05.05.202027.05.2017

Sochi

NECROPOLIS

FROM

Sochi, Krasnodar region, Russia.

And finally I got ready to go and explore the Old Believer cemetery in the area of Imereti Bay. I often heard from local residents about him, when in conversations I asked if any famous people were buried in their local cemeteries. When I tried to ask in more detail about the cemetery of the Old Believers, it turned out that no one really knew anything, and out of 10, only one had been there. It betrayed some kind of mystery. I heard the same thing in response to my questions about the Old Believers themselves, who lived and have lived since time immemorial in that area. There was nothing left to do but go there and see for yourself. There was no information at all on the INTERNET. On Adler’s map, the cemetery of the Old Believers was depicted as a green blot with crosses in a vacant lot in the Imereti Bay area. The only way to get there was on foot.
One Sunday my friend and I went there. We were unlucky with the weather. It was damp, it was raining a little, but it was warm. I was worried that my camera might not get wet while taking pictures.
We walked along the so-called Imereti Bay. In different directions from the road along which we were walking, crooked stripes of cabbage beds ran away; incomprehensible buildings and torn greenhouses loomed dimly on the horizon. The area was kind of smeared and devastated. The road was not only dirty and broken, there had been worse - but every now and then I had to look at my feet and avoid huge puddles. We walked and thought out loud that this is some kind of utopia - the Olympic Village! How is it even possible to build anything here? The picture was not drawn.... Lowland, swampy area. A sticky mist clings to the tops of the thistles. A dog somewhere is dryly barking intermittently. Gun pops were heard, poachers were hitting in the backwater migratory bird. This year there were especially many swans and ducks.
The cemetery is visible from afar. It rises like a green oasis with a bluish tint. A straight road leads out like a beam to a crooked iron gate - a wicket. They are, of course, a convention, because there is absolutely no fence around the cemetery. There is no fence - but there is a gate!
Now, after so much time, I’m trying to remember my feelings. I'm reviewing the photos I decided to post. An ordinary churchyard. The internationality is striking. Reading the names, you try to determine the nationality. Armenians, Abkhazians, Ukrainians, Jews, Estonians, Germans, Georgians. There are no blackened out, expensive monuments in the churchyard. Modesty is the hallmark of this cemetery. Predominance of wooden crosses. Many are nameless. These are precisely the graves of the Old Believers. But there are not so many of them. They stand in family plots. There are evergreens all around. Mimosa, magnolias, plane trees, eucalyptus, palm trees... Despite the month of February, daffodils have already sprouted on many graves.
I tried to take as many pictures as possible. There were about 200 graves. When I was taking photographs, I subconsciously understood that the cemetery could simply be removed from the Olympic Village. As they did in St. Petersburg, when Energetikov Avenue was laid through the Bolsheokhtinskoe cemetery and a long strip 60 meters wide crossed the entire cemetery. They dug it up and reburied it. They didn't ask much. And in this situation, I was also interested in the question of what the Olympic organizing committee would do. And several publications on this topic have appeared on the Internet. I decided to post my photos.
The good news is that they did everything wisely and didn’t make any mistakes - but they could have...!

© 2014 WALKER

Olympic bow.

How did you manage to save old cemetery in the very center of the Sochi Olympic Park

http://www.sovsport.ru/gazeta/article-item/571128

Two weeks ago, hundreds of journalists from all over the world visited the Sochi Games venues. Participants in the world Olympic briefing did not hide their amazement at the pace of construction sports facilities. But they were no less struck by the small cemetery in the Imereti Valley - two steps from the skating palace and the Shayba hockey arena...

DECEMBRIST-PARACEOMAN

Adler is not too concerned about historical heritage. Guests of the upcoming Olympics will only be able to walk around Bestuzhev Square - touch an old cannon, take a photo of the monument to the Decembrist officer Alexander Bestuzhev. Exiled to Siberia after the events on Senate Square, the brave staff captain begged to serve in the Caucasian War. And he died heroically in Adler on June 7, 1837 - as part of the Black Sea battalion during the landing from the frigate Anna. In 1913, at the site of the death of Iskander-bek (as the sailors nicknamed their comrade), the townspeople laid out a park by the sea, and in 1957 they erected a monument...

