw in Moscow the only defender of the national interests of the Russian people and constantly sought to unite with Russia. The most far-sighted representatives of the Belevsky princes in their foreign policy could not ignore this. In 1494, completing the unification of the fragmented Russian lands into a single centralized state.

Ivan III forever annexed Belev to Moscow. Since that time, the Belevsky princes became servants of the Moscow sovereigns. At the head of the Belevsky squads, they were sent to Smolensk against the Poles and to the Tula defensive line against the Tatars. The last of the Belevsky specific princes, Ivan Ivanovich, in 1531 was the first governor of the sentry regiment on a campaign against Lithuania.

In 1558, Ivan the Terrible, strengthening a centralized state with a single autocratic power, sent Ivan Ivanovich to Vologda and imprisoned him in a monastery, where he died, and included the city in the number of lands taken into the oprichnina and destined for "use", i.e. content of the royal servants. “And the Belev princes were exhausted, and their patrimony, Belev, the tsar and Grand Duke Ivan Vasilyevich, of all Russia, took over” - it is written on this occasion in the annals. In the same year, Ivan the Terrible came with guardsmen to Belev, as to his patrimony. The Belevsky specific principality existed for a little over 100 years. The princes had the right to mint their own copper coins "pools". Such money was found during excavations, you can read on them: “Belevskaya money”.

The return of the upper Oka basin was of great importance for the Russian state, as it gave great advantages in the defense of its entire southern outskirts.

Being on the southwestern outskirts of the Russian state, Belev was repeatedly attacked by the Tatars and Lithuania.

In 1437, the Khan of the Golden Horde, Ulu Muhammad, expelled from the Horde by his rival Edigey, fled to the Russian lands with three thousand of his followers. In the autumn of the following year, he captured Belyov with the suburban settlements adjacent to it, hoping to sit here and then resume the struggle for the Khan's throne. Having settled in the city, the Tatars began to subject its environs to continuous robberies.

When winter began, the Tatars arranged from brushwood and thick ice fortress, covered it with snow and flooded it with water, turning it into a reliable stronghold in case of a sudden attack.

At the proposal of the Grand Duke of Moscow Vasily Vasilyevich Dark to leave Belev Ulu Muhammad refused. Then Vasily the Dark sent an army against him under the command of his cousin Dmitry Shemyaka. However, Shemyaka, who was a political opponent of his brother in the struggle for the grand prince's throne, did everything in his power to doom this campaign to failure, to restore the masses against him. On the way from Moscow to Belev, this "valiant" army "differed" in that it subjected the peaceful Russian population to robbery and violence.

On December 4, 1438, Shemyaka's army approached the ice fortress of Ulu Mohammed. After an unsuccessful attempt at peace negotiations, the battle began. The chronicle says: “In the summer of 6946 (1438) December 5, the battle was the Grand Duke of Rus on Belov with Tsar Makhmet”; it ended in the defeat of the Russian troops.

The chronicle of 1472 mentions the invasion of the Crimean Khan Akhmat in the upper reaches of the Oka and his appearance under the walls of Belev. In 1507 and 1512, the Crimean Tatars again attacked the Belevsky and Odoevsky principalities and ruined them. Karamzin in the “History of the Russian State” reports this event: “in May 1512, the sons of the khans Akhmat and Burnash Giray with numerous gangs broke into the regions of Belevsky, Odoevsky, villainized like robbers, and fled when they learned that Prince Daniel Shchenya was hurrying them meet in the field.

In 1536, the Azov Tatars again tried to attack Belev. Belevsky governor Levshin, having learned about the approach uninvited guests, came out to meet them and in a bloody battle near the village of Temryan, 7 km from Belev, defeated them.

The period of the Polish-Lithuanian intervention of the 17th century was especially devastating for Belev. Occupying a border position, he was among the most devastated territories of the Moscow state. In 1611-1615. the city and the surrounding villages and villages were almost completely destroyed. The surviving townspeople and peasants, left without a roof and a piece of bread, turned into beggars and fed on alms around the Belevsky churches and monasteries.