That's all that remains of old Adler. But in 1839 it was a city of twenty forts and fortresses. The only memory of this - a piece of stone wall on Karl Marx Street - is now propped up by a cell phone store. The royal hunting palace of Nicholas II in Krasnaya Polyana has also sunk into oblivion, along with the dachas of opera singers Fyodor Chaliapin and Leonid Sobinov.
And only the cemetery of the Old Believers survived the change of centuries...

“WE BURY ACCORDING TO ALL CUSTOMS...”

Four years ago, during the visit of the IOC commission, a meeting of Old Believers at the cemetery caused a lot of noise. People stood between the grave fences, holding SOS posters in their hands. On the contrary - officials and riot police...

“Seeing our posters, one of the city administration officials shouted: they say, now we’ll open fire to kill!” – recalls community leader Dmitry Drofichev. - The disobedient ones were thrown to the ground. The graves were trampled. The police forced the Cossacks onto the bus, where they forced them to write explanatory notes.…

– What about the IOC commission?

- What do you! We were not allowed to see her.

As a result, the Old Believers village of Morlinsky was moved a kilometer higher from the sea. But it was not possible to raze the cemetery to the ground: the people blocked the road for the bulldozers with their breasts.

In the village of Nekrasovka, where 112 families have moved, I meet new resident Lyubov Markovna Logaryova. She flatly forbids taking photographs of herself, saying that this is worldly fun. Old Believers, by the way, immediately warn: you don’t need to shake hands with them, touch things, dishes...

– Are people happy with the new houses?

- Yes, what kind! The plots are tiny, there is no place to plant a garden - the interlocutor is not inclined to compromise.

- It’s great that you defended the cemetery...

- Yes. We bury as before, according to all customs,” the interlocutor softens a little. – It’s bad that there is no church, we pray at home (a new Old Believer church in Nekrasovka has been built since 2011, and the old wooden one in Adler burned down in 1932. – Ed.)…

“THEY CALLED NICHOLAS II...”

“You can understand the Old Believers, their great-grandfathers were the first settlers here: they drained the swamps, died of malaria, built houses, planted gardens,” says Margarita Kuzina, senior researcher at the local history museum of the Adler district of Sochi. This woman, who receives a measly six thousand rubles a month for her work, knows everything about Adler and the Adler people. It was the Old Believers who came to her for help when they defended the cemetery.

“The first graves appeared on it in 1911, when 160 families of Old Believers arrived here from Turkey,” says Kuzina. – Descendants of the Don Cossacks and opponents of church reform of the 17th century. Nicholas II personally called them to their homeland. And before that, as the founder of the community, Foma Drofichev, said, he and his ancestors in Romania and Turkey were engaged in fishing and farming. And during the Russian-Turkish wars they refused to fight for the Sultan against Russia. The Turks and Circassians began to push them out. And after the end of the Caucasian War, the tsarist government carried out the resettlement of Russians to the Black Sea lands liberated from the Ottomans. Foma and 60 other families from the city of Banderma were taken by ship through Batumi to Sochi. So the Cossacks settled the Imereti Valley.

“In those days, the seashore was covered with impenetrable forest and boxwood,” local historian Irina Golovina takes the floor. – The emperor gave everyone a loan for the construction of roads and houses, and gave the men a deferment from the army for 20 years. All current Old Believers are descendants of those settlers. Even the revolution and collectivization did not break their faith. The collective farm of Old Believers named after the VII Congress of Soviets supplied vegetables and herbs to the Kremlin table! And during the Great Patriotic War, the Cossacks were the first to go to the front. It was they who stopped the Germans at the Caucasian Pseashkho pass.

– Did you consult the Old Believers about the cemetery?

“You can say so,” Kuzina answers. – When the Olympic construction began, they came to me and said: there is a deed of gift for the land, including the cemetery one, which was issued by Nicholas II in 1911. But we didn’t have such documents. I advised them to go to the Sochi archive, but they simply laughed at them. As we found out, most likely, the emperor’s deed of gift was lost during the war. When the Germans approached the mountain passes in 1942, local officials conserved all archival documents. They hastily packed them into ordinary bags and buried them. Almost everything has rotted - the climate here is humid. But, fortunately, the local authorities came to their senses and did not demolish the cemetery.

“TWO FEELINGS ARE WONDERFULLY CLOSE TO US...”

You can get to the historical churchyard only with a special pass, which is issued at Olympstroy. At the appointed hour I stand at checkpoint No. 2 of the Olympic Park. Here a magnetic card and an escort from the construction department are waiting for me.

“It’s easier for relatives to get to the graves,” he explains. “They’re on the security list.” It is enough to present your passport.

...The cemetery is like a dusty oasis in the desert. The graves are shrouded in palm branches and covered with tree crowns. Literally across the road is the Fisht stadium, the Figure Skating Palace...

The cemetery area is tiny, about 25 meters long and wide. The graves of the Old Believers are easy to identify - they are the most abandoned. Faded wooden crosses on a grassy hillock, no nameplates...

“Old Believers don’t look after their graves,” my aunt, Adler resident Victoria Boldyskul, told me before the trip. On her husband’s side, relatives are buried in the Imeretian land. “They still have a tradition from the Turks: they buried it, the grass sprouted, and that’s it.”
We walk slowly along the graves. I read the names, dates on monuments...

“In fact, in Soviet times, the cemetery ceased to be an Old Believer cemetery,” explains the guide. – Adler migrants were buried here, and in addition to Old Believers, these were Moldovans, Armenians, Orthodox Russians, and even Muslims. Who's not here...

It's time for us to leave. From an island of eternal silence and sadness into the world of a huge, rumbling construction site around the clock.

“It’s still great that the cemetery was preserved,” says my guide. – This is a connection of times. Those who lie in this land built the city. And their descendants are building the first Winter Olympics in our history.

And I think that it’s not about the Olympics at all. It was impossible to do otherwise in the country that gave Pushkin to the world. “Two feelings are wonderfully close to us, in them the heart finds food: love for the native ashes, love for the tombs of our fathers...”

Old Believer cemetery in the Imereti Bay area (2006)

Mikhalev
Viktor Matveevich

Drofichev
Alexander Pavlovich

Seferyan
Levon

(1906 - 1955)

Panasenko
Victor Vasilievich

Brashchenko
Lidia Ivanovna

Dubov
Nikolai Nikolaevich

Sheveleva
Evgenia Kalinovna

Yemtsev
Nikolai Alexandrovich

(1953 - 2003)

Odessa
Ekaterina Safronovna

(1904 - 1977)

Dubinina
Klavdia Petrovna

Khodakevich
Alexander Konstantinovich

Belitsky
Ivan Ivanovich

Nicheporuk
Grigory Fedorovich

Vine
Pyotr Alexandrovich

Petrenko
Sergei Tikhonovich

Old Believers celebrated Radonitsa in the Sochi Olympic Park
14.05.2013
http://www.yuga.ru/photo/polosa/2022.html

In the center of the Olympic Park (Coastal Cluster), at the Old Believers cemetery, commemorations of the deceased were held.

The cemetery, where Old Believers and local residents were buried, is located right in the center of the Olympic Park, and all the stadiums are located around it. To get to the cemetery, you need to get a special pass, since it falls within a protected area. True, for local residents this procedure is simplified as much as possible for one day.

Radonitsa is the first commemoration of the dead after Bright Easter Week. Most often it is performed on Tuesday (if there is no holiday) on St. Thomas Week, which follows Easter. In the Krasnodar Territory, Radonitsa falls on Monday, which is declared a day off in the region.