This difficult time for Belev, as well as for many other Russian cities, is narrated by scribe books. Each page of them is evidence of the disasters and sufferings that the Russian people had to endure during these years: “and the people who became impoverished from the war, and now the breadwinners in Belev in the settlement and in the county of Christ in the name of 46 people, and they have empty places too. Yes, there are 42 empty places that people have been beaten by Lithuanian people, and there are 88 empty township places in total.

In 1613 the Lithuanians burned the prison. Belevsky voivode Gagarin reported to Moscow: “The Belevsky jail was taken, and he sat out in the city with the nobles and boyar children.”

In 1615, the Polish hetman Lisovsky attacked Belev and its environs, but was defeated by Russian troops led by the folk hero D. M. Pozharsky and fled in the direction of Przemysl and Aleksin.

In 1618, the city was attacked by the Polish governor Chaplinsky, but was repulsed by the Belevsky governors Levshin and Afremov, who died in this battle.

In the XVI-XVII centuries. Belev was part of the defensive line of the Russian state - the notch, so much attention was paid to its strengthening. Even under the first Belevsky specific prince Vasily Romanovich, an oak fortress was built with towers, cuts and loopholes, with an earthen rampart on all sides, two gates and a hiding place,going out to the Oka.

Wooden fortress built in the 15th century XVI century fell into disrepair. Taking into account the special position of Belev in protecting Moscow from Polish-Lithuanian and Tatar attacks, the king decides to build a new fortress in Belev. For this, Prince Solntsev-Zasekin is sent there. In 1592 the fortress was built.

The fortress - a city of oak, chopped was built on a high mountain on the left banks of the Oka River and the Belevka River and occupied an area of ​​more than 4 hectares. The fortress had 11 towers, which were called: Vasilievskaya, Tainitskaya, Spasskaya, Passing, Field, Middle, Lobovskaya, Mironositskaya, Moscow, Deaf, Torture.

The walls were 4 meters thick. Parallel to the fortress wall, a deep ditch was dug, over which a bridge was thrown. There were buildings inside the fortress: to the right of the Tainitskaya tower - a prison, to the left of it - a prison where thieves were imprisoned, and to the left stood the Assumption Cathedral. Near the Middle Tower was the office of the voivode - the head of the fortress and the commander of the Belev garrison. On the left side of the fortress were the Lantratsky mansions - the local administration of all civil affairs. From the Field Tower to the left, on Sechina Gora, a staircase was built, from which the road went to the Oka, as well as to the bridge over the Belevka River. From the Moscow travel tower there was a big road (bolshak) to Moscow and was called the Great Moscow Road.

The fortress from two sides flowed around the then-existing river Belevka, from the third side - the Oka, and from the fourth - was protected by a wall and an artificial deep ditch. In 1620 the fortress was fortified with a new stockade and a rampart.

In the painting of 1643, it was noted that “Belyov city measures 400 sazhens around the prison, two passing gates - one Bolkhovokie, the other Kaluga, the third Tainitsky, 8 deaf and coal-bearing towers, a cache well; in prison 3 iron wolves squeaked, and 2 iron squeaked, which in the past in 1642 were sent from Moscow to Belyov, 2 mattresses, a copper squeaker, 17 iron squeakers.

In 1636-1637. The Belevskaya Fortress, in terms of its significance and the number of military people (461 people), ranked third among the cities of the Tula Territory (after Dedilov and Tula).

Since 1640, in connection with the movement of the defensive line of the Russian state to the south, to the Belgorod line, from Belev, as well as from other cities in the Tula Territory, a gradual ebb of military people begins. In 1640, 13 Cossacks and 10 archers were transferred from Belyov to Chuguev, in subsequent years the outflow of military people from the city increases. If in 1651 the Belevsky garrison numbered 321 people, then in 1669 - 277, and in 1678 - 212.

The fortress itself is losing its former military significance, being destroyed. In the painting of 1694, it is noted that “the prison fell down in many places and the towers rotted and it was impossible to repair. The hiding place of the well has rotted and collapsed, and there is no water in it.” In 1719, during the great fire of the city, the fortress with all 11 towers was destroyed, the Church of the Assumption, the chancellery, the prison, the prison burned down. In the monastery, 2 churches burned down. 9 parish churches, almshouses, 295 residential buildings, shops and barns, taverns and forges burned down. The fire destroyed the Zemstvo yard, the living room and the lace yard.