PHOTOS © Mikhail Mordasov, YUGA.ru

In the sea. Mountains. Expanded clay"

On Monday, on ORT, a new television series was released - “The Sea. Mountains. Expanded clay." It was directed by Tigran Keosayan from the script of Margarita Simonyan... straight - "Armenfilm"))) The plot develops during the Sochi Olympic construction and, as I understand it, the authors are from the local Armenian diaspora.
The genre, as stated, is comedy, but here is the announcement from ORT http://www.1tv.ru/cinema/fi=8407
“In one of the coastal villages of Sochi called “Vesely”, Russian Old Believers live side by side with Circassians, Armenians, and Greeks. A measured life flows: the Old Believers pray and grow vegetables, the rest make money from tourists. The son of the owners of the khinkal restaurant, Armen, falls in love with an Old Believer girl, Seraphim Suddenly, the usual life of the village is disrupted by the news: the Olympics will be in Sochi. The Olympic construction is coming to the village of Vesely. Local residents are hostile to the Olympics..."

Well what can I say? The film, of course, is not a masterpiece))), but it’s still nice that they don’t forget about us, the bearded ones))), it’s also nice that the Old Believers are presented as positive heroes, the filmmakers still make fun of the Armenians, they still have a feeling for the Old Believers respectful attitude... the only thing that could be corrected... it’s clear that the artists really don’t know how to make the sign of the cross, even though they clench their two fingers, but our fingers are always held vertically, and the sign itself is applied differently.. . heroine, constantly pray on your knees, it’s not that they don’t pray like that, but it’s also forbidden - like the Latin custom... in our country they make prostrations, but of course this is different... well, they could teach you how to use a ladder. , the handymen would have been bought in our shop, and of course, there are no such prayers as they depicted...))) although of course all these are little things... they will do!)))

That’s just the heroine’s “grandfather”, Nikonenko with a glued-on beard... by the way, he looks very handsome.)))

A little historical background: The settlement "Nizhneimeretinskaya Bay" was created in 1911 by Christian Old Believers (Beglopopovtsy). All of them come from the lower reaches of the Don and are descendants of the Don Cossacks. Nowadays this is the city of Novocherkassk and the village of Starocherkasskaya. There were impenetrable forests, swamps and swamps; the settlers created this land with their own hands. Three years later, after settling on the Lower Imeretinskaya Bay, half of the settlers died of malaria and fever. During the USSR, the Bukh residents created their own collective farm, “Collective Farm named after the Seventh Congress of Soviets,” which, by the way, was advanced. Before the start of construction and resettlement, about 400 indigenous Old Believers, more than 100 households, lived in Nizhneimereti Bay. In the film, of course, it is too “colorful”, they depicted local residents, of course there are people who fully comply with all the rules both in everyday life and in clothing, but mostly these are old people, young people dress like this only for work.

Regarding the real events in the Imereti Lowland in the Sochi region, not everything was so comedic during construction. The entire village, no matter how the residents resisted, was demolished; only a piece of the cemetery was able to be defended; it is located right in the center of the Olympic Village. (in the form of a circle behind a fence)

Here in the video, you can see what a serious struggle it was... sorry, there was a lot of obscene language... although it was a non-standard situation, the Old Believers still shouldn’t swear.

By and large, some local residents may even have benefited from the shacks, they were moved to decent houses... but many still lived in beautiful houses.

But still, people weren’t completely thrown out onto the street, the only thing I understand is that the promised church, damn it, wasn’t built... we had to chip in ourselves. Here’s a report from RTR

What do you think was closely guarded by a whole squad of riot police during the 2014 Olympics in Sochi? Cemetery in the center of the Olympic Park!

The first time I saw this amazing cemetery was while flying around Sochi by helicopter in 2013. Pay attention to the fenced circle of forest on the left in the photo - this is the cemetery.

The cemetery is surrounded by a three-meter concrete fence and was carefully guarded during the Olympics; it was impossible to get inside even with a special pass. Now it is open to everyone, but the entrance is made so cleverly that not everyone will figure out how to get there!

Initially, they wanted to demolish the cemetery, but local residents did not allow it. It's even on YouTube video of mass clashes between local residents and police. After the visit of the IOC delegation, it was decided to preserve the cemetery.

They write on the Internet that this is a cemetery of Old Believers. I walked around the graves and didn’t notice any Old Believers. But there are a lot of fresh graves, which is probably why the locals managed to defend it.