In the XVIII century there were two more big fires - in 1763 and in 1772. The strongest was the fire of 1801 - the whole Zavyrye and 450 more houses burned down.

Belyov of the 16th-17th centuries is a typical feudal old Russian city, built and growing without any plan. The main fortified part of the city was an oak prison (fortress). Around it were the huts of the urban, so-called townspeople, numerous wooden churches.

The population of the city was the most heterogeneous: military men and artisans, merchants and clergy, market deacons, ship's yarzhki and peasants.

There were many small shops in Belev, selling mainly products of local artisans and a variety of food typical of that time: honey, rolls, kvass, pies, hemp oil, sweets, fish, etc. The shops formed trading rows - kalashny, bread, meat, etc. At every step there were kvass, taverns, malt and beer breweries, wax slaughterhouses and other small craft establishments.

The townspeople were engaged in crafts typical of ancient Russian cities. Among the local population there were many carpenters, chebotars, tailors, potters, fermenters, candle makers, kalachniks, coopers, piemen, sheepskin workers, etc. But there were also many military people in the city - archers, Cossacks, gunners, zatinshchikov, collars.

Numerous settlements were located around the city: Streletskaya, Pushkarskaya and Cossack, inhabited by military people; The lowest - along the banks of the Oka, below the fortress, inhabited by poor fishermen; Podmonastyrokaya, populated by peasants and artisans who belonged to the Spaso-Preobrazhensky Monastery. The largest settlement, Zavyrskaya, made up the second part of the entire city and was separated from the rest of it by the Malaya Vyrka River. Under Boris Godunov, Zavyrye was considered palace property, and under Mikhail Fedorovich it was ranked as Belev.

Most of the urban population of the city was engaged in small crafts and trade.

Life was much harder for the peasants of the Belevsky district, who were in cruel bondage with the sovereign's servants, large and small estate owners and boyar children.

In the XVI-XVII centuries. the final enslavement of the peasants takes place, accompanied by the seizure of their lands by the feudal lords, the cruel exploitation of peasant labor, and the strengthening of the economic and legal power of the feudal lords over the person, labor and property. peasant. Each peasant was listed in the scribe books and assigned to a specific owner.

Everyone was under the master's smell the best lands, and peasant arable land, as a rule, was located in the worst areas - wastelands, fallows, swampy and forested places. There were less than 5,000 acres of land under peasant arable land. On the other hand, large military men, nobles, and boyar children lived freely, who were repeatedly “granted” by the Moscow tsars for their “faithful service” with many lands, estates, lands and serfs. The stolnik Bezobrazov alone had from 400 to 500 acres of land in the Belevsky district.

The owners of estates in the county were 354 people of nobles and boyar children, 9 stewards, 1 boyar, not counting a large number of smaller service people. They owned 16 villages, more than 130 villages with a population of over three thousand peasants and about 25 thousand acres of land.

Large estates in Belev and the district were monasteries and churches. The princes patronized them in every possible way, finding reliable support in their person. Even the first Belevsky princes founded the Transfiguration Monastery of the Savior and, having chosen it as the place of their burial, attributed their rich estates to it in eternal possession. According to the 1694 census book of the Spassky Monastery for the abbot with the brethren in Belev and Belev district on the dues of the river. Oka with fishing, and with transportation, and with beaver ruts, and from lakes from the sources from the Likhvinsky border on both sides to the Mtsensk border. Yes, the Spaskov Monastery in the town of Belev on the river on Malaya Vyrka has a mill without a cut. The Holy Cross Monastery owned large lands.

The Belevsky monasteries owned about two thousand acres of land, a number of villages and hamlets. The former names of some of these villages, now not preserved in the memory of the population, indicate that they were monastic possessions. For example, der. Lamonovo in the XVI-XVII centuries. belonged to the Monastery of the Transfiguration of the Savior and was called Cherntsovo (black means monk). In Belyov there was a Podmonastyrskaya Sloboda, where peasants lived, who also belonged to the Transfiguration Monastery of the Savior.

In addition to the monasteries, there were 14 churches in Belev, not counting more than three dozen churches located on the territory of the county. All of them were kept at the expense of the state and the population and had land and other lands.

Beginning in the 17th century new period in the history of the Russian state, characterized by the strengthening of feudal serf oppression, the formation of an all-Russian market, the development of small-scale industry and manufactories, and the emergence of bourgeois relations. Naturally, Belev did not stay away from the changes that were taking place in the economic and political structure of Russia.

Having lost its military-strategic significance, Belev remains the most significant township town of the Tula Territory, and since the 18th century it has become a major trading and merchant center of the Tula province with a fairly developed network of handicraft and small industrial establishments. Belev retains this meaning until the 60-70s of the XIX century.

Street of old Belev

The craft is developing not only in the city, but also in the villages, among the serfs. As early as the second half of the 17th century, more than 200 arshins of homespun cloth were annually delivered to the Moscow court of the stolnik Bezobrazov from all his villages located in various districts, with the largest amount of cloth coming from Belevsky district, where it was produced at home by the manual labor of serfs and then in the form of quitrent was given to the feudal landowner.

In administrative terms, Belev in 1708 was assigned first to the Smolensk, and then to the Kyiv provinces. In 1766 he was part of the Belgorod province. In 1777, with the establishment of the Tula governorship, it was included in its composition as a county town. In 1797, after the formation of the Tula province, the significance of Belev as a county center did not change.

In 1778, a coat of arms was approved for the city, which was a barley sheaf in a blue field with a flame coming out of it - the emblem of brewing, which was very developed in Belev until 1801, when almost all breweries were destroyed during one of the big fires.

Coat of arms of the city of Belev

The plan of the city of Belev was approved in 1779, but only after the fire of 1801, which destroyed a significant part of the city, the newly built-up streets received a certain system.

Developing in the XVIII and the first half of the XIX century. how significant shopping center and a pier in the upper reaches of the Oka, Belev becomes the largest city of the Tula province after Tula. At the beginning of the XIX century. he conducts a brisk trade in grain, agricultural products and raw materials. During this period, the central streets of the city - Bolshaya Kozelskaya and Kaluga - are built up with large stone houses that belonged to merchants and nobles. At the end of the XVIII century. (1792) there were over 5 thousand inhabitants in the city, in the second half of the 19th century - 10 thousand, and by 1914 - 14 thousand.

The industry that developed at that time in Belev was mainly associated with the processing of agricultural products and raw materials. In 1792, there were 18 tanneries and 3 lard factories, several mills in the city. In the 30s and 40s of the 19th century, several factories operated, manufacturing ropes for river vessels and ropes for sewing sacks, several hemp spinning and hemp carding factories, cloth, flour mills, breweries, oil mills and other enterprises.

These were small industrial establishments of various types with imperfect equipment, low productivity and a small number of workers. A comparatively large cloth factory for that time, owned by the court adviser Pavlov, was equipped with one horse-driven wool carding machine and five hand-operated spinning machines. Forty artisans employed at the factory on 12 machines annually produced 13,000 arshins of white cloth, which came mainly to the Moscow Commission for Supplying Troops with Cloth.

At the tannery of the merchant Semin, with two machines for crushing bark and 30 sour vats, 10 workers and 1 foreman worked. The plant produced plantar and other leathers for several thousand rubles a year. Four lard factories, each of which had one laborer and one foreman, produced about 7 thousand poods of pure lard per year. In these 4 factories, about 10.5 thousand pounds of raw beef lard were processed per year.

On the territory of the Belevsky district there were 6 oil mills with a number of workers 14 people, more than a dozen wool beaters, several grain mills and about 70 mills, which employed a total of over a hundred workers. Their products were mainly exported.

The development of Belev as a trading point was facilitated by its advantageous geographical position. Being on the border between the northern provinces of Central Russia and its southern black earth regions, he was an intermediary in all trade transactions and relations between the Oryol, Kursk, Voronezh, Tambov and other southern provinces of Russia, as well as Ukraine with Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, St. Petersburg and Riga.