Judging by the wrenches and car parts on the fence, the body of an automotive master rests here.

Citizens restore order

Someone remembers over a glass of “water”

This is such an amazing place

Surprising but true - entertainment facilities sporting purposes built around the cemetery. On the other hand, the authorities listened to the opinions of the residents and made concessions...

This is a material from sovsport.ru, dated 2012 and dedicated to the Old Believers cemetery, which is located almost in the center of the Olympic Park. The existence of the graveyard was discovered only during topographical work when marking the territory; it was not on maps of the area.

The cemetery is operational, it arose without permission from the authorities near the Old Believer village, which was moved to another place. People, members of the community, opposed the demolition of the unauthorized graveyard, and they managed to defend their cemetery. As a result, a fence was built so that tourists and fans walking along the colorful bridges would not see the graveyard.

Photos from the blog ammo1.livejournal.com were used as illustrations for the material.

“Two weeks ago, hundreds of journalists from all over the world visited the sites of the Sochi Games. Participants in the world Olympic briefing did not hide their amazement at the pace of construction of sports facilities. But they were no less amazed by the small cemetery in the Imereti Valley - a stone’s throw from the skating palace and the Shaiba hockey arena "...

DECEMBRIST-PARAMETER

“WE BURY ACCORDING TO ALL CUSTOMS...”

– What about the IOC commission?

- What do you! We were not allowed to see her.

– Are people happy with the new houses?

- Yes, what kind! The plots are tiny, there is no place to plant a garden - the interlocutor is not inclined to compromise.

- It’s great that you defended the cemetery...

“THEY CALLED NICHOLAS II...”

– Did you consult the Old Believers about the cemetery?

“TWO FEELINGS ARE WONDERFULLY CLOSE TO US...”

“It’s easier for relatives to get to the graves,” he explains. “They’re on the security list.” It is enough to present your passport.

It's time for us to leave. From an island of eternal silence and sadness into the world of a huge, rumbling construction site around the clock.

Now it’s hard to imagine that on the site of the Olympic Park there were vegetable beds and Sochi summer residents admired the Black Sea sunsets. Now that we see the final result and can root for our athletes, it is especially interesting to see how it all was created. Did you know that in the very heart of the Olympics in Sochi, very close to the main Olympic torch, there is an ancient Old Believer cemetery?

When the National Olympic Committee chose Sochi as the capital of the 2014 Olympics in 2007, the small seaside resort had no large construction structures, only small houses and problems with transport accessibility. Seven years and 51 billion dollars - the total cost of the Olympic Games in Sochi, turned a quiet place into a modern one sports Complex country: a new railway system, a lot of sports facilities equipped with the latest technology.

New Zealand snowboarders pose on the Olympic rings in the Olympic Village

Inside view of the Bolshoi under construction Ice Palace in the Sochi Olympic Park

Exterior view of the Great Ice Palace under construction

A volunteer walks around the Big Ice Palace

On the site of the future Olympic Park there are still strawberry beds

October 2010. Construction of Olympic facilities

February 2012

Almost everything is ready. December 2013. Two months before opening

During the construction of Olympic facilities in the center of Sochi, a three-story building tilted. It's all because of the collapse of the road due to construction work.

May 2011. Rosa Khutor. View from Krasnaya Polyana

View of Rosa Khutor in February 2017

The photograph from above shows that near the Olympic torch there is an incomprehensible fenced circle, and near it there are red screens. This is a preserved Old Believers cemetery, which was located in the village where the main olympic stadiums. The cemetery was discovered when they began to make markings for construction on the site. Since the cemetery itself formed spontaneously, it was not marked on the city plans. “Olympstroy” had every right to raze it to the ground, but local residents, who were already forced to move from their homes, stood up to defend their cemetery. As a result, they managed to defend the cemetery. The city mayor announced. that, most likely, a chapel will be built on the site of the cemetery. Until the issue is finally resolved, the cemetery has been closed with red structures acting as a screen, and it is not visible to passers-by. You can't even see it from the colorful bridges. The cemetery can only be recognized from above.