Belevskaya river pier was the southernmost and, in fact, the only large pier in the upper reaches of the Oka, conveniently located for the main grain-producing provinces. Only through it could agricultural products, grain and raw materials be sent from these provinces. Often, goods were delivered to Belyov by land, and here they were reloaded onto barges and headed further north. The transport significance of the Belevskaya pier was especially great before the construction of the Dankovo-Smolensk branch of the Ryazan-Ural railway.

View of Belev from the Oka.

Photo from the beginning of the 20th century.

Belev merchants carried on a lively trade in silk and woolen fabrics not only in Belev, but also in other cities: they bought hemp, bread, butter, wax, lard, yuft and other agricultural products and raw materials, loaded these goods in Belev on barges, plows and along the Oka they were sent to Moscow, St. Petersburg, and from there to Riga and abroad. Many merchants had their own auctions at the St. Petersburg port, where they sold these goods.

A peculiar form of craft, very developed among the population of Belev at the end of the 18th and the first half of the 19th century, was cankering - trade in products and military items in the army during military campaigns and maneuvers.

Belyov is a small city (13 thousand inhabitants), but at the same time the same age as Moscow (mentioned in the annals for the first time in 1147), that is, a year younger than Tula. It is located in the south-west of the Tula region, near the high bank of the Oka, near the junction of three regions - Tula, Oryol and Kaluga, being at the same time removed at approximately the same distance (a little more than a hundred kilometers) from all three regional centers. Belev has a solid past behind it - in the 14th century it was under the rule of Lithuania, for some time it was the center of a specific principality, and as part of the Russian state it was an important point of the security line. Already in the 18th century, Belyov lost its military significance and became a quiet provincial county town, as it remains to this day.

From Tula to Belev, the bus goes two and a half hours, stopping along the way in some villages, and passing by old town Odoev. Since Belev is located in the south of the Tula region, the forest-steppe already begins next to it. There are already so few forests in these places that each of them has its own name. For example, on the way I passed Vezhensky forest and Fandeevsky forest. They are deciduous, and to a person from the Northwest they look like groves or even parks. At the very entrance to Belyov, the road passes through the Oka valley, where the monastery domes become visible a few kilometers before the city. The road, albeit a secondary one, is of very good quality, but for some reason, at the entrance to Belyov, the number of holes on the road increases sharply immediately after the entrance sign.

2. The bus went through the whole city, but I did not go out on the central streets and drove to the bus station, which is located on the opposite end of the city. Before me appeared a nondescript industrial zone. This is the Transmash machine-building plant, one of Belev's main enterprises.

3. This is how the quiet Belevsky outskirts look like. I walk towards the city center along Rabochaya Street. In fact, this is part of the highway connecting Kaluga and Oryol.

4. A sign entwined with wild grapes, which looks about thirty years old.

5. A typical late Soviet five-story building and my favorite "brick painting":

6. There are also private sector with gardens:

7. Shady city park. On a hot day, it was good to hide from the scorching sun.

8. And even a goat can be found in the city park. Tied to a tree, by the way.

9. Belevsky pipes:

10. Nearby is another water pump:

12. An interesting three-part house. I rarely see these.

13. And this Train Station. Such a quiet provincial station with a touch of desolation.

14. The station has been preserved since it was built here railway i.e. since 1899. Belev is located on the secondary line Kozelsk - Gorbachevo, but, unfortunately, has been completely absent here recently passenger traffic, and on the building of the station there is an announcement "The ticket office is not working. Trains do not run." It's sad, in general.

15. View towards Kozelsk. The traffic here is now only freight.

16. From the time of the construction of the railway, a water tower has also been preserved here:

17. Steam locomotive-monument:

18. Having looked at the station, I went to the very center. There are houses from the district past of the city.

19. And here the pre-revolutionary house was built on:

20. And wooden houses sometimes seem to be sent decades into the past ...

21. Late Soviet post office with another "brick pattern":

22. And this is how the county center looks like:

23. The condition of roads in the city is different. But in general, there is a noticeable desolation, and it is felt that the city is poor.

24. There is also an interesting wooden carving:

25. Holy Trinity Church, built in 1785, at the Trinity Cemetery. Such a provincial baroque.

26. On the edge of the cemetery - the mass grave of the Red Army soldiers who died in the battles for the city.

Belev, like most of the Tula region, stayed under Nazi occupation for a short time at the end of 1941. In October Soviet troops were defeated in the Oryol-Bryansk defensive operation, which led to a retreat towards Tula. On October 24, units of the 31st Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht entered Belyov, but a month and a half later the German offensive on Moscow failed, and the Tula and Kaluga offensive operations began. Belev was released exactly 75 years ago - under New Year, December 31, 1941.

If Tula is famous for gingerbread, then Belev is known outside the region thanks to the Belev pastille. The craft was founded in 1888 by the merchant Amvrosy Prokhorov. Subsequently, it almost died out and fell into oblivion, but in our time it began to revive. Now there are several manufacturers of Belyovsky pastila - they make it at the Belyovsky bakery and several private factories. I brought one box home - pastila turned out to be a very tasty thing.

29. This is Sovetskaya Street (the historical name is Kaluga), which, probably, can be considered the main one in the city.

30. Lonely standing block five-story building series 1-467.

32. In the central part, Sovetskaya Street is quite well-groomed and lively.

33. This is what the border looks like historical center from the east side. Pre-revolutionary buildings are being replaced by panel five-story buildings (there are almost no stalins in Belev).

34. Another "crossing of epochs":

35. Also quite an interesting house:

36. In Belev there is even one intersection with a traffic light, which is rare in cities of this size.

Let's return now to the very center of the city and head to the Transfiguration Monastery.

37. District House of Culture on Sovetskaya Street. In this building in 1918, Soviet power was proclaimed in the Belevsky district. It seems that later the building was slightly altered in the Stalinist style.

38. Some houses have very beautiful carvings. Alas, the abundance of advertising spoils this picture.

Belev, as already mentioned, is located close to the Russian Chernozem region. And in the speech of local residents, the peculiarities of the dialect inherent in the South of Russia are often noticeable. Including the fricative "G" (which for some reason, in the minds of many Russians, is considered purely Ukrainian). However, sometimes this can be seen in Tula.

40. And in this house, as the memorial plaque says (it can be seen in the frame), a Russian officer and later a member of the White movement Vladimir Oskarovich Kappel lived for several years as a child.

Another of the central places in Belyov is October Square. Against the backdrop of the city, it also looks very civilized, and during my time, landscaping work was still being carried out. The area is quite large and abundantly planted with trees. Here, probably, favorite place walks with the townspeople. The intersection of Sovetskaya and Karl Marx streets creates four squares in it at different corners of the square.

41. One square - unnamed, adjacent to the administration of the Belevsky district (visible in the frame). In it is the mass grave of the liberators of Belev.

42. The second square - named after Know Who, with a monument to Know Who, one and a half times smaller than its pedestal.

43. The third is the Square of Memory, with a memorial to the Belevites who died in different wars of the 20th century.

44. Fourth Square - named after Mikhail Fomichev (1911-1987), a native of the Belevsky district, a participant in the Great Patriotic War and twice a Hero Soviet Union. There is also a monument to him here. Further you can see a children's town, donated, as the inscription says, by the previous governor of the Tula region, Vladimir Gruzdev.

46. ​​On the north side of the square is a pre-revolutionary building occupied by the ubiquitous "Pyaterochka":

47. Karl Marx Street goes north. At the exit from the city, it turns into the highway to Kozelsk (and before the revolution it was called Kozelskaya Street).

48. I followed it to the south of the city.

49. Many houses are in rather neglected condition.

50. Monument to Kirov:

51. In front of the medical school - a square named after V. A. Zhukovsky with a monument to him. Vasily Andreevich is also a famous countryman here - he was born in 1783 in the village of Mishenskoye, Belevsky district.

52. A little further - the abandoned Church of the Intercession of the late 18th century built (it can also be seen on the title frame). It is likely that it will be restored.

54. On the slope - old merchant houses. The one on the left is now the pension fund, and the one on the right is the local history museum.

55. And under the hill - like this picturesque valley. Between the trees, the water of the Oka glistens in the sun, the Vyrka River flows into it nearby, and then - a small "piedmont" part of the city. This place reminded me of Kostroma.

56. There is also an old bus station. Whether it works now, I still do not understand.

57. I did not go downhill. Instead, he turned sideways, onto crooked streets half-overgrown with sprawling trees, cunningly tangled along the banks of the Oka.

58. One of them wears this unusual name. Obviously appeared in the post-Soviet era. It is named in honor of Metropolitan Evlogy (Vasily Georgievsky), a native of the neighboring Odoevsky district, who served after the revolution in the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (ROCOR).

59. It is this corner of the city, facing the Oka, that is the center of most of its churches. After a few minutes of walking through the Belev bushes, I saw the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin (early 18th century).

60. Well, then - Spaso-Preobrazhensky monastery. It is he who, with his domes over a high river bank, adorns the view of the city from afar (unfortunately, I did not photograph this spectacular landscape from the bus window). The monastery has existed since 1525, and the current buildings date back to the 17th-18th centuries. Until recently, the monastery stood in ruins, but is now being restored. Work was in full swing at the time of my visit.

61. main temple monastery - Spaso-Preobrazhensky Cathedral (1690s).

62. The bell tower was built already in the 19th century, and it can be seen from the central city streets. I can imagine what kind of view opens from it to the city and its surroundings ...

63. And this is the Vvedenskaya Church (1698-1700). To the right and in the background is the Church of Alexy, Metropolitan of Moscow (1693-97), next to the bell tower.

64. A refectory adjoins the Vvedenskaya Church, and Russian open spaces stretch further.

65. The Oka flows under the cliff. Here is its upper course, and it is still not wide at all - Belev is the second city along the river Oka (after Orel). From here it flows to Kaluga, before which it merges with the Ugra, and then returns to Tula region to continue to carry their waters to the Volga.

66. On the Oka flood meadows - fertile fertile land. Villages look at each other in the distance.

67. Slightly upstream, the Oka crosses a road bridge on the road to Tula, built in the 1970s.

68. And on the other hand - the railway bridge on the already mentioned line Kozelsk - Gorbachevo. The harvester is harvesting in the field.

69. A few more mysterious streets near the monastery:

70. In one place, even a cobblestone pavement has been preserved.

According to the map of the city, you can return directly to the center along these streets, but the reality turned out to be different. I ran into a dead end in the form of a fence, and I had to return to Marx Street and again go to the center in an indirect way. Returning to the center, and having had lunch there, I completed my inspection of the old Belev and went to Tula on the return bus.

71. Finally - the Belevsky cat.

Dear visitors of EtoRetro.ru, you have a collection old photos of the city of Belev? Join us, post your photos, rate and comment on photos of other members. If you recognize a place in an old photo, an address, or recognize people in a photo, please share this information in the comments. Project participants, as well as ordinary visitors will be grateful to you.

Our participants have the opportunity to download old photos in original quality (large size) without the project logo.

What is retro photography, or how old should it be?

What can be considered old photo worthy for publication on our project? These are absolutely any photos, starting from the moment of the invention of photography (the history of photography begins in 1839) and ending with the end of the last century, everything that is now considered history. And to be specific, it's:

• photographs of the city of Belev of the middle and end of the 19th century (as a rule, the 1870s, 1880s, 1890s) - the so-called. very old photographs (you can also call old ones);
• Soviet photography (photos of the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, early 90s);
• pre-revolutionary photograph of Belev (until 1917);
• military retro photographs - or photos of the times of the war - this is the First World War (1914-1918), Civil War(1917-1922/1923), World War II (1939-1945) or in relation to our Motherland - the Great Patriotic War (1941-1945), or the Second World War;

Please note: retro photographs can be both black and white and color (for later periods) photographs.

What should be in the photo?

Anything, be it streets, buildings, houses, squares, bridges and others architectural structures. It can be both, and another type of transport of the past, from to wagons. These are the people (men, women and children) who lived in those times (including the old family photos). All this is of great value and interest to EtoRetro.ru visitors.

Collages, vintage postcards, posters, vintage maps?
We also welcome both a series of photos (using the ability to upload several photos in one publication) and collages (a well-thought-out combination of different photos, usually from the same place using some kind of graphic editor) - kind - was / became, somehow immersing in a kind of time travel, reflecting a look into the past. The same place on the project